Accordance AI Adoption..

[Rick55]

The main competitor of Accordance has recently developed and released an AI tool "Smart Tool" called  Smart Search. I am hoping Accordance incorporates an AI tool like chat GPT (like smart search). 

 

Why? Because like many other Accordance users, I use chatGPT consistently, and every time I have a question now, I can ask it to chat GPT. Chat GPT points me in the right direction, and gives various points of view, from critical to conservative, and can also read the text from an atheistic, polytheistic perspective, etc., which is fun and challenging regarding apologetics. 

 

The only issue is that ChatGPT can't incorporate the Accordance database installed on my laptop, how much more intricate would utilizing AI be if we could direct it to answer questions solely from your Accordance library's lexicons, dictionaries, commentaries, etc.? 

With a tool like this, your exhaustive research can be accomplished more efficiently and speedily. 

Edited August 4 by Rick55

[rcdeacon]

I for one am NOT interested in AI!

[Rick55]

54 minutes ago, rcdeacon said:

I for one am NOT interested in AI!

That is understandable. Of course, we should be the ones to read and get to know all the books we own so that when we go to search various topics, verses, or passages, we can already know exactly where to find what are looking for.

While this is commendable and has served to great benefit in the history of time, we have encountered a new generation where technology is at the forefront of what we live by (physically speaking).

 

I mean think about this; people now call their laptops, smartphones, and iPads their Bibles while reading commentaries from people who did not even have the benefit of owning electricity.  

 

So if you are put off by A.I., maybe those who did not even own electricity would be put off by a digital Bible; but have you found a benefit of owning a digital Bible software such as Accordance? 

 

Do you ever type searches into Google when you want to look something up? Or maybe if you ever went to seminary as a seminary student, would you utilize Google's search engine to research various topics? If you have not done this before, do you know people who have or do this often and benefit from it? 

The question then becomes, why would you want to use Google's search engine when you can use a built-in AI search tool within accordance to not only find what you are looking for but even help you find what you are looking for within your own invested library? 

 

I see often people keep a Google search engine tab open, some Google, some chatGPT, etc just to find further knowledge. Accordance even has a website amplification feature to direct you to Google so you can ask expansive topical questions to find further knowledge and ideas. 

 

If Accordance has this feature it will eliminate Google from the equation and will allow you to use your Accordance modules to search more conveniently and point you where and to what exactly you are looking for, much faster.

 

You can still do this now, but you have to be much more specific in your search prompts which will point you towards the right place then you have to skim through however many modules you own to narrow down to what you are looking for.

 

While this type of searching I believe will still be useful even if an AI tool is incorporated, if you had an AI tool, it could turn something that could be done in just a few minutes into a several-hour trail. 

 

There is a benefit to both, so why not have both? 

There is a benefit to working smarter, not harder; 

And there is a benefit to working harder, and smarter. 

 

 

Edited August 5 by Rick55

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

We're continuing to research and explore feedback from customers concerning AI, and we appreciate any feedback/discussion customers wish to contribute.

 

While we don't have anything specific to announce at the moment, one thing I've personally been doing is occasionally trying BibleMate.org in the Accordance web browser when I need to quickly look up something with AI.

 

Although ironically, I've personally been doing more with HI (Human Intelligence) lately than AI.

[Kristin]

15 minutes ago, Dr. Nathan Parker said:

We're continuing to research and explore feedback from customers concerning AI, and we appreciate any feedback/discussion customers wish to contribute.

 

 

I would literally stop using the program if AI was involved. I mentioned this on another thread, but it is worth repeating, that if Accordance wants to change Accordance with AI, this absolutely must be something that can be completely and totally disabled in settings in a very genuine sense. This is very serious for those of us who do scholarly work from scratch.

