Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • NEWS AND VIEWS

Argument technology for debating with humans

A fully autonomous computer system has been developed that can take part in live debates with people. The findings hint at a future in which artificial intelligence can help humans to formulate and make sense of complex arguments.
  1. Chris Reed

    1. Chris Reed is at the Centre for Argument Technology, University of Dundee, Dundee DD1 4HN, UK.

    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed  Google Scholar

The study of arguments has an academic pedigree stretching back to the ancient Greeks, and spans disciplines from theoretical philosophy to computational engineering. Developing computer systems that can recognize arguments in natural human language is one of the most demanding challenges in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). Writing in Nature, Slonim et al.1 report an impressive development in this field: Project Debater, an AI system that can engage with humans in debating competitions. The findings showcase how far research in this area has come, and emphasize the importance of robust engineering that combines different components, each of which handles a particular task, in the development of technology that can recognize, generate and critique arguments in debates.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Nature 591, 373-374 (2021)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-00539-5

References

  1. Slonim, N. et al. Nature 591, 379–384 (2021).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Lawrence, J. & Reed, C. Comput. Linguist. 45, 765–818 (2020).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Devlin, J., Chang, M.-W., Lee, K. & Toutanova, K. Preprint at https://arxiv.org/abs/1810.04805 (2018).

  4. Feigenbaum, E. A. Proc. 5th Int. Joint Conf. Artif. Intell. 1014–1029 (Morgan Kauffman, 1977).

    Google Scholar 

  5. van Eemeren, F. H. et al. Handbook of Argumentation Theory (Springer, 2014).

    Google Scholar 

  6. Hahn, U. Trends Cogn. Sci. 24, 363–374 (2020).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Levy, R., Yonatan, B., Hershcovich, D., Aharoni, E. & Slonim, N. Proc. COLING 2014, 25th Int. Conf. Comput. Linguist. Tech. Pap. 1489–1500 (2014).

  8. Trautmann, D., Daxenberger, J., Stab, C., Schütze, H. & Gurevych, I. Proc. AAAI Conf. Artif. Intell. 34, 9048–9056 (2020).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Rahwan, I., Zablith, F. & Reed, C. Artif. Intell. 171, 897–921 (2007).

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Subjects

Latest on:

Nature Careers

Jobs

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing

Search

Advanced search

Quick links