Author: Aaron J. Snoswell, Research Fellow in AI Accountability, Queensland University of Technology

Artificial intelligence (AI) prophets and newsmongers are forecasting the end of the generative AI hype, with talk of an impending catastrophic “model collapse”. But how realistic are these predictions? And what is model collapse anyway? Discussed in 2023, but popularised more recently, “model collapse” refers to a hypothetical scenario where future AI systems get progressively dumber due to the increase of AI-generated data on the internet. The need for data Modern AI systems are built using machine learning. Programmers set up the underlying mathematical structure, but the actual “intelligence” comes from training the system to mimic patterns in data. But…