Will AI replace Physicists?
Estimated risk score: 62 out of 100
Moderate replacement risk
Estimate from published task research, not reviewed by a person · how we estimate
Within about 19 points for 4 in 5 of the jobs we checked (43 to 81).
For the occupation as a whole, from ratings of its 15 O*NET tasks published in 2023 and calibrated to our hand scores. A specialty inside it can sit higher or lower.
O*NET-SOC 19-2012.00 · Life, Physical, and Social Science
Tasks rated in 2023 as ones AI could do or speed up
Tasks a GPT-4-class model could do, or do in half the time or less: 8 of its 15 rated tasks; the first 6 are shown. In O*NET’s words.
- Describe and express observations and conclusions in mathematical terms.
- Perform complex calculations as part of the analysis and evaluation of data, using computers.
- Write research proposals to receive funding.
- Analyze data from research conducted to detect and measure physical phenomena.
- Design computer simulations to model physical data so that it can be better understood.
- Report experimental results by writing papers for scientific journals or by presenting information at scientific conferences.
Tasks rated in 2023 as not sped up by AI
Tasks such a model was rated as not speeding up or taking over: 1 of its 15 rated tasks. In O*NET’s words.
- Observe the structure and properties of matter, and the transformation and propagation of energy, using equipment such as masers, lasers, and telescopes, to explore and identify the basic principles governing these phenomena.
What the job is
Conduct research into physical phenomena, develop theories on the basis of observation and experiments, and devise methods to apply physical laws and theories.
Also called: Health Physicist, Rheologist, Aerophysicist, Cloud Physicist, Space Physicist, Fluid Dynamicist, Plasma Physicist, Electrodynamicist.
Source. This site includes information from the O*NET 30.1 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license. O*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. USDOL/ETA has not approved, endorsed, or tested these modifications. (O*NET, CC BY 4.0.) Task ratings: Eloundou, Manning, Mishkin and Rock (2023), “GPTs are GPTs: An Early Look at the Labor Market Impact Potential of Large Language Models”, data used under the MIT licence (licence texts). Our change: we averaged the ratings over this occupation’s tasks and calibrated them to our 0–100 scale. It is not a prediction about any one person and not career advice. Disagree? Write to hello@yourstopwashit.com. How we estimate