Is this a Turing test? - By ChatGPT

Interesting concept but too much "telling" rather than "showing". Btw, I asked ChatGPT to write a story (well several actually) and it was boring as hell. It can only regurgitate and isn't original. I wonder how many years down the line this will be possible. Seems still a long way off.

Quoting Benkei

Interesting concept but too much "telling" rather than "showing"

I disagree. “Show don’t tell” is an American thing, useful for screenwriting and some styles of fiction. Many of the greatest writers have been tellers.

I thought this was great up to the last paragraph, which was a big let-down. The story was very well told and fascinating but then nothing came of it; the last paragraph adds nothing, merely embellishing what had been said in the previous paragraph.

So I don’t know what to vote. The author is a good writer but this story is unsatisfying.

I found it well written, with a good flow, and based on a good idea but a bit too "flat" and factual. I am missing a motive, some tension, emotions motivating John. For instance, what originally hampers John's writing could be fear of other people's judgment; he could find solace initially in a non-judgmental AI, but then... the AI could bite back, or something.

Quoting Jamal

I disagree. “Show don’t tell” is an American thing, useful for screenwriting and some styles of fiction. Many of the greatest writers have been tellers.

You may. I think @Olivier5 probably states it better: too factual for my taste.

Reply to Benkei Yes, and I think the reason it seems too factual is that nothing story-like happens, or it has no shape, or there is not much of an ending, or however you want to see it. From this perspective, my comment was the most perspicacious. :grin:

Quoting Jamal

perspicacious

What's that about sweat?

Reply to Benkei Yes, the sweat of my mind.

I think this is an AI story actually. It is asked to write a story about someone who submitted and AI story and won... some sort of self reflection loop...

Reply to Tobias That occurred to me too.

Reply to Jamal Reply to Tobias I suspect an AI would rely very heavily on "plot" to write a story and here we don't have much in way of that. The lack of dialogue raises the likelihood again though. If you don't tell ChatGPT, for instance, to include dialogue, it doesn't.

Is this a Turing test?

Is the story a Turing test?
Are we supposed to read the story and wonder whether the author is human or AI.
Yeah.
It reminds me of Searle's Chinese Room.

The author has been inspired re the potential for automatic, generated tomfoolery. Input > Output. Perhaps the 'Abstract Conspiracy' discussion? Previously, he might have relied on using books of prompts. This time, it's coming from experience, I think :chin:

Quoting Caldwell

John downloaded the program and fed it all of his past writing, as well as some of his favorite stories. Within minutes, the AI had come up with a rough outline for a tale about a man who discovers a hidden underground city filled with advanced technology.

Now that story might have been worth reading! Perhaps the author has dug deep in the labyrinth of his mind and dreams of becoming a SuperAI...

Quoting Caldwell

After several days of intense collaboration, John had a finished story that he was proud of. He submitted it to the contest, and was thrilled when he found out that he had won.

Yay. A mix of human and machine. So, emotionally satisfying and not robotic.

Quoting Caldwell

Thanks to the AI's help, John had managed to create a truly original and captivating story. He knew that he couldn't have done it without the AI, and he was grateful for the assistance it had provided.

The ending of this story. Do we have the answer to the title?
If the last paragraph is flat, then who is to blame - the human or the machine?
The author, of course, knows the answer to that one!
Any criticism can be answered with: "It wisnae me, guv, it was the 'pooter!".
In an English accent, of course :wink:

***

I like it. The author is having fun :up:

Quoting Jamal

I thought this was great up to the last paragraph, which was a big let-down.

I agree, or the writer suffered from very low esteem. The algorithms we call AI now days aren't yet so great. But with a human touch, with someone who knows what he is doing, it's different. A Google-translate text has to be gone through to make sense of it. Otherwise, it's obvious to be something concocted with Google translate. Now a writing competition usually sets the bar a bit higher as (at least usually) the judges.

So perhaps @Tobias is right. Flat for purpose, nice touch.

I would have ended the story with an Indian businessman, who hired a team of cheaply paid, yet talented ghostwriters, raising a glass of wine to John's win in the annual writing competition and being more confident as ever that the intended IPO will go through.

I expected there to be a twist at the end and feel a little jipped.

Quite incisive.

An open question is if the story is a Turing test. Well, a normal human probably wouldn't think of it as so and would just comment on the lack-luster ending and shallow conflict. A machine would likely fixate on whether or not it is being tested. Yes, I get it: I'm playing into it.

So really, the test is being administered to us, and the status of John or the A.I. is irrelevant. A meta-Turing test, if you will.

