Simulating famous thinkers beyond 'act like X': grounding personas in documented beliefs

haybreaker · reddit · 2026-09-13

The author's thecouncil project explores simulating how famous figures would respond to personal problems. Simple 'you are Einstein' prompting falls back on stereotypes and famous quotes, so they instead inject deeper context — documented beliefs, writings, experiences, relationships — and have multiple figures (Marcus Aurelius, Einstein, Steve Jobs, Muhammad Ali, Sherlock Holmes) respond independently and challenge each other. Early results include cases where a figure's 'obvious' answer contradicts their documented beliefs. They invite community input on better persona-simulation techniques.

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