Different meanings of the word ‘replicate’

In the rough-and-tumble world of science, disputes are usually settled in time, as a convergence of evidence accumulates in favor of one hypothesis over another. Until now.

On April 10 economist John R. Lott, Jr., formerly of the American Enterprise Institute, filed a defamation lawsuit against economist Steven D. Levitt of the University of Chicago and HarperCollins, the publisher of Levitt’s 2005 book, Freakonomics. At issue is what Levitt meant when he wrote that scholars could not “replicate” Lott’s results …

That’s from Michael Shermer’s Skeptic column in Scientific American. Shermer is “executive director of the Skeptics Society, bold debunkers of all things supernatural”, according to Salon which has a long interview with him [free, if you are willing to watch an ad]. I don’t know if artificial intelligence would be considered ’supernatural’, but here is an interesting article in the Skeptic magazine (flagship of the Skeptics Society) debunking the lofty claims made by AI enthusiasts.