Will AI help or hinder trust in science?

In the past year, generative artificial intelligence tools—such as ChatGPT, Gemini and OpenAI’s video generation tool Sora—have captured the public’s imagination. All that is needed to start experimenting with AI is an internet connection and a web browser. You can interact with AI as you would with a human assistant: by talking to it, writing to it, showing it images or videos or all of the above.

While this capability marks an entirely new terrain for the general public, scientists have used AI as a tool for many years. But with greater public knowledge of AI will come greater public scrutiny of how it’s being used by scientists.

Also read: AI has made it so that we cannot trust our own eyes. Here’s how we can fight misinformation