Reviewed before publication
Notes
Notes are short, dated texts on questions of method. None has been published yet; this page sets out what they will address and the rules they follow.
Current status
Planned The first notes are planned. No note has been published so far.
Open The external specialist in philology who is to review each note before publication has not yet been named. Until then, no note will appear.
Once notes are published, each will carry the following details:
- Date
- The day of publication.
- Author
- Who wrote the note.
- Review
- A statement that the note was reviewed, and when. The reviewer is named only with their consent.
- Sources
- Source, edition and place for every quotation.
- Corrections
- Every later change, dated, at the end of the note.
Planned topics
The notes are to address four fields. They describe areas of work, not announced publications.
Citation fidelity
How can one show that AI attributes nothing to a source that the source does not contain? Notes on quotation checks, test sets and measurement.
Sovereign and secure operation
How do holdings, indexes and models stay under the control of the institutions responsible for them? Notes on protecting the integrity of data and on disclosing where systems run.
Governance of AI applied to religious and historical texts
Where does philology end and interpretation begin? Notes on the limits that tools working with such texts should observe.
Link back to the source and ownership
How can holdings be digitised and made findable without being taken from the institutions that keep them? Notes on crediting sources and on the digital return of dispersed holdings, undertaken only together with those concerned.
Rules for every note
- Every note is reviewed before publication by an external specialist in philology. AI does not replace scholarship.
- Arabic texts are also read by a native-speaking editor before publication.
- No statements on current religious or political questions.
- No fatwas, no religious legal rulings, no theological assessment, no ranking of schools of law, and no judgement on the authenticity of hadith.
- Neutrality between states: no note takes the side of one state against another.
- Every quotation names its source, edition and place, and every figure comes with an evidence card and a methods report.
- A note that concerns tools operated by a company belonging to the founder of the Initiative opens with a disclosure notice; see Disclosure.
- Corrections are dated and recorded. Nothing is changed without notice.
Suggestions and corrections
Suggestions for topics and notices of errors are welcome through the Contact page. Please note that the Initiative does not answer questions of religious law.