The so-called main competitor (which I frankly don't see as an actual competitor since the base is so different), uses AI specifically since their base was never primarily scholars to begin with. I am not claiming scholars don't use that program, but that other program is more intended for people who are not proficient in languages. Accordance, by contrast, is firmly rooted in scholarly language work, and this is critical.

 

If Accordance wants to make sure people stay with Accordance, they need to focus on making sure the corruption issues are addressed so people can get on with their work. If, by contrast, Accordance forgets its roots, it just blurs the lines between itself and the so-called competitor, and that is obviously not in anyone's interest except the competitor.

In other words, Accordance is worlds ahead in original language and scholarly work, and the other company is world's ahead in, shall we say, "less scholarly" work. Accordance can either maintain it's lead, or slip into the shadow of the competitor while trying to mimic it.

 

So that is my feedback, per your request.  

[Rick55]

1 hour ago, Dr. Nathan Parker said:

We're continuing to research and explore feedback from customers concerning AI, and we appreciate any feedback/discussion customers wish to contribute.

 

While we don't have anything specific to announce at the moment, one thing I've personally been doing is occasionally trying BibleMate.org in the Accordance web browser when I need to quickly look up something with AI.

 

Although ironically, I've personally been doing more with HI (Human Intelligence) lately than AI.

Thank you for your reply, Nathan. To a new Bible student, the integration of AI could be exceptionally beneficial and contribute to expansive growth within the company. Regarding those who would stop using Accordance if AI is involved, is that the majority of the investors of Accordance?

 

From my understanding, most users are not on this forum. Unless I am mistaken there, this might not represent the overall sentiment. Also, if you stopped using Accordance, what would be the reason for discontinuing the use of the software completely? And if so, what alternative software would you turn to, or would you revert back to only using physical books?

 

AI has already established its presence and is proving to be the future of technological advancements. Both Apple and Windows are heavily incorporating AI in their latest and upcoming updates. From a consumer's perspective in a technology-based software, given the current direction of technological progress, it wouldn't make sense to not evolve alongside where the industry is heading, for the sake of the company's longevity.

 

If AI can help a new Bible student discover dictionary contents, that they might not have found otherwise, we could very well be fostering a renowned scholar who just needs the right tools to learn. This opens up doors for teachers, pastors, missionaries, evangelists, and students who need assistance with their new study Bible. I try to see the benefits for everyone, not just myself.

 

AI greatly aids people in their research and learning, but it's a tool that requires learning and skill to use effectively. It doesn't automatically make someone a better researcher; rather, it supports the research process when used properly.

Thank you, Nathan, also for the reference link. I have never heard of biblemate.org but will put it to the test alongside ChatGPT.

Edited August 5 by Rick55

[Kristin]

25 minutes ago, Rick55 said:

To people who would stop using Accordance if AI is involved, is that the majority of the investors of Accordance? From my understanding, most users are not on this forum, unless I am mistaken there.

 

Hi Rick, 
Ya, you are correct, the people on the forum are just a fraction of the users. However, as a former employee told me, the people on the forum are typically those who are most passionate about the software and use it the most.

I don't agree with most of your post, but before I respond, I would like to mention that I appreciated your post and can see your perspective. With that as a preface...
 

26 minutes ago, Rick55 said:

Also if you stopped using Accordance, what is the reason you would stop using the software completely? And if so, what software would you turn to, or would you go back to physical books? 

 

That's a good question. I had previously thought I would need to go back to physical books, but after giving it some thought, I decided I would use "the other company." While you are correct that L is bragging about new AI capability, it is a subscription feature. That means, if you don't pay for the feature, you would be restricted to using L without the new feature... which sounds like a great deal to me.
 

31 minutes ago, Rick55 said:

This can open up the doors for teachers, pastors, missionaries, evangelists, and just students who need some help studying their new study bible. I try to see the benefit for everyone and not just myself. 

