Not Quite ‘Ask a Librarian’: AI on the Nature, Value, and Future of LIS

Abstract

AI language models trained on Web data generate prose that reflects human knowledge and public sentiments, but can also contain novel insights and predictions. We asked the world's best language model, GPT-3, fifteen difficult questions about the nature, value, and future of library and information science (LIS), topics that receive perennial attention from LIS scholars. We present highlights from its 45 different responses, which range from platitudes and caricatures to interesting perspectives and worrisome visions of the future, thus providing an LIS-tailored demonstration of the current performance of AI language models. We also reflect on the viability of using AI to forecast or generate research ideas in this way today. Finally, we have shared the full response log online for readers to consider and evaluate for themselves.

Global AI Initiatives: from Theory to Practice

“…library discovery tools), or what impact the systems (and their many well‐established biases) will have on European society. A paper presented at ASIS&T 2021 suggested that because GPT‐3 already generated plausible but false content, future iterations might "drastically change the nature of everyday information retrieval… with serious social and ethical” consequences (Dinneen & Bubinger, 2021, p. 10). With ChatGPT and its contemporaries, that future is now, and society is in an uncharted information frontier.…”