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There have been a number of artificial intelligence machine learning systems over the last few years which have been given samples of artwork and music and have produced new creative works. I haven't come across any systems that have done the same with literature yet, but I am guessing it is only a matter of time before we have a machine generated murder mystery.

I was thinking it would be interesting to feed a similar system sample Divrei Torah and see what it could produce. Hypothetically it could be connected up to Sefaria and similar data sources for drawing on pesukim etc as textual sources to base the Dvar on. This does raise some interesting questions though. Is there any reason that such a project would present problems from the perspective of halacha (or perhaps hashkafa etc)? Would any results produced from the system be necessarily inherently problematic (eg. as long as a sufficiently qualified human reviews it to ensure there is nothing that would be problematic if a human wrote it)?

msh210
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Moses Supposes
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    It already exists. It got a +15 score, so apparently it's acceptable – b a Sep 06 '19 at 11:49
  • @ba Haha! That's pretty cool, but I was thinking of something a bit more general than answering Mi Yodeya questions. – Moses Supposes Sep 06 '19 at 11:56
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    https://openai.com/blog/better-language-models/ – Joel K Sep 06 '19 at 12:06
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    In seriousness, I don't really understand what the problems this presents could be. If you already have a human reviewing it, what inherent problem is there with something being AI-generated? Human-generated Torah isn't flawless either, is it? – b a Sep 06 '19 at 12:42
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    Technically, nothing is Divrey Torah until accepted as such. Surely Gogle can write a summary on any subject incl. Torah or Halachah. Eventually, passing the Turing Test, I don't think anybody could distinguish it from human work. Eventually, it will pass Rabbis in its clarity, consistency, and scope of sources. Maybe we will call it מלאה הארץ דעה את ה' as the Navi prophecized? – Al Berko Sep 07 '19 at 22:11
  • לא ניתנה התורה למלאכי השרת ולא לבינה מלאכותית – shmosel Feb 06 '24 at 05:41
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    Generative AI are word machines, not understanding or logic machines. Therefore you can't classify something an AI wrote as Torah, since there is no understanding inherent in its generation. – The GRAPKE Feb 06 '24 at 07:18
  • @TheGRAPKE Is it necessary for there to have been understanding inherent in its generation for it to be Torah? If it is indistinguishable from a human-written Dvar Torah, maybe the act of reading it makes it Torah? – Moses Supposes Feb 06 '24 at 15:13
  • @MosesSupposes But then if a monkey would type out a dvar torah you could say the same thing? – The GRAPKE Feb 06 '24 at 19:41
  • @TheGRAPKE Yes, so? To my mind the only difference is that is far less likely statistically. – Moses Supposes Feb 07 '24 at 18:40
  • @MosesSupposes So it's not Torah. – The GRAPKE Feb 08 '24 at 07:58
  • @TheGRAPKE Does it matter how it was derived as long as it works as a dvar torah? – Moses Supposes Feb 08 '24 at 15:53
  • @MosesSupposes A monkey cannot comprise a connection to Hashem. – The GRAPKE Feb 09 '24 at 08:14
  • @TheGRAPKE But if a monkey writes something that inspires someone else to enhance their connection to Hashem then is that a Dvar Torah? Is it the source or the effect that matters? – Moses Supposes Feb 09 '24 at 10:06
  • @MosesSupposes That's not possible. – The GRAPKE Feb 12 '24 at 18:52
  • @TheGRAPKE certainly statistically unlikely but it is much more likely for an AI – Moses Supposes Feb 12 '24 at 19:28

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