But then again, there is definitely more to it than just that.

edit: this might be the most elaborate and deft trolling I've ever encountered, if it can even be called that

My guess is that this was submitted by a relatively new member.

edit: I have a good idea of who it was, but it doesn't really matter, honestly. Good writing is good writing, even if it is at someone's expense.

another edit: this was written by a professional writer; it is exactly 200 words long, and not a word is wasted

Quoting Caldwell

Thanks to the AI's help, John had managed to create a truly original and captivating story. He knew that he couldn't have done it without the AI, and he was grateful for the assistance it had provided.

Okay, this seems important. A machine would likely read this as the AI not getting enough credit, and a normal person would likely view the gratitude as satisfactory recompense for the work the AI did. A machine would probably read this as unfair, thus giving a different response from the typical person, differentiating themselves from a human. This is if the machine is capable of identifying with other machines.

edit: so yes, this is definitely a Turing Test

Reply to ToothyMaw Congratulations. You failed. By obsessing about machine feelings you've disclosed yourself as machine.

Reply to Benkei

:razz:

Quoting Benkei

Interesting concept but too much "telling" rather than "showing". Btw, I asked ChatGPT to write a story (well several actually) and it was boring as hell. It can only regurgitate and isn't original. I wonder how many years down the line this will be possible. Seems still a long way off.

Quoting Tobias

I think this is an AI story actually. It is asked to write a story about someone who submitted and AI story and won... some sort of self reflection loop...

This story was indeed written by ChatGPT. I asked it to "write a 200 word story about a man who uses an AI to write a story to win a competition".

All I did was remove 19 words to meet the word requirement.

Quoting Michael

This story was indeed written by ChatGPT. I asked it to "write a 200 word story about a man who uses an AI to write a story to win a competition".

:smile:
As simple as that?! Is that all you did?
I thought that it would involve an input of specific words, a name, and then a creative tweaking of the output...
Well done, anyway. It certainly fooled me. Damned clever machine. Where can I get one :chin: :flower:

Well done ChatGPT!

Better writing (style, lexicon and all) than I could ever manage. :rage: Hrrmpf!

Quoting Michael

This story was indeed written by ChatGPT. I asked it to "write a 200 word story about a man who uses an AI to write a story to win a competition".

All I did was remove 19 words to meet the word requirement.

Sometimes things are complex and laden with meaning. More often they are not. It is very cleverly done though.

Quoting Amity

Well done, anyway. It certainly fooled me.

Me too...

Quoting Michael

This story was indeed written by ChatGPT.

I felt relieved. I downvoted it. :smile:

Quoting Jamal

I disagree. “Show don’t tell” is an American thing, useful for screenwriting and some styles of fiction. Many of the greatest writers have been tellers.

... and those greatest writers were boring as hell, too.

In my opinion a novel or a short story should roll in front of the eyes of imagination of the reader like a movie. Because life is like a movie, that's why they make movies roll like life.

Unless you mean that many of the greatest writers of the nineteenth century were tellers is banks, and they secretly wrote stories for publication, because the bank contract distinctly disallowed them to publish novels.

Reply to god must be atheist Each to their own, GM. You like what you like, and that’s cool.

Only, spare a thought for those poor souls like me who actually enjoy Proust, Borges, Tolstoy, and Nabokov.

Quoting Jamal

Proust, Borges, Tolstoy, and Nabokov.

Nabokov I think was 20th century; but the rest, 19th. You like what you like, too, no denying it. I won't stand between you and your enjoyment. My point is that it's not precisely Americanism to turn away from "telling". It is worldwide, because people like objects, tend to gravitate toward the lowest energy level. It takes more energy to read "telling", because for most, not for you, reading stagnant "telling" is unenjoyable, hence more energy is needed to focus the attention on the uncaptivating subject.

Lenin said, that is, Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, and I agree, "To us, the most important art form is film." True. You really, but really can sink into a low level of energy output to follow the line of events.

Plus, perhaps Lenin realized also, that film is like life, because life is like film. You visually walk through it; sure, there are tastes, smells, touches along the way, but the memories you capture are always on visual spaces, and they resembles more-or-less the image set-ups on the silver screen. The paintings of the masters, and the dreams of humans, also resemble movie scenes more than long passages of "telling".

Yes, I don't deny that James Joyce, Victor Hugo and Lermontov were geniuses; but their time as entertainers for the larger masses has passed.

Reply to god must be atheist Borges and Proust were twentieth century too, and plenty of more recent and contemporary writers do a lot of telling.

But sure, movies are great too. When I want something that feels like a movie, I go for a movie every time, rather than a book.

That said, "telling" is not simply prose without dialogue. Look at my two pieces; there are events unfolding. Telling and showing alternate. But there is hardly any dialogue, if any at all.

Reply to god must be atheist Yes, it's about balance I guess. And there's a reason we call it "telling a story."

Dialogue alone also does not guarantee the absence of "telling". ETC.

Reply to Jamal :up: