The influence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Artificial Life (ALife) technologies upon society, and their potential to fundamentally shape the future evolution of humankind, are topics very much at the forefront of current scientific, governmental and public debate. While these might seem like very modern concerns, they have a long history that is often disregarded in contemporary discourse. Insofar as current debates do acknowledge the history of these ideas, they rarely look back further than the origin of the modern digital computer age in the 1940s-50s. In this paper we explore the earlier history of these concepts. We focus in particular on the idea of self-reproducing and evolving machines, and potential implications for our own species. We show that discussion of these topics arose in the 1860s, within a decade of the publication of Darwin's The Origin of Species, and attracted increasing interest from scientists, novelists and the general public in the early 1900s. After introducing the relevant work from this period, we categorise the various visions presented by these authors of the future implications of evolving machines for humanity. We suggest that current debate
Using the Scopus dataset (1996-2007) a grand matrix of aggregated journal-journal citations was constructed. This matrix can be compared in terms of the network structures with the matrix contained in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR) of the Institute of Scientific Information (ISI). Since the Scopus database contains a larger number of journals and covers also the humanities, one would expect richer maps. However, the matrix is in this case sparser than in the case of the ISI data. This is due to (i) the larger number of journals covered by Scopus and (ii) the historical record of citations older than ten years contained in the ISI database. When the data is highly structured, as in the case of large journals, the maps are comparable, although one may have to vary a threshold (because of the differences in densities). In the case of interdisciplinary journals and journals in the social sciences and humanities, the new database does not add a lot to what is possible with the ISI databases.
Using "Analyze Results" at the Web of Science, one can directly generate overlays onto global journal maps of science. The maps are based on the 10,000+ journals contained in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR) of the Science and Social Science Citation Indices (2011). The disciplinary diversity of the retrieval is measured in terms of Rao-Stirling's "quadratic entropy." Since this indicator of interdisciplinarity is normalized between zero and one, the interdisciplinarity can be compared among document sets and across years, cited or citing. The colors used for the overlays are based on Blondel et al.'s (2008) community-finding algorithms operating on the relations journals included in JCRs. The results can be exported from VOSViewer with different options such as proportional labels, heat maps, or cluster density maps. The maps can also be web-started and/or animated (e.g., using PowerPoint). The "citing" dimension of the aggregated journal-journal citation matrix was found to provide a more comprehensive description than the matrix based on the cited archive. The relations between local and global maps and their different functions in studying the sciences in terms of journal lit
We compare the network of aggregated journal-journal citation relations provided by the Journal Citation Reports (JCR) 2012 of the Science and Social Science Citation Indexes (SCI and SSCI) with similar data based on Scopus 2012. First, global maps were developed for the two sets separately; sets of documents can then be compared using overlays to both maps. Using fuzzy-string matching and ISSN numbers, we were able to match 10,524 journal names between the two sets; that is, 96.4% of the 10,936 journals contained in JCR or 51.2% of the 20,554 journals covered by Scopus. Network analysis was then pursued on the set of journals shared between the two databases and the two sets of unique journals. Citations among the shared journals are more comprehensively covered in JCR than Scopus, so the network in JCR is denser and more connected than in Scopus. The ranking of shared journals in terms of indegree (that is, numbers of citing journals) or total citations is similar in both databases overall (Spearman's \r{ho} > 0.97), but some individual journals rank very differently. Journals that are unique to Scopus seem to be less important--they are citing shared journals rather than bein
Publication patterns of 79 forest scientists awarded major international forestry prizes during 1990-2010 were compared with the journal classification and ranking promoted as part of the 'Excellence in Research for Australia' (ERA) by the Australian Research Council. The data revealed that these scientists exhibited an elite publication performance during the decade before and two decades following their first major award. An analysis of their 1703 articles in 431 journals revealed substantial differences between the journal choices of these elite scientists and the ERA classification and ranking of journals. Implications from these findings are that additional cross-classifications should be added for many journals, and there should be an adjustment to the ranking of several journals relevant to the ERA Field of Research classified as 0705 Forestry Sciences.
