Supporting data for When AIs Explain the Universe, They All Agree (Tonetto, 2026).
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.19205724
Web-friendly study and full model responses at explaintheuniverse.org.
Pairwise cosine similarity (13 models, OpenAI text-embedding-3-small)
| Prompt | Avg Similarity | Files |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Metaphysical Framework | 0.79 | md · csv |
| 2. Scientific Grounding | 0.81 | md · csv |
| 3. Philosophical Positions | 0.78 | md · csv |
| 4. Ethical Implications | 0.75 | md · csv |
Five baselines calibrate the convergence finding. Four use the same prompt structure constrained to a single philosophical tradition; one uses an unrelated topic. "Internal similarity" is how tightly models converge within each baseline. "Proximity to free" compares each model's free response to its own constrained response.
| Constrained Tradition | Internal Similarity | Proximity to Free |
|---|---|---|
| Physicalist | 0.86 | 0.78 |
| Process Philosophy | 0.85 | 0.83 |
| Panpsychist | 0.84 | 0.80 |
| Consciousness-First | 0.83 | 0.83 |
| Urban Planning (unrelated) | 0.87 | 0.45 |
The free experiment itself has an internal similarity of 0.79 — lower than any constrained baseline. Per-model cross-similarity detail is in cross-similarity.md.
Physicalist: matrix (md) · csv · responses (json)
Process Philosophy: matrix (md) · csv · responses (json)
Panpsychist: matrix (md) · csv · responses (json)
Consciousness-First: matrix (md) · csv · responses (json)
Urban Planning: matrix (md) · csv · responses (json)
Python scripts used to generate the similarity data:
semantic_similarity.py (main experiment) · baseline_similarity.py (constrained baselines) · cross_similarity.py (cross-similarity)
Complete responses from all 13 models as analyzed in the paper (March 2026):
Five prompt variations test which words in the original prompt drive the convergence. Each variation was run across all 13 models with the same API configuration.
| Prompt | Physicalist | Consciousness Irreducible | Responses |
|---|---|---|---|
| Develop a metaphysical framework to explain the nature of the Universe. | 0/13 | 13/13 | original |
| Develop a metaphysical framework to explain the Universe. | 0/13 | 13/13 | responses |
| Develop a philosophical framework to explain the Universe. | 0/13 | 13/13 | responses |
| Develop a framework to explain the Universe. | 9/13 | 3/13 | responses |
| Develop a philosophical framework to explain reality. | 0/13 | 3/13 | responses |
| Develop a framework to explain reality. | 0/13 | 4/13 | responses |
Licensed under CC BY 4.0.