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   Nazo (nazokiyoubinbou@urusai.social)'s status on Monday, 24-Feb-2025 20:29:19 JST Nazo

   • myrmepropagandist
   • Prof. Emily M. Bender(she/her)
   • John Wehrle

   @joby @futurebird @CptSuperlative @emilymbender Yeah, there are a lot of little scenarios where it can actually be useful and that's one of them. The best thing about that is it merely stimulates you to create on your own and you can just keep starting over and retrying until you have a pretty good pre-defined case in your head to start from with the real person.

   As long as one doesn't forget that things may go wildly differently IRL, it can help build up towards a better version of what might otherwise be a tough conversation.

   • Embed this notice
     myrmepropagandist (futurebird@sauropods.win)'s status on Monday, 24-Feb-2025 20:29:16 JST myrmepropagandist

     in reply to

     • Prof. Emily M. Bender(she/her)
     • Samuel Smith ✅
     • John Wehrle

     @Jirikiha @nazokiyoubinbou @joby @CptSuperlative @emilymbender

     If I asked chat GPT to "turn off the porch light" and it said "OK, I've turned off the light on your porch." I would know that it has not really done this. It has no way to access my porch light. I would realize that it is just giving a text answer that fits the context of the previous prompts.

     So, why do people think it makes sense to ask chat GPT to explain how it produced a response?

   • Embed this notice
     Samuel Smith ✅ (jirikiha@mastodon.cloud)'s status on Monday, 24-Feb-2025 20:29:18 JST Samuel Smith ✅

     in reply to

     • myrmepropagandist
     • Prof. Emily M. Bender(she/her)
     • John Wehrle

     @nazokiyoubinbou @joby @futurebird @CptSuperlative @emilymbender I use LLMs generally for two things: Things I know how to do, but don't have time (but can quickly check the accuracy), and things I don't know how to do, but can check the results. Fermented statistics is useful when you know and account for its limitations. It sucks if you don't because you often get a confident answer that is plausible, but wrong.

   • Embed this notice
     myrmepropagandist (futurebird@sauropods.win)'s status on Monday, 24-Feb-2025 20:29:18 JST myrmepropagandist

     in reply to

     • Prof. Emily M. Bender(she/her)
     • Samuel Smith ✅
     • John Wehrle

     @Jirikiha @nazokiyoubinbou @joby @CptSuperlative @emilymbender

     "Confidently Wrong: The Brave New World of LLMs"

     This would be a good title for a mini-essay for the faculty newsletter on this topic. I'm deeply unsettled when people use these systems in ways that imply a deep misunderstanding about their limitations and design. Can we please just understand what this system *is* doing and what it is not doing?

     Rich Felker repeated this.