How to Use AI In Your Genealogy Research + Other Topics

Andy and Thomas MacEntee discussed using AI in genealogy research.

[@LindaSchreiber]

Fascinating !!! Thanks !!!

[@FamilyHistoryFanatics]

Glad you enjoyed it

[@mariajohnson8023]

You solved my problem. Add about the 4640 mark. There was mention of circuit minister Who only performed baptisms every six weeks. In 2008 I was able to Obtain a baptism record on Great grandmother In cheboygan michigan The baptism was performed in May 19 0 3. But she was born February 1st 19 0 3.

[@nikkisuethatcher1334]

❤

[@mariacapaldi5062]

Here is the limerick I got: In the world of genealogy's embrace, Families' roots we eagerly trace, With charts and records, Old tales are restored, In history's dance, we find our place.

[@CeliaLewis]

Very interesting - love the examples and discussion about sources etc. Good discussion!!

[@FamilyHistoryFanatics]

Thank you!

[@mariajohnson8023]

I've been the person doing the research for 30 plus years, but not everyone has the same values to preserve.

[@ValorieZimmerman]

James Tanner has a "sunday class" on the BYU chan on new things in genealogy, and he spend most of the time talking about AI. Decent discussion.

[@FamilyHistoryFanatics]

Thanks for the tip.

[@woodturner1954]

I have the same problem... what to do with all the stuff left to me. I have my grandfathers ARMY Air Force uniform and all the metals from WWII. Same with my dad's WWII stuff. Stuffed dolls, wire rim glasses, dad's baby shoes, and so much more. What do I do with it. I'm doing the family genealogy but no one else in the family cares ???

[@lollyfullerton]

I’ve used AI for writing a biography of my ancestors - using my ancestors’ timeline.

[@FamilyHistoryFanatics]

Cool. Devon might like to feature that on her new channel @WriteYourFamilyHistory

[@mariajohnson8023]

Give the family the heirlooms while you're still alive. Marking your name on an item holds no meaning. You'll have 1 member who will literally put everything on a curb ! Horrific because all family history documents, etc are either with the landfill or bon fire.

[@ValorieZimmerman]

there is a good Facebook group about using AI for genealogy -- and none of it is search. Most of the useful stuff is in organizing information you feed to it. It can also do OCR. Some have successfully asked it to create a gedcom out of an informative obituary, create a table out of some information, etc.

[@FamilyHistoryFanatics]

I'll need to follow-up with you about how folks are using AI. I have dabbled a little more while on the unintended sabbatical but I will admit I cut off all genealogy discussions and focused on my projects and my family.

[@ValorieZimmerman]

@@FamilyHistoryFanatics It's so important to take time off. Calling it a sabbatical is a great idea!

[@positivecynic365]

My concern about copyright and AI is that the AI has absolutely no respect or understanding of copyright. It will skim from copyrighted material, pretend that the writing or art it creates counts as original, and offer zero attribution. It is a huge problem that makes me wary of using AI for anything because I believe people deserve credit and compensation for their creative work. AI at best is derivative and a lot of the time is just fancy theft. This is not even getting into the scary possibilities like what happens when AI advances past the point of human capabilities and what happens if someone instructs it to wipe out humanity or it takes the initiative to do that on its own. It has absolutely no morality, so killing off humanity in order to stop global warming is absolutely not outside of the realm of possibilities. I realize this is far outside of the scope of this genealogy discussion, but anyone using AI needs to be very careful and very skeptical in my opinion.

[@ValorieZimmerman]

Right at the end you are describing "guided research" at FSearch

[@FamilyHistoryFanatics]

Yep. Thanks

[@learningcurvenz]

I think Andy when you alter or enhance AI generated material you would automatically establish copyright.

[@FamilyHistoryFanatics]

That's not exactly my understanding of the law. In time, we'll see how things play out.

[@danjohnson6207]

How can the information that comes up on A1 be corrected?

[@ValorieZimmerman]

If you start with your own material and ask AI to do the things it is good at, such as summarizing, pulling out names, dates, facts such as relationships and organizing that, and specify that you want a quote of "what phrase from the will states this fact" in the table, you will be able t fact-check very easily. If you ask it to make stuff up, that is what it will do.