[mtlmtlmtlmtl]

So what is ChatGPT supposed to be useful for if people need to understand what the answer is in order to ask the "correct" question? Clearly the person didn't pick up on this closed/non-closed distinction which is why they ended up asking on a forum instead of reformulating.

I think GPT just saw "entropy" and "system" and predicted 2nd law. Which is the sort of low effort response you might get if you ask random non-experts on the internet.

[dwringer]

> So what is ChatGPT supposed to be useful for if people need to understand what the answer is in order to ask the "correct" question?

Personally I think there's still a lot of value in mere rephrasing, recontextualizing, perspective shifting, and occasional insightful connection that ChatGPT can do even if it's all using information you already ostensibly know.

As it is often said that one never learns a topic more deeply than when they teach it to others, ChatGPT can serve as the ultimate "rubber duck" coworker for any subject. I'm not sure what we can do about users not using critical thinking, or expecting the machine to do that part for them. There are plenty of non-AI sources of misinformation that can readily be taken uncritically too, though, so it's not necessarily a new problem.

[DonHopkins]

No, rubber ducks are still the ultimate rubber ducks, because they don't talk back with industrial grade overconfident bullshit that misleads and confuses you.

[dwringer]

Is there a body of evidence that suggests people get more misled and confused after using things like ChatGPT? It seems like a reasonable hypothesis, but my own experience doesn't necessarily support it. I've used the language model at character.ai for a bit and have found it to be clarifying in a sense. When the model spits out some overconfident misinformation, it's a great opportunity to argue with the bot about it in ways one could never argue with another person - certainly not a stranger, at least.

Perhaps I've been confused and misled so badly I don't realize it, so all I can really say is I think it's premature to assume people will be any more misled or confused by technologies like ChatGPT when all they have to do now is get on the internet or flip on a TV to be personally targeted with misleading and confusing information already. I think there's very real potential for the technology to give people a lever against misinformation if it helps them understand and explore their own thoughts/thought processes.

I guess to me, fundamentally, it's a question of who's the one with agency over using it, and to what end. I'd be much more comfortable once we can fit models like this on home computers and worry less about them suddenly trying to sell us sponsored products or convince us of some ideology because their creator was paid to do so.