This is a paper I wrote for the Science and Society course at Sabanci University in the fall term of 2021.

Abstract: Thomas Kuhn brought about a new account of science, seeking to capture its socio-historical character, and coining the (initially not very well defined) term paradigm to discussions of philosophy of science. Since then, philosophers attempted to reconstruct the history of numerous scientific disciplines with Kuhn’s philosophical account of science to understand the developmental history of science better.

Artificial intelligence is a subfield of computer science that aims to build systems that have the intelligence properties of a human. Human intelligence is a very complex concept, a mystery not solved yet, and there is no consensus on how to achieve human intelligence in machines. There are several approaches to AI that characterized AI research in different periods, and this paper will focus on behavioral AI and deep learning. And this paper aims to determine whether the shift from behavioral AI to deep learning constitutes a Kuhnian paradigm shift and whether Kuhn’s account of science is compatible with the research patterns of these fields.