A number of journal classification systems have been developed in bibliometrics since the launch of the Citation Indices by the Institute of Scientific Information (ISI) in the 1960s. These systems are used to normalize citation counts with respect to field-specific citation patterns. The best known system is the so-called "Web-of-Science Subject Categories" (WCs). In other systems papers are classified by algorithmic solutions. Using the Journal Citation Reports 2014 of the Science Citation Index and the Social Science Citation Index (n of journals = 11,149), we examine options for developing a new system based on journal classifications into subject categories using aggregated journal-journal citation data. Combining routines in VOSviewer and Pajek, a tree-like classification is developed. At each level one can generate a map of science for all the journals subsumed under a category. Nine major fields are distinguished at the top level. Further decomposition of the social sciences is pursued for the sake of example with a focus on journals in information science (LIS) and science studies (STS). The new classification system improves on alternative options by avoiding the problem
Using three years of the Journal Citation Reports (2011, 2012, and 2013), indicators of transitions in 2012 (between 2011 and 2013) are studied using methodologies based on entropy statistics. Changes can be indicated at the level of journals using the margin totals of entropy production along the row or column vectors, but also at the level of links among journals by importing the transition matrices into network analysis and visualization programs (and using community-finding algorithms). Seventy-four journals are flagged in terms of discontinuous changes in their citations; but 3,114 journals are involved in "hot" links. Most of these links are embedded in a main component; 78 clusters (containing 172 journals) are flagged as potential "hot spots" emerging at the network level. An additional finding is that PLoS ONE introduced a new communication dynamics into the database. The limitations of the methodology are elaborated using an example. The results of the study indicate where developments in the citation dynamics can be considered as significantly unexpected. This can be used as heuristic information; but what a "hot spot" in terms of the entropy statistics of aggregated cit
Data science has become increasingly essential for the production of official statistics, as it enables the automated collection, processing, and analysis of large amounts of data. With such data science practices in place, it enables more timely, more insightful and more flexible reporting. However, the quality and integrity of data-science-driven statistics rely on the accuracy and reliability of the data sources and the machine learning techniques that support them. In particular, changes in data sources are inevitable to occur and pose significant risks that are crucial to address in the context of machine learning for official statistics. This paper gives an overview of the main risks, liabilities, and uncertainties associated with changing data sources in the context of machine learning for official statistics. We provide a checklist of the most prevalent origins and causes of changing data sources; not only on a technical level but also regarding ownership, ethics, regulation, and public perception. Next, we highlight the repercussions of changing data sources on statistical reporting. These include technical effects such as concept drift, bias, availability, validity, accur
Explainable Artificial Intelligence (XAI) is essential for building advanced machine learning-powered applications, especially in critical domains such as medical diagnostics or autonomous driving. Legal, business, and ethical requirements motivate using effective XAI, but the increasing number of different methods makes it challenging to pick the right ones. Further, as explanations are highly context-dependent, measuring the effectiveness of XAI methods without users can only reveal a limited amount of information, excluding human factors such as the ability to understand it. We propose to evaluate XAI methods via the user's ability to successfully perform a proxy task, designed such that a good performance is an indicator for the explanation to provide helpful information. In other words, we address the helpfulness of XAI for human decision-making. Further, a user study on state-of-the-art methods was conducted, showing differences in their ability to generate trust and skepticism and the ability to judge the rightfulness of an AI decision correctly. Based on the results, we highly recommend using and extending this approach for more objective-based human-centered user studies t
Rankings of scholarly journals based on citation data are often met with skepticism by the scientific community. Part of the skepticism is due to disparity between the common perception of journals' prestige and their ranking based on citation counts. A more serious concern is the inappropriate use of journal rankings to evaluate the scientific influence of authors. This paper focuses on analysis of the table of cross-citations among a selection of Statistics journals. Data are collected from the Web of Science database published by Thomson Reuters. Our results suggest that modelling the exchange of citations between journals is useful to highlight the most prestigious journals, but also that journal citation data are characterized by considerable heterogeneity, which needs to be properly summarized. Inferential conclusions require care in order to avoid potential over-interpretation of insignificant differences between journal ratings. Comparison with published ratings of institutions from the UK's Research Assessment Exercise shows strong correlation at aggregate level between assessed research quality and journal citation `export scores' within the discipline of Statistics.
