Paper Short Abstract:

An artificial intelligence chatbot, but also a visual generative system dedicated to learning about cultures and societies and exercising a constant comparison protocol would contribute significantly to deepen the ethnographic epistemology. Nevertheless, it is very important to take into consideration the susceptibly of such information systems to political or ideological bias.

Paper Abstract:

. While metaverse can be seen as another fascinating realm to be explored, gaining knowledge from the encounter with an AI has the potential of instilling not only an epistemological, but also an ontological shift to the researcher’s worldview. A generative AI could impersonate a character or a typical individual, bringing the methods and hypothesis testing to new levels for contemporary cultural, physical and ethnolinguistic anthropology. Alternatively, it could constitute, in an ingenious way, the very subject of a historic or forensic research. Even with an amoral machine, the ethical aspects of research remain of no less importance. On the contrary, new challenges concerning privacy and transparency are raised – evidently not only in social sciences, but in all areas of science and knowledge. In this instance, anthropology (which was conceived as a discipline based on tolerance and respect for others) could serve as a provider of a code of conduct. This reflexive epistemological study represents not only an assessment of the potential which resides in working as an anthropologist with the AI or working with the AI as an anthropologist. It aims to provide a glimpse to what an AGI would bring to the table – an omniscient, omnipresent train of thought who would perhaps conduct anthropological research as a study of ancestors.