Editor’s message: about Artificial Intelligence as a tool for writing papers

Abstract

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become a trendy topic through advertisements, notes and even warnings about it, claiming that it can be used to answer almost any kind of question. Although we did not use to call it AI, we are somehow familiar with the concept of having computers answering tough inquiries as it can be seen in several science fiction stories, where they predict scenarios and help people to make decisions. In some cases, computers portraying certain personality were shown, but most of them did not imitate human intelligent behavior. Probably robots built with positronic brains were the only ones exhibiting such actions, but they still belong to the science fiction universe, hence there are no details on how they work to mimic human like thought. Modern AI consists in algorithms running by computers to simulate human capacity for learning, understanding, reasoning, and deducting. These are not isolated abilities since they conform a system which includes gathering data, analyzing, and reaching to conclusions. In many cases, worthiness perception of this intelligence depends on its applicability. The IA features have been described by many reporters and social media, claiming its great feats in forecasting scenarios, answering questions, and performing some tasks, as they were carried out by intelligent flowless humans. Therefore, as soon as IA applications (software) became readily available, a lot of tests follow up. Some are pursuing a quite serious interest in learning more about this technology and its capacities, while others are just driven by curiosity. Several opinions have emerged from the news and reports of the users, so that there are enthusiastic people who see a powerful tool that might help professionals to perform their tasks, better or faster, in opposition to others who are afraid of its probable misuse, proposing that it should be banned. This response could be compared to the automation technology, that nowadays uses AI for controlling machines while performing programmed instructions. The automatic devices include, but are not limited to, house appliances, manufacturing machines, service machines, and vehicles. This technology that might be controversial has matured so that it is not questioned and seems naturally employed. Perhaps a point of concern with AI is that it is supposed to perform intellectual rather than hard work, although AI exists in all kinds of apparatus and gadgets with the smart adjective. Among the intellectual applications of AI that are becoming an attractive interest is writing. We are wondering if AI can really produce new documents, write essays, and do the homework of the students or anyone who wants to produce written material. The articles attributed to AI, demonstrating congruence resembling human work, are aimed to general topics and comments about markets, sports, and other events, where their originality is based on the quality of the compilation presented as a single easy to read document. Therefore, despite the absence of contribution parameters, there are comments supporting that AI can write something new by collecting written material from diverse sources, select proper paragraphs, and assemble them accordingly to a set of rules that involves accuracy of the employed keywords.