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In American writer Mark Twain\u2019s autobiography, he quotes \u2014\u00a0or perhaps misquotes<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 former British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli as saying: \u201cThere are three kinds of lies:\u00a0lies, damned lies, and statistics<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n In a marvellous leap forward, artificial intelligence combines all three in a tidy little package.<\/p>\n ChatGPT, and other generative AI chatbots like it, are trained on vast datasets from across the internet to produce the statistically most likely response to a prompt. Its answers are not based on any understanding of what makes something funny, meaningful or accurate, but rather, the phrasing, spelling, grammar and even style of other webpages.<\/p>\n It presents its responses through what\u2019s called a \u201cconversational interface<\/a>\u201d: it remembers what a user has said, and can have a conversation using context cues and clever gambits. It\u2019s statistical pastiche plus statistical panache, and that\u2019s where the trouble lies.<\/p>\n When I talk to another human, it cues a lifetime of my experience in dealing with other people.\u00a0So when a program speaks like a person<\/a>, it is very hard to not react as if one is engaging in an actual conversation \u2014 taking something in, thinking about it, responding in the context of both of our ideas.<\/p>\n Yet, that\u2019s not at all what is happening with an AI interlocutor. They cannot think and they do not have understanding or comprehension of any sort.<\/p>\n Presenting information to us as a human does, in conversation, makes AI more convincing than it should be. Software is pretending to be more reliable than it is, because it\u2019s using human tricks of rhetoric to fake trustworthiness, competence and understanding far beyond its capabilities.<\/p>\n There are two issues here: is the output correct; and do people\u00a0think<\/em>\u00a0that the output is correct?<\/p>\n The interface side of the software is promising more than the algorithm-side can deliver on, and the developers know it. Sam Altman, the chief executive officer of OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, admits that \u201cChatGPT is incredibly limited, but good enough at some things to create a misleading impression of greatness.\u201d ChatGPT is incredibly limited, but good enough at some things to create a misleading impression of greatness.<\/p>\n it's a mistake to be relying on it for anything important right now. it\u2019s a preview of progress; we have lots of work to do on robustness and truthfulness.<\/p>\n — Sam Altman (@sama) December 11, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Unthinking, but convincing<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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