Undergraduate Spotlight: Sohrab Hassibi

Sohrab Hassibi ‘26 is in his final year of our Honors Program in Ethics in Society. He is majoring in Computer Science. Outside of the classroom he serves as the Co-General Manager of KZSU, Stanford's student-run radio station and one of the oldest collegiate broadcasting operations in the country. Hassibi also conducts research at the Hoover Institution, where he focuses on emerging markets investment and global infrastructure development. His curiosity is drawn to the ways technology and humanistic inquiry intersect.

Why did you choose to participate in the Honors Program in Ethics in Society?

I was drawn to the Honors Program primarily by the opportunity to sustain a single intellectual project over time. Much of my academic work at Stanford moves quickly, so I wanted the experience of sitting with a question long enough to really develop it. The program also felt like a rare and special chance to sharpen my writing and to curate a research agenda that felt genuinely mine — shaped by my own personal curiosities. 

What was the most rewarding aspect of your experience in the Honors Program?

The most rewarding aspect has been the iterative nature of the work itself. Watching how my project evolved — discarding early framings, gradually narrowing toward something that felt rigorous, personal, and challenging — felt genuinely satisfying in a way that not many academic experiences could be. I found a particular pleasure in curating my own intellectual lineage. I enjoyed figuring out which scholars to build from and which conversations to enter. That kind of careful, deliberate thinking felt like I was working to develop a real scholarly voice. 

What is your honors thesis research? 

My thesis examines a specific, modern cultural phenomenon: the growing number of people who restructure their emotional and intellectual lives around interactions with AI chatbots. I trace how Silicon Valley's optimization logic created the conditions for this shift, and why the frictionless ideal became so culturally and evolutionarily seductive. I then draw on scholars such as philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche and computer scientist Norbert Wiener to discuss how these tools are eliminating something constitutive of genuine self-development — the resistance, risk-taking, mutual recognition, and the productive difficulty that authentic human relationships demand. 

What opportunities would you like to pursue within the next five years?

In the next five years, I hope to pursue a JD/MBA joint-degree. I look forward to using that foundation to explore several intersecting domains I find genuinely compelling: emerging markets investment, global supply chain management and cybersecurity, financial crime, and product strategy. I'm drawn to problems that sit at the intersection of law, capital, and technology, where a strong technical background must be reinforced by a socially-grounded human perspective. I don't know yet exactly where I'll land, but I'm really excited to take the steps needed to figure it out.