The metaphors of artificial intelligence

2024/11/14 by Melanie Mitchell · 3 voices · 23 citations
Medicine · Physics and Astronomy · Psychology · #Alien #Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare and Education #Artificial intelligence #Artificial neural network #Cognitive science #Computer science #Demography #Human intelligence #Linguistics #Philosophy #Psychology #Sociology #Space (punctuation) #Space Science and Extraterrestrial Life

paper · doi:10.1126/science.adt6140

published in Science 386(6723), eadt6140 (American Association for the Advancement of Science)

openalex publication_date 2024/11/14 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/04

Abstract

A few months after ChatGPT was released, the neural network pioneer Terrence Sejnowski wrote about coming to grips with the shock of what large language models (LLMs) could do: "Something is beginning to happen that was not expected even a few years ago. A threshold was reached, as if a space alien suddenly appeared that could communicate with us in an eerily human way.…Some aspects of their behavior appear to be intelligent, but if it's not human intelligence, what is the nature of their intelligence?"

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Discussions

• Nice piece by @melaniemitchell.bsky.social on metaphors in AI. Too often, scientists see metaphors as avoidable and problematic. But metaphors do--and must--structure how we conceive, design, and leg [bsky, 44 points, 1 comments]
• This piece by @melaniemitchell.bsky.social is absolutely essential for thinking clearly about LLMs. doi.org/10.1126/scie... [bsky, 7 points, 1 comments]
• And more reading from @melaniemitchell.bsky.social : doi.org/10.1126/scie... [bsky, 2 points, 0 comments]

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