Will AI replace scientists?
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Future Proof with Jonathan McRae. Proudly supported by Research Ireland. On Newstalk. Hello and welcome to Future Proof, the podcast. This is the show where we take a closer look at the world around us. My name is Jonathan McRae. Thank you for subscribing, downloading, rating, just being here generally. Coming up on this week's episode, we're going to be talking about scientists that are AI made by AI scientists.
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
A Gordian knot of an idea that is promising enough. The idea that an AI could actually figure out gaps in science, perform the research, test the answers and then publish science. is actually not as wild as you might think. And what does it mean for the future of science? First, though, it's time to look back at some of the more interesting stories from the world of science. This week, we're joined by Dr. Jessamyn Fairfield from the University of Galway and from Trinity College, Dublin, Professor Matthew Campbell. You're both very welcome. Our first story, Jessamyn, as a female comedian, I challenge you with this one. Make this not so terrifying.
Amok run amok.
Okay.
Yeah. It's like, all right, fine. So this story is about something that we've been hearing more about in recent months and years, the Atlantic meridional overturning current, which is, of course, an intrinsically funny name. But what it has to do with is in the Atlantic Ocean, warm water flowing sort of to the north in the North Atlantic on the top, the sort of broad, shallow part of the ocean, and then getting cold up north, sinking back down and going back down towards the equator. Right off the coast of our country. Right off the coast of our country. Local story, this. And it's part of a global network of ocean currents and these kind of conveyor belts that process and effectively move heat through the ocean.
Enormous amounts of heat. Enormous amounts of water. But surprisingly quick.
How does AI potentially impact scientific research?
Yeah, exactly. And so this is a part of how the global climate is constructed from these moving ocean currents. And where AMOC has been making the news recently is that there are predictions that it is starting to slow down. So this would have obviously huge implications for us if the flow of hot water through the ocean was to slow down. I mean, both Ireland specifically and Northern Europe in general, like we have much warmer climates than we kind of have the right to based on our latitude, which is great in some sense, but it's very much tied to this ocean circulation. And of course, no surprise here, but the reason for this is climate change. So in addition to global warming, ocean acidification, all this other really fun stuff that we love to talk about, this potential slowdown and what's more concerning, possible collapse of AMOC, of this overturning current,
would have huge implications for the climate of Ireland, mainly in terms of the humidity and the storms that we experience. So potentially drier summers, wetter winters, but more extreme storms, which is already a consequence of climate change that we're kind of looking at. And something that's quite relevant, like to me out in Galway, to anyone that's living near the coast, but actually just to the country as a whole.
What are the implications of AI scientists on traditional roles?
Are we not talking about like independence, not independency? What's the one with all the, the one in the future where all the, everything turns to ice?
What's that called? Ice bad planet. Yeah, that one. Three. The reckoning. Are we not talking about that?
Because I thought it was more significant than more storms and hotter and colder.
Well, it depends on where you are in the world, right? So the problem, too, is that all of these things are connected. So we could have differing temperatures from the AMOC collapsing, which mainly would be lowering the temperatures, but we're also seeing rising in temperatures from climate change and global warming. So... For us, the temperature difference might not be as extreme as it would be in other parts of Europe potentially, but the overall impact on our climate will be very bad.
Yeah. And this story has gone back and forth a bit.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:01–0:26
2
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:26–1:47
3
How does AI potentially impact scientific research?
1:47–2:58
4
What are the implications of AI scientists on traditional roles?
2:58–3:50
5
How does the AI scientist generate and test hypotheses?
3:50–5:39
6
What are the ethical considerations of AI in science?
5:39–7:31
7
How does AI compare to human creativity in scientific discovery?
7:31–8:25
8
What challenges does AI face in scientific research?
8:25–38:19