 

While I can appreciate the point you are making, I would have to disagree about the usefulness, as I would argue it is a real hindrance. I can use my own experience as an example. I went to seminary, but before that my B.A. was in theology, and this story takes place at that time. When I was first learning Greek, and for the first time being taught how to look inflected words up by the lex in Strongs, I did so with a physical book. This was HARD because I was just learning the language, and trying to look words up was time consuming and challenging. I also needed to figure out the meaning of inflected words myself because it was just me doing it. 

 

This wasn't because it was so long ago, it actually wasn't, and pretty much all of my classmates had some sort of Bible software. It was typically BibleWorks or Logos (I hadn't heard of Accordance until grad school). Anyway, my classmates who had the same assignment as I did simply clicked on a word and their software told them the answer and they recorded what the program stated. While their grades were fine, it wasn't a secret that I was learning the language on a deeper level, and a lot of the skills I learned have now been transferable to my research. I obviously did eventually get Bible software, but I didn't do so until after grad school, and I am grateful for the wisdom to do this at the time.

That is just Bible software, and that is nothing compared to AI which is basically a cheat sheet on steroids. That might be fine in some fields (I frankly can't think of one), but it sounds disastrous for people who claim to be either doing research or creating sermons from leading of the Spirit of God himself. So we are changing it from "Spirit led" to "AI led" and no one seems to see the problem. 

 

45 minutes ago, Rick55 said:

AI greatly aids people in their research and learning

 

As I mentioned above, I obviously don't think it is good for learning. However, I would argue that it not only does not "aid" in research, but I would say it prevents research. The whole point of AI is that it has vast information, and the AI sorts through the information and spits back the "relevant" information based on your query. But wait a minute... it just censored some information that you never saw since it decided it wasn't relevant. That is not research, but more like a "preliminary search" or something. AI is fine to find the weather for a place of an upcoming trip, or to identify the type of caterpillar just seen on a plant, but it is not "research" in a scholarly sense. On top of this, it is public knowledge that AI is biased and makes factual errors. So I don't think it belongs in any kind of scholarly research at all.

Take care,

Kristin

[Lawrence]

The term "AI" is bit like "cloud" or "nice" - it has a generic sense but can have widely different specifics for each instance. In a sense, Accordance's fuzzy search and INFER searches are one type of AI.

 

What I'd like to see is:

1. Keep the existing search functionality. AI would be a separate feature.

2. Keep building on Accordance's 'fuzzy search': synonyms, spelling, INFER, etc.

3. Offer the kind of AI 'lite' that Perlego offers: use a kind of fuzzy search to suggest relevant books to consider.

4. Encode resources with a relevant ontology (using automated AI tools in the first instance) to use with fuzzy search.

5. Use the encoding in #4 with a natural-language processor to produce a set of results similar to Accordance's 'research' feature.

 

There may be subscription fees involved with using the ontology navigation and the natural-language processing (and yes, they're related), but I'd prefer that the subscription be not tied to specific resources. It may be useful for researchers and also for Accordance financially if the search results had 2 parts: the primary part being results from resources in a user's own library or a specified Group (i.e. specific collection of resources) within that library, and a secondary part being resources available on Accordance but which the user has not yet purchased. In the latter case, a few paragraphs of context would be helpful, together with bibliographic information and a purchase link + price, etc.

 

@Kristin makes a good point that it's in the nature of AI to hide/censor information in the interest of relevance. However, that limiting of information is not intrinsic to AI. The more fundamental thing AI does is provide a 'relevance' ranking to search results. Although current AI engines severely limit the number of displayed results, it wouldn't be difficult for an AI-engine developer to show more results, like google searches with page 1, page 2, etc. You might limit the results to the best 5 (or some user-specified number), then hit a button to get the next 5, and so on.

 

I see the role of AI in research as that of a research assistant. Once the researcher has the lay of the land, they'd switch to traditional search if they want to be thorough. The AI + search combination can be very helpful when looking at areas outside one's immediate field of expertise. The paper analogue to AI + search is index + table of contents for a single book, or librarian + catalogue for a library. The first is always filtered; the second ties more directly with the (author's) text than with the (researcher's) topic. Each has its own limitations, but each source of information also has value when used appropriately.

