What is AI?
AI (Artificial Intelligence) "is the science and engineering of making intelligent machines, especially intelligent computer programs. It is related to the similar task of using computers to understand human intelligence, but AI does not have to confine itself to methods that are biologically observable [emphasis added]." (McCarthy, n.d.)
AI can be considered as an umbrella term with specific areas of study under it such as Machine Learning, Natural Language Processing, Computer Vision, Recommender Systems, etc.
ML (Machine Learning) consists of "algorithms that give computers the ability to learn from data, and then make predictions and decisions". Examples include automatically detecting spam emails, suggesting videos to watch after finishing one, etc. (CrashCourse, 2017)
LLMs (Large Language Models) "can generate natural language texts from large amounts of data. Large language models use deep neural networks, such as transformers, to learn from billions or trillions of words, and to produce texts on any topic or domain. Large language models can also perform various natural language tasks, such as classification, summarization, translation, generation, and dialogue." (Maeda & Chaki, 2023)
GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer) "models give applications the ability to create human-like text and content (images, music, and more), and answer questions in a conversational manner." (What Is GPT AI?, n.d.)
AI Tools for Research
Disclaimer: Please refer to syllabus for course work or journal guidelines for use of AI/ML tools in research or writing process. This guide is purely for helping identify tools and limitations of those tools.
Guidance concerning the usage and development of AI
- Artificial Intelligence Tools and TeachingUniversity of Iowa Office of Teaching, Learning & Technology FAQs about AI in teaching
- Blueprint for an AI Bill of RightsThe Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights is a set of five principles and associated practices to help guide the design, use, and deployment of automated systems to protect the rights of the American public in the age of artificial intelligence.
- Guidelines for the secure and ethical use of Artificial IntelligenceUniversity of Iowa ITS - Many questions have been raised about risks related to security, privacy, and ethical considerations. Because this field is quickly evolving, guidance is needed to help understand and evaluate these risks.
Some of the most popular and well-known AI Tools:
Not an all-inclusive or exhaustive list
- elicit.orgElicit is a research assistant using language models like GPT-3 to automate parts of researchers’ workflows. Currently, the main workflow in Elicit is Literature Review.
- Google - GeminiPrompt: "Write a 1 sentence bio about yourself" Response: "I am a large language model fueled by information and fueled by a passion for learning and exploration."
- Microsoft - CopilotPrompt: "Write a 1 sentence bio about yourself" Response: "Certainly! I’m an AI language model designed to assist with a wide range of tasks, from answering questions to creative writing. 😊"
Embedded in Microsoft Edge Browser from any page/tab open Bing Chat using (Ctl + Shift + .) - OpenAI - ChatGPTPrompt: "Write a 1 sentence bio about yourself" Response: "
ChatGPT
I'm ChatGPT, an AI language model here to assist and engage with a wide range of topics and conversations." Response given using GPT-4.0 - Perplexity.aiPrompt: "Write a 1 sentence bio about yourself" Response: "I am an AI assistant created by Perplexity, designed to assist with various tasks and answer questions in a helpful and informative manner."
- Research RabbitA citation-based literature mapping tool, showing links and relationships between authors and sources. Allows you create collections, categorize resources, and share collections.
Limitations and Concerns of AI
Overall, these tools can be a good starting place and be useful for you when you are brainstorming topic ideas or trying to come up with keywords to search on a specific topic. However, it is important to remember that these tools are not search engines, but uses vast amounts of data to generate responses that appear to make sense. They are fluency-based text-language generators, which means that they literally guess what word comes next.
Chat tools are known for producing "hallucinations" - where the program presents and defends false information as if it were factual. When prompted a chatbox can produce realistic looking articles from legitimate journals from actual authors but they are fabricated. These tools have been able to generate abstracts for these non-existent articles.
In addition to these limitations of the tool there are several of concerns around the development AI.
- Many LLMs are for-profit tools and by engaging with them you are adding to their learning corpus which is, at its core, unpaid labor. Additionally, many companies do not disclose their training data so an author's work could be included without their consent.
- These AI systems are designed by humans and based off design and programming decisions can lead to biases and harmful results.
- Addressing bias in big data and AI for health careBias in AI algorithms for health care can have catastrophic consequences by propagating deeply rooted societal biases. This can result in misdiagnosing certain patient groups, like gender and ethnic minorities, that have a history of being underrepresented in existing datasets, further amplifying inequalities.
- Coded BiasExplores the fallout of MIT media lab researcher Joy Buolamwini's startling discovery that facial recognition does not see dark-skinned faces accurately. Available on DVD for check-out or Netflix
- Disability, fairness, and algorithmic bias in AI recruitmentArtificial intelligence (AI) hiring tools promise to transform the workplace, these algorithms risk exacerbating existing biases against marginalized groups.
- The scary truth about AI copyright is nobody knows what will happen nextArticle from The Verge exploring the legality of the text, code, images, and art all trained off existing data.
Learn More
Finding Datasets:
- NYU Data CatalogAn open repository maintained by NYU medical school. It includes datasets generated by NYU researchers as well as publicly available and licensed datasets that are generated at external organizations
- PubMed Central Text Mining CollectionsPubMed Central (PMC) maintains several large subsets or collections of articles where files for text mining and other purposes are made available under Creative Commons or similar licenses
- re3data.orgre3data is a global registry of research data repositories. The registry covers research data repositories from different academic disciplines.
- UC Irvine Machine Learning RepositoryMaintain datasets as a service to the machine learning community.
- WordNetA large lexical database of English. Nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs are grouped into sets of cognitive synonyms (synsets), each expressing a distinct concept.
Journals and eBooks about AI/ML:
- Applied Artificial IntelligenceAn open access journal focusing on research on artificial intelligence, including applications to solve engineering, administration and education tasks, and evaluations of AI systems.
- eBook Collection on AIeBooks covering Artificial Intelligence.
- Lecture Notes in Artificial IntelligenceThe mission of the series is to serve the international R & D community by providing an invaluable service, mainly focused on the publication of conference and workshop proceedings and postproceedings.
References
- CrashCourse (Director). (2017, November 1). Machine Learning & Artificial Intelligence: Crash Course Computer Science #34. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-EtmaFJieY
- Maeda, J., & Chaki, E. (2023, April 3). Concepts Overview for LLM AI. Microsoft Build. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/semantic-kernel/concepts-ai/ McCarthy, J. (n.d.).
- What is AI?: Basic Questions. Professor John McCarthy. Retrieved May 3, 2023, from http://jmc.stanford.edu/artificial-intelligence/what-is-ai/index.html
- What is GPT AI? - Generative Pre-Trained Transformers Explained - AWS. (n.d.). Amazon Web Services, Inc. Retrieved August 10, 2023, from https://aws.amazon.com/what-is/gpt/