Hugging Face Scientist Doubts AI's Ability to Drive Scientific Discovery

Thomas Wolf, chief scientist at Hugging Face, casts doubt on the ability of current AI systems to make the groundbreaking scientific discoveries some leading labs anticipate. While large language models (LLMs) excel at answering questions, Wolf argues they struggle with the more challenging task of formulating truly original questions—the crux of scientific progress. He uses the game of Go as an analogy: mastering the rules is impressive, but inventing the game itself is a far greater feat. Similarly, he believes current AI models, acting as 'yes-men on servers,' lack the capacity to challenge existing assumptions and pose truly novel scientific questions.