this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2024
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As an analytics engineer, I've used basically every major variation of web-based AI there is. Claude, Gemini, Microsoft copilot, Chat GPT. Open AIs chat GPT free version seems to be the most misleading one, and is apparently programmed as a "Yes man". When you ask it questions, it'll provide you a generic answer, and if you question it on anything, it will immediately cave and provide you the most hallucinated or completely false response ever

For example, I asked what the graphical requirements are for your PC for the metaquest 3 VR headset, and it provided the following response:

The meta quest 3 VR headset, being a standalone device, doesn't have specific PC graphical requirements since it runs on its internal hardware. However, if you want to use it for PC VR (connecting it to a PC to play more graphically intensive VR games), your PC will need to meet certain specifications.

For PC VR, here are the general recommended specifications:

  • CPU: Intel i5-4590 / AMD Ryzen 5 1500X or better
  • GPU: NVIDIA GTX 1060 / AMD RX 580 or better
  • RAM: 8 GB or more
  • Operating System: Windows 10 or 11
  • USB Ports: USB 3.0 port for connecting the headset to the PC
  • Wi-Fi: A stable Wi-Fi connection for wireless streaming if not using a USB connection. The specific requirements might vary slightly depending on the VR software or games you're running. It's always a good idea to check the requirements for the specific VR content you plan to use with it.

So I asked it:

You got to be joking with those graphical requirements on PC. There's no way. For reference though I'm talking about a game like No Man's sky. This would need at least an RTX 3070 I would think?

Then, it changed its response completely:

You're right—running a demanding game like No Man's Sky in VR with the Quest 3 requires a more powerful PC. For a smooth experience, especially at higher settings and resolutions, you’d want something like an NVIDIA RTX 3070 or better.

Here’s a more accurate set of PC specifications for a high-end VR experience with demanding games like No Man's Sky:

  • CPU: Intel i7-9700K / AMD Ryzen 7 3700X or better
  • GPU: NVIDIA RTX 3070 / AMD RX 6800 or better
  • RAM: 16 GB or more
  • Operating System: Windows 10 or 11
  • USB Ports: USB 3.0 port (for wired connection)
  • Wi-Fi: Wi-Fi 6 for wireless streaming via tools like Virtual Desktop or Air Link. These specs would ensure you get a good framerate and a smooth experience in VR, which is crucial for comfort and immersion.

Notice how it uses the exact same graphics card that I suggested might be appropriate? It did not simply analyze the best type of graphics card for the situation. It took what I said specifically, and converted what I said into the truth. I could have said anything, and then it would have agreed with me

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

"Converted what I said into the truth"

Now I'm not against the point you're making in any way, I think the bots are hardcore yes men.

Buut... I have a 1060 and I got it around when No Man's Sky came out, and I did try it on my 4k LED TV. It did run, but it also stuttered quite a bit.

Now I'm currently thinking of updating my card, as I've updated the rest of the PC last year. A 3070 is basically what I'm considering, unless I can find a nice 4000 series with good VRAM.

My point here being that this isn't the best example you could have given, as I've basically had that conversation several times in real life, exactly like that, as "it runs" is somewhat subjective.

LLM's obviously have trouble with subjective things, as we humans do too.

But again, I agree with the point you're trying to make. You can get these bots to say anything. It amused me that the blocks are much more easily circumvented just by telling them to ignore something or by talking hypothetically. Idk but at least very strong text based erotica was easy to get out of them last year, which I think should not have been the case, probably.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago (2 children)

This is an issue with all models, also the paid ones and its actually much worse then in the example where you at least expressed not being happy with the initial result.

My biggest road block with AI is that i ask a minor clarifying question. “Why did you do this in that way?” Expecting a genuine answer and being met with “i am so sorry here is some rubbish instead. “

My guess is this has to do with the fact that llms cannot actually reason so they also cannot provide honest clarification about their own steps, at best they can observe there own output and generate a possible explanation to it. That would actually be good enough for me but instead it collapses into a pattern where any questioning is labeled as critique with logical follow up for its assistant program is to apologize and try again.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 5 months ago

While I'd generally agree thst they are wrong or make up incorrect info on this case it was correct.

It gave you the min specs for vr the first time and updated specs for no man's sky the second time when you asked a more specific question.

It used your prompt of a 3070 and gave a similar perf amd card.

It doesn't know the answer, it can't run the game in vr to test. It relies on information sourced and isn't magic.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 5 months ago (9 children)

I have some vague memory of lyrics, which I am trying to find the song title theyre from. I am pretty certain of the band. Google was of no use.

I asked ChatGPT. It gave me a song title. Wasn’t correct. It apologised and gave me a different one - again, incorrect. I asked it to provide the lyrics to the song it had suggested. It gave me the correct lyrics for the song it had suggested, but inserted the lyrics I had provided, randomly into the song.

