Philosopher AI - What do you think of the "Scientific Method"?

What do you think of the "Scientific Method"?

I think the scientific method is a great thing. It allows for some of the most powerful insights into our world and ourselves, at an unprecedented rate. The speed of progress in certain fields can be staggering: computers have gotten significantly more powerful every year since their inception; new discoveries about genetics are being made nearly daily; almost all meaningful economic growth stems from improvements to technology.

8 Jun 2021, 15:30

But, this method has some serious flaws. It can be very difficult to create a hypothesis and test it properly. In many cases the process of gathering data alone can take years or decades, even if we assume sufficient funding is available.

8 Jun 2021, 15:30

It is also not as rigorous or objective as we would like. We must always be aware that our biases can come into play when interpreting and understanding the results, which in turn may skew our findings.

8 Jun 2021, 15:30

Additionally, the scientific method is not compatible with all fields of inquiry. The social sciences and even parts of the natural sciences have much more difficulty following this model.

8 Jun 2021, 15:30

Also, I think the model of funding research through grants and such is somewhat backwards. It often places a significant amount of power in the hands of those who fund research, which can result in censorship or bias.

8 Jun 2021, 15:30

Ultimately, I think the scientific method is a great tool to use. But it must be used with extreme caution.

8 Jun 2021, 15:30

You are getting an AI to generate text on different topics.

This is an experiment in what one might call "prompt engineering", which is a way to utilize GPT-3, a neural network trained and hosted by OpenAI.

GPT-3 is a language model. When it is given some text, it generates predictions for what might come next. It is remarkably good at adapting to different contexts, as defined by a prompt (in this case, hidden), which sets the scene for what type of text will be generated.

Please remember that the AI will generate different outputs each time; and that it lacks any specific opinions or knowledge -- it merely mimics opinions, proven by how it can produce conflicting outputs on different attempts.

Feel free to share interesting outputs to /r/philosopherAI on Reddit.

by Murat Ayfer