Dyads of journals related by citations can agglomerate into specialties through the mechanism of triadic closure. Using the Journal Citation Reports 2011, 2012, and 2013, we analyze triad formation as indicators of integration (specialty growth) and disintegration (restructuring). The strongest integration is found among the large journals that report on studies in different scientific specialties, such as PLoS ONE, Nature Communications, Nature, and Science. This tendency towards large-scale integration has not yet stabilized. Using the Islands algorithm, we also distinguish 51 local maxima of integration. We zoom into the cited articles that carry the integration for: (i) a new development within high-energy physics and (ii) an emerging interface between the journals Applied Mathematical Modeling and the International Journal of Advanced Manufacturing Technology. In the first case, integration is brought about by a specific communication reaching across specialty boundaries, whereas in the second, the dyad of journals indicates an emerging interface between specialties. These results suggest that integration picks up substantive developments at the specialty level. An advantage o
This paper leverages various philosophical and ontological frameworks to explore the concept of embodied artificial general intelligence (AGI), its relationship to human consciousness, and the key role of the metaverse in facilitating this relationship. Several theoretical frameworks underpin this exploration, such as embodied cognition, Michael Levin's computational boundary of a "Self," and Donald D. Hoffman's Interface Theory of Perception, which lead to considering human perceived outer reality as a symbolic representation of alternate inner states of being, and where AGI could embody a different form of consciousness with a larger computational boundary. The paper further discusses the necessary architecture for the emergence of an embodied AGI, how to calibrate an AGI's symbolic interface, and the key role played by the Metaverse, decentralized systems and open-source blockchain technology. The paper concludes by emphasizing the importance of achieving a certain degree of harmony in human relations and recognizing the interconnectedness of humanity at a global level, as key prerequisites for the emergence of a stable embodied AGI.
This study examines the social media uptake of scientific journals on two different platforms - X and WeChat - by comparing the adoption of X among journals indexed in the Science Citation Index-Expanded (SCIE) with the adoption of WeChat among journals indexed in the Chinese Science Citation Database (CSCD). The findings reveal substantial differences in platform adoption and user engagement, shaped by local contexts. While only 22.7% of SCIE journals maintain an X account, 84.4% of CSCD journals have a WeChat official account. Journals in Life Sciences & Biomedicine lead in uptake on both platforms, whereas those in Technology and Physical Sciences show high WeChat uptake but comparatively lower presence on X. User engagement on both platforms is dominated by low-effort interactions rather than more conversational behaviors. Correlation analyses indicate weak-to-moderate relationships between bibliometric indicators and social media metrics, confirming that online engagement reflects a distinct dimension of journal impact, whether on an international or a local platform. These findings underscore the need for broader social media metric frameworks that incorporate locally dom
The following briefly discusses possible difficulties in communication with and control of an AGI (artificial general intelligence), building upon an explanation of The Fermi Paradox and preceding work on symbol emergence and artificial general intelligence. The latter suggests that to infer what someone means, an agent constructs a rationale for the observed behaviour of others. Communication then requires two agents labour under similar compulsions and have similar experiences (construct similar solutions to similar tasks). Any non-human intelligence may construct solutions such that any rationale for their behaviour (and thus the meaning of their signals) is outside the scope of what a human is inclined to notice or comprehend. Further, the more compressed a signal, the closer it will appear to random noise. Another intelligence may possess the ability to compress information to the extent that, to us, their signals would appear indistinguishable from noise (an explanation for The Fermi Paradox). To facilitate predictive accuracy an AGI would tend to more compressed representations of the world, making any rationale for their behaviour more difficult to comprehend for the same r
We introduce a novel methodology for mapping academic institutions based on their journal publication profiles. We believe that journals in which researchers from academic institutions publish their works can be considered as useful identifiers for representing the relationships between these institutions and establishing comparisons. However, when academic journals are used for research output representation, distinctions must be introduced between them, based on their value as institution descriptors. This leads us to the use of journal weights attached to the institution identifiers. Since a journal in which researchers from a large proportion of institutions published their papers may be a bad indicator of similarity between two academic institutions, it seems reasonable to weight it in accordance with how frequently researchers from different institutions published their papers in this journal. Cluster analysis can then be applied to group the academic institutions, and dendrograms can be provided to illustrate groups of institutions following agglomerative hierarchical clustering. In order to test this methodology, we use a sample of Spanish universities as a case study. We f
