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This research note is a conversation between ChatGPT and a sociologist about the use of ChatGPT in knowledge production. ChatGPT is an artificial intelligence language model, programmed to analyse vast amounts of data, recognise patterns and generate human-like conversational responses based on that analysis. The research note takes an experimental form, following the shape of a dialogue, and was generated in real time, between the author and ChatGPT. The conversation reflects on, and is a reflexive contribution to, the study of artificial intelligence from a sociology of science perspective. It draws on the notion of reflexivity and adopts an ironic, parodic form to critically respond to the emergence of artificial intelligence language models, their affective and technical qualities, and thereby comments on their potential ethical, social and political significance within the humanities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the light of the recent growth of artificial intelligence (A!), and of its implications for understanding human behaviour, this paper evaluates the prospects for an association between sociology and artificial intelligence. Current presumptions about the distinction between human behaviour and artificial intelligence are identified through a survey of discussions about A! and 'expert systems'. These discussions exhibit a restricted view of sociological competence, a marked rhetoric of progress and a wide variation in assessments of the state of the art. By drawing upon recent themes in the social study of science, these discussions are shown to depend on certain key dichotomies and on an interpretive flexibility associated with the notions of intelligence and expertise. The range of possible associations between sociology and A! reflects the extent to which we are willing to adopt these features of Al discourse. It is suggested that one of the more important options is to view the Al phenomenon as an occasion for reassessing the central axiom of sociology that there is something distinctively `social' about human behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]