[ekim37]

Honestly, I don't think Accordance has enough budget to do anything AI. It seems like they don't even have enough money to purchase new or updated commentaries. 

[A. Smith]

For research, chatgpt is abhorrent. It invents facts and books. That is not something I want to see in a research tool. It can't do anything useful with Ancient Greek or Hebrew. It's useful for some tasks. Biblical research is not yet one of them. 

[JonathanHuber]

AI is a tool that can be used well or used badly. If you use it as a research assistant, as @Lawrence described, then it could be a really nice addition to help you in your work. (And that's what Logos's implementation looks like.) If you use it to do the work for you and just turn your brain off, then of course that's a problem, but that's not the fault of the tool. I share a lot of the concerns here about how AI is trained (where it gets information from) and how it's used, but I still agree with @Rick55 that it can be a helpful assistant, even in scholarly work. 

Edited August 5 by JonathanHuber

[Brian K. Mitchell]

On 8/5/2024 at 12:39 PM, Kristin said:

The so-called main competitor (which I frankly don't see as an actual competitor since the base is so different), uses AI specifically since their base was never primarily scholars to begin with.

Well said @Kristin ! This is also how I see the issue. A good example of this is the fact that years ago the so-called competitor used to have a original language library basepackage ( I know because I bought it), but they decided that package wasn't profitable and they stopped selling it publicly. It was still available for while but only on a hidden webpage and only for those enrolled in academic programs. Another example is this..currently the competitor does not even have a Japanese Bible translation available for sale and they have been round for a little over three decades (32 years)! Why, not? Clearly Japanese Bible translation were considered to be an unprofitable venture. 

 

However the so called competitor is great as a theological library, but for Biblical philology/exegeis it still can't do most of things I need to do very well or easily if at all. 

Edited August 6 by Brian K. Mitchell

[Brian K. Mitchell]

11 minutes ago, JonathanHuber said:

AI is a tool that can be used well or used badly.

I guess one way to make everyone happy is for Accordance to create an addon AI module that one could purchase if they want AI in Accordance and that others could ignore if they don't want AI.

Edited August 5 by Brian K. Mitchell

[ukfraser]

1 hour ago, JonathanHuber said:

I share a lot of the concerns here about how AI is trained (where it gets information from) and how it's used,

1) totally agree with concerns about how AI is trained

2) totally agree about how it is used. For me the danger is the user coming to rely on it rather than using your brain, a bit like some drivers blindly following sat navs and getting stuck on unsuitable roads or driving into rivers! 
 

its a tool, but is heavily reliant on how well it is programmed. 
 

but i want to go down the rabbit holes I come across, not be directed to them! It could be useful to see other warrens but I am happy being lead by the spirit (and research)!
 

isnt research meant to show you everything in your library? Something like that on mobile devices along with stacks has to be a higher priority for me. 
 

im typically a late adopter and NOT interested now or in the near future so having as an additional purchase item would be ideal as others can be the guinea pigs!

 

;o) 

Edited August 5 by ukfraser

[Kristin]

2 minutes ago, ukfraser said:

isnt research meant to show you everything in your library?

 

Amen.

[Lorinda H. M. Hoover]

1 hour ago, JonathanHuber said:

AI is a tool that can be used well or used badly. If you use it as a research assistant, as @Lorinda H. M. Hoover described,...

'Twas not me who described it this way.  In fact, I'm highly skeptical about AI in Accordance.  I don't really see how it would be more productive for research than the current options available in Accordance, including the Research feature.  

 

Plus, doing AI well in Accordance would take a lot of time and expertise.  I'd much rather that time and expertise be put to other improvements to Accordance and to module development.

