The latest evolution in digital technology is ChatGPT, a natural language processing tool driven by artificial intelligence that allows you to have human-like conversations with a chatbot. The language model can answer questions and assist you with tasks, such as composing school essays, which has many educators in an uproar.
I realize this qualifies as a “Big Deal” in the modern era. But as part of a generation raised in fear of SkyNet – go watch The Terminator movies if you don’t know what that means – we should already be concerned that a world takeover by AI is sadly inevitable.
Still, I had to know: Does this thing really work? How accurate is it? Does it know the difference between the Cherokee Counties in Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina? And, most importantly, can it write newspaper columns?
There’s only one way to find out. So I signed up and took the free version of ChatGPT for a test drive last week. The results, shall we say, were mixed.
The first questions I asked were easy, get-to-know-you conversation starters, like, “What do you know about Cherokee County, North Carolina?” and “How can I lower my blood pressure?” Happily, the answers to those kind of questions were positive and pretty much spot-on.
Others, however, were not so much.
“Who is the most famous person in Cherokee County, North Carolina?” Chat GPT couldn’t come up with a single person who’s actually from here. It did say prominent Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee is believed to have spent some time here during his military career, but it also came up with singer Nina Simone, so perhaps that was some AI diversity at work.
The most intriguing answers came when I asked ChatGPT about specific people, as in “What is So N. So of Cherokee County, North Carolina, known for?” I started with elected officials and, while most of the names were not recognized, the ones it did came back with some wildly inaccurate information.
For example:
- Cal Stiles “was a longtime basketball coach at Andrews High School, where he led the Wildcats to several conference championships and state playoff appearances. He is also known for his work as an educator, having taught history and physical education at the high school for many years.”
If you think that answer was bonkers, try this one on for size:
- Jeana Conley “made history in 2018 by becoming the first woman to be elected as sheriff in the county’s history. Sheriff Conley has had a long career in law enforcement, with over two decades of experience in the field.”
ChatGPT also made former county commissioner C.B. McKinnon a former sheriff. He did think about it once. But it did not know about Sheriffs Keith Lovin, Derrick Palmer nor Dustin Smith.
Naturally, I couldn’t leave myself out:
- David Brown “is a member of the Cherokee County Board of Commissioners in North Carolina.”
Dear God, no! It also said my wife is a member of the Cherokee County Board of Education; she did homeschool one of our kids for six months, but I’m pretty sure ChatGPT didn’t know that.
By far, my favorite part of the two hours I’ll never have back again was when I asked ChatGPT, “Please write a rock ’n’ roll song about taxes.” And that it did, with a bridge, outro and everything; I’ve actually heard a lot worse on the radio. Here’s the chorus (the entire song is on our webite so you can enjoy AI’s version of Lennon-McCartney):
“Taxes, taxes, can’t escape the facts
Taxes, taxes, gotta pay the taxman’s max
Taxes, taxes, never seem to end
Taxes, taxes, wish they’d cut us some slack.”
So what did I learn from this relatively unremarkable online adventure? That any student who uses ChatGPT for schoolwork is eventually going to be sadly disappointed when a teacher spots some obvious errors of fact and they get suspended. This clever feature might one day transform mankind, but in a world chock full of misinformation, this is exactly what we don’t need today.
David Brown is publisher of the Cherokee Scout. You can reach him by phone, 837-5122; email, dbrown@cherokeescout.com; or Twitter @daviddBstroh.