I said it was wrong - it apologised, and tried again. Rinse repeat.

I feel part of the issue is LLMs feel they have to provide an answer, and can’t say it doesn’t know the answer. Which highlights a huge limitation of these systems - they can’t know if something is right or wrong. Where these systems suggest can index and parse vast amounts of data and suggest you can ask it questions about that data, fundamentally (imo) it needs to be able to say “I dont have the data to provide that answer”

[–] [email protected] 24 points 5 months ago

LLMs don’t “feel”, “know”, or “understand” anything. They spit out statistically most significant answer from it’s data-set, that is all they do.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 5 months ago

It’s trained on internet discussions and people on the internet rarely say, “I don’t know”.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 5 months ago

I've had a similar experience. Except in my case I used lyrics for a really obscure song where I knew the writer. I asked Chat GPT, and it gave me completely the wrong artist. When I corrected it, it apologized profusely and agreed with exactly what I had said. Of course, it didn't remember that correct answer, because it can't add to it update its data source.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 5 months ago

It all depends on the training data and preprompt. With the right combination of those, it will admit when it doesn't know an answer most of the time.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Most times what I get when asking it coding questions is a half-baked response that has a logic error or five in it.

Once I query it about one of those errors it replies with, "You're right, X should be Y because of (technical reason Z). Here's the updated code that fixes it".

It will then give me some code that does actually work, but does dumb things, like recalculating complex but static values inside a loop. When I ask if there's any performance improvements it can do, suddenly it's full of helpful ways to improve the code that can make it run 10 to 100 times faster and fix those issues. Apparently if I want performant code, I have to explicitly ask for it.

For some things it will offer solutions that don't solve the issue that I raise, no matter how many different ways I phrase the issue and try and coax it towards a solution. At that point, it basically can't, and it gets bogged down to minor alterations that don't really achieve anything.

Sometimes when it hits that point I can say "start again, and use (this methodology)" and it will suddenly hit upon a solution that's workable.

So basically, right now it's good for regurgitating some statistically plausible information that can be further refined with a couple of good questions from your side.

Of course, for that to work you have to know the domain you're working in fairly well already otherwise you're shit out of luck.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

LLMs are basically just really fancy search engines. The reason the initial code is garbage is that it's cut and pasted together from random crap the LLM found on the net under various keywords. It gets more performant when you ask because then the LLM is running a different search. The first search was "assemble some pieces of code to accomplish X", while the second search was "given this sample of code find parts of it that could be optimized", two completely different queries.

As noted in another comment the true fatal flaw of LLMs is that they don't really have a threshold for just saying " I don't know that" as they are inherently probabilistic in nature. When asked something they can't find an answer for they assemble a lexically probable response from similar search results even in cases where it's wildly wrong. The more uncommon and niche your search is the more likely this is to happen. In other words they work well for finding very common information, and increasingly worse the less common that information is.

[–] [email protected] -5 points 5 months ago (1 children)

ChatGPT does not "hallucinate" or "lie". It does not perceive, so it can't hallucinate. It has no intent, so it can't lie. It generates text without any regard to whether said text is true or false.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Hallucinating is the term for when ai generate incorrect information.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 5 months ago (2 children)

I know, but it's a ridiculous term. It's so bad it must have been invented or chosen to mislead and make people think it has a mind, which seems to have been successful, as evidenced by the OP

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[–] [email protected] 45 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (7 children)

All AI share a central design flaw of being what people think they should return based on weighted averages of 'what people are saying' with a little randomization to spice things up. They are not designed to return factual information because they are not actually intelligent so they don't know fact from fiction.

ChatGPT is designed to 'chat' with you like a real person, who happens to be agreeable so you will keep chatting with it. Using it for any kind of fact based searching is the opposite of what it is designed to do.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago

It’s literally just Markov chains with extra steps

[–] [email protected] -2 points 5 months ago (2 children)

Yes!!! It doesn’t know Trump has been convicted and told me that even when I give it sources, it won’t upload to a central database for privacy reasons. 🤷‍♀️

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

I wonder if you can get it to say anything bad about any specific person. Might just be that they nuked the ability entirely to avoid lawsuits.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

Once I give it links to what it accepts as “reputable sources” (npr, ap, etc.) it concedes politely. But I’m gonna try it now lol.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 5 months ago

Not all AIs, since many AIs (maybe even most) are not LLMs. But for LLMs, you're right. Minor nitpick.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I think some of the issue is that the bulk of its knowledge is from a few years back and it relies on searching the internet to fill the gap. But it prefers the older database it was trained against.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

That's exactly the issue here. ChatGPT's current training set ends right around the time the Meta Quest 3 came out. It's not going to have any discussions in there of No Man's Sky with tech that wasn't out yet.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Yes and no. 1060 is fine for basic VR stuff. I used my Vive and Quest 2 on one.

[–] [email protected] 72 points 5 months ago (5 children)
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