[ukfraser]

13 minutes ago, Lorinda H. M. Hoover said:

Plus, doing AI well in Accordance would take a lot of time and expertise.  I'd much rather that time and expertise be put to other improvements to Accordance and to module development.

Amen!

[JonathanHuber]

39 minutes ago, Lorinda H. M. Hoover said:

'Twas not me who described it this way.  

Ack, apologies. I edited the post to reassign blame attribution.

[Lorinda H. M. Hoover]

8 minutes ago, JonathanHuber said:

Ack, apologies. I edited the post to reassign blame attribution.

Thanks; I figured it was a slip of the finger/mouse in selecting the name, even as I was setting the record straight.

 

[William Cross]

How about no AI and just a better Research capability that is smarter than merely key words. Like any search engines ability to find info.

[A. Smith]

15 hours ago, Kristin said:

(which I frankly don't see as an actual competitor since the base is so different)

10,000x yes. Such a vastly different base and approach. Complementary and certainly competitive commercially. But for me and many accordance users, we're doing something different with bible software than logos users as a whole. 

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

A few comments....

 

• We do have the module development to expand new commentary volumes, in face, stay tuned very soon.
• BibleMate is based on ChatGPT but limited specifically to Bible questions. I don't use it a ton, but I'll use it for some quick stuff.
• There are things we could do to enhance Research besides leveraging AI. I'd like multi-field searching with NEAR or WITHIN searching so I could search all of my journals for a Scripture NEAR or WITHIN x WORDS a topic. I could leverage some powerful searches with just these two enhancements.
• "If" we do something along the lines of AI in the future (and I'm not promising anything specific, as AI is still in its early stages, so it still involves watching to see where it goes), my personal preference would be something that would supplement our current search engine and not replace our current search engine. In fact, my recommendation would be that to make it an optional install (kind of like we did with Atlas/Timeline). We realize there are schools that are going to restrict the use of AI tools, and we want Accordance in as many hands as possible. "If" we do something along the lines of AI in the future, I personally recommend that it be completely optional so that customers who want it can purchase/install it. Customers who aren't interested in it or who would be restricted from using it won't purchase/install it. Let the customer make the choice.
• There is one area where I personally believe AI could make for a useful tool for a wide swath of Accordance users, even though who generally wouldn't use AI. I won't spill it publicly yet though. 
• I've taken various AI tools for a spin for a while, and I've been personally been doing less with AI in general and leveraging more "HI" (Human Intelligence). For example, I was using an AI-powered app to check my daily weather forecast, but I've noticed that AI can still create some wild changes in temperatures or even forecasts. I've now been relying on a forecast that's generated by actual human meteorologists who live in the area where the forecasts are being written.

[cweber]

Since there are Python programming libraries (e.g LangChain) for “AI”, an Accordance API could be the avenue for curious users to opt in and write their own code and use it. Nobody at all would have their individual code unless individuals collaborated over that between themselves.
 

There’d also be no issue for Accordance as it’d be provided as is, use at your own expense.

 

Edited August 5 by cweber

[jlm]

I recently had a 30-day trial of the L company’s AI features and I couldn’t wait for it to end. I had high hopes that it would help me find things where a literal search would produce too much information (because a search term is common or has multiple meanings) or too little information (because some books use synonyms of the search terms). It never produced a useful search result, and in fact only gave results where search terms occurred literally. So in that, at least, I would say the competition has no lead on Accordance.

 

 The subscription also includes other AI features. Of these, summarization could be useful, but in the course of 30 days, I never needed to use it. I definitely don’t want AI to write my homily.

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

On 8/5/2024 at 3:52 PM, cweber said:

Since there are Python programming libraries (e.g LangChain) for “AI”, an Accordance API could be the avenue for curious users to opt in and write their own code and use it. Nobody at all would have their individual code unless individuals collaborated over that between themselves.

 

I'm curious to more API feedback. Keep sending it.