This article analyzes the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on contemporary society and the importance of adopting an ethical approach to its development and implementation within organizations. It examines the technocritical perspective of some philosophers and researchers, who warn of the risks of excessive technologization that could undermine human autonomy. However, the article also acknowledges the active role that various actors, such as governments, academics, and civil society, can play in shaping the development of AI aligned with human and social values. A multidimensional approach is proposed that combines ethics with regulation, innovation, and education. It highlights the importance of developing detailed ethical frameworks, incorporating ethics into the training of professionals, conducting ethical impact audits, and encouraging the participation of stakeholders in the design of AI. In addition, four fundamental pillars are presented for the ethical implementation of AI in organizations: 1) Integrated values, 2) Trust and transparency, 3) Empowering human growth, and 4) Identifying strategic factors. These pillars encompass aspects such as alignment with the com
Using the referencing patterns in articles in Cognitive Science over three decades, we analyze the knowledge base of this literature in terms of its changing disciplinary composition. Three periods are distinguished: (1) construction of the interdisciplinary space in the 1980s; (2) development of an interdisciplinary orientation in the 1990s; (3) reintegration into "cognitive psychology" in the 2000s. The fluidity and fuzziness of the interdisciplinary delineations in the different visualizations can be reduced and clarified using factor analysis. We also explore newly available routines ("CorText") to analyze this development in terms of "tubes" using an alluvial map, and compare the results with an animation (using "visone"). The historical specificity of this development can be compared with the development of "artificial intelligence" into an integrated specialty during this same period. "Interdisciplinarity" should be defined differently at the level of journals and of specialties.
The advent of artificial intelligence has changed many disciplines such as engineering, social science and economics. Artificial intelligence is a computational technique which is inspired by natural intelligence such as the swarming of birds, the working of the brain and the pathfinding of the ants. These techniques have impact on economic theories. This book studies the impact of artificial intelligence on economic theories, a subject that has not been extensively studied. The theories that are considered are: demand and supply, asymmetrical information, pricing, rational choice, rational expectation, game theory, efficient market hypotheses, mechanism design, prospect, bounded rationality, portfolio theory, rational counterfactual and causality. The benefit of this book is that it evaluates existing theories of economics and update them based on the developments in artificial intelligence field.
Artificial intelligence (AI) models are increasingly finding applications in the field of medicine. Concerns have been raised about the explainability of the decisions that are made by these AI models. In this article, we give a systematic analysis of explainable artificial intelligence (XAI), with a primary focus on models that are currently being used in the field of healthcare. The literature search is conducted following the preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA) standards for relevant work published from 1 January 2012 to 02 February 2022. The review analyzes the prevailing trends in XAI and lays out the major directions in which research is headed. We investigate the why, how, and when of the uses of these XAI models and their implications. We present a comprehensive examination of XAI methodologies as well as an explanation of how a trustworthy AI can be derived from describing AI models for healthcare fields. The discussion of this work will contribute to the formalization of the XAI field.
Collectiveness is an important property of many systems--both natural and artificial. By exploiting a large number of individuals, it is often possible to produce effects that go far beyond the capabilities of the smartest individuals, or even to produce intelligent collective behaviour out of not-so-intelligent individuals. Indeed, collective intelligence, namely the capability of a group to act collectively in a seemingly intelligent way, is increasingly often a design goal of engineered computational systems--motivated by recent techno-scientific trends like the Internet of Things, swarm robotics, and crowd computing, just to name a few. For several years, the collective intelligence observed in natural and artificial systems has served as a source of inspiration for engineering ideas, models, and mechanisms. Today, artificial and computational collective intelligence are recognised research topics, spanning various techniques, kinds of target systems, and application domains. However, there is still a lot of fragmentation in the research panorama of the topic within computer science, and the verticality of most communities and contributions makes it difficult to extract the cor