The best conversations I still have are with real people, but those are rare. With ChatGPT, I reliably have good conversations, whereas with people, it’s hit or miss, usually miss.

What AI does better:

  • It’s willing to discuss esoteric topics. Most humans prefer to talk about people and events.
  • It’s not driven by emotions or personal bias.
  • It doesn’t make mean, snide, sarcastic, ad hominem, or strawman responses.
  • It understands and responds to my actual view, even from a vague description, whereas humans often misunderstand me and argue against views I don’t hold.
  • It tells me when I’m wrong but without being a jerk about it.

Another noteworthy point is that I’m very likely on the autistic spectrum, and my mind works differently than the average person’s, which probably explains, in part, why I struggle to maintain interest with human-to-human interactions.

  • ContrarianTrail@lemm.eeOP
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    3 months ago

    It sounds like you are training yourself to be a poor communicator, abandoning any effort to become more understandable to actual humans.

    Based on what? That seems like a rather unwarranted assumption to me. My English vocabulary and grammar have never been better, and since I can now also talk to it instead of typing, my spoken English is much clearer and more confident as well.

    • JamesStallion
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      3 months ago

      You say yourself that you use the vaguest descriptions when talking to the bot and that it fills in the blanks for you. This is not a good way to practice speaking with human beings.

      The fact that you assumed I was talking about grammar is indicative of the problem. You clearly dislike others assuming you are talking about something you are not talking about, yet you do it yourself. That’s because misunderstandings are normal and learning to deal with them is an essential part of good communication.

      • ContrarianTrail@lemm.eeOP
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        3 months ago

        You say yourself that you use the vaguest descriptions when talking to the bot and that it fills in the blanks for you

        Not quite what I said.

        It understands and responds to my actual view, even from a vague description

        Yes, because I’m not a native english speaker and I’m way better at writing english than speaking it. If you transcribe my speech into text it’s a horrible word salad and it still understand perfectly what I mean and I don’t need to repeat myself endlessly and correct it on what I actually said. Contrast this with my discussions online, in writing, where I may spend 40 minutes spelling out an idea as clearly as I can and I’m still being misunderstood by a huge number of people. Like right now.

        • JamesStallion
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          3 months ago

          Regardless of why the bot is able to adapt to vagueness (or other communication problems), the fact that it can discourages you from overcoming those problems.

          Someone diagreeing withyou, or attempting to show you some other thing you might not have thought of or seen for yourself, is not always a misunderstanding. You need to entertain the possibility that sometimes you are wrong, unaware of something, or simply misunderstanding the other person yourself.

          • ContrarianTrail@lemm.eeOP
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            3 months ago

            This very discussion we’re having right now perfectly illustrates my point.

            The issue isn’t about disagreeing with my point. I welcome all disagreement. The problem is that they’re not disagreeing with what I actually said but with what they think I said. Maybe it’s personal bias, and they just want to paint me as the devil in their mind, or perhaps my explanation wasn’t clear enough. Either way, this issue only happens with people. ChatGPT understands the point I’m making perfectly almost every time, regardless of how detailed my explanation is. When I have discussions with ChatGPT, I can actually talk about the topic I’m interested in, rather than constantly having to say, “That’s not what I said/meant,” and then try to explain my point even clearer, only to be misunderstood again.

            • JamesStallion
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              3 months ago

              “Someone disagreeing with you, or attempting to show you something you might not know or have seen”

              So this is another example of how you are doing the same things you avoid communicating with humans over. You have selected one part of my statement to misunderstand and selectively ignored the point.

              We absolutely are talking about what you wanted to talk about. Your first statement to me was asking what I based my assessment that you were training yourself to be a poor communicator on. Since then we have stuck to that topic, but you haven’t really addressed the central point that a machine that adapts to things that hinder communication with humans will inevitably train you not to correct or address those hindrances.

              This isn’t me disagreeing with you, it is me pointing out something you might not have considered. However you have framed this whole discussion as a case of you being misunderstood. That really isn’t the case.

              • ContrarianTrail@lemm.eeOP
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                3 months ago

                You say yourself that you use the vaguest descriptions when talking to the bot and that it fills in the blanks for you.

                I never said that. You make it sound like I’m not even trying when I’m talking with chatGPT which is not true. What I did say was that even if I use the vaguest descriptions when talking to chatGPT it still understands me where as with people misunderstand my even the most carefully and thoughtfully written responses. Basically it does a good job at understanding me even when I’m not even trying where as with some people it doesn’t matter how hard I try, they still wont.

                I’m even willing to accept that this may be on me aswell. Maybe I’m just really bad at explaining my views and that’s why people keep misunderstanding me. However, chatGPT doesn’t. Not even despite my shitty explanations.

                • JamesStallion
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                  3 months ago

                  If it understands you without you even trying then regardless of whether you try to communicate well or not you will never know if you have done a good or poor job of communicating. This is my point.

                  Your unpopular opinion that you enjoy it more is not in question, and you are free to abandon your fellow mortals if that’s what you want to do. However, in my opinion, this can only lead to a further deterioration in skills that you already admit are not as developed as you would like.

                  I would also gently remind you that you are one of us, and subject to the same imperfections. Keeping this in mind can help smooth your interactions with others.

                  • ContrarianTrail@lemm.eeOP
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                    3 months ago

                    I’m not using chatGPT to improve my communication skills. I’m using it to have interesting and insightful discussions where I don’t need to debate semantics. It’s entertainment. Better than watchig YouTube atleast which is what I would otherwise do.

            • Zos_Kia@lemmynsfw.com
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              3 months ago

              This thread is hilarious to us all. I’m sorry you have to go through this but it is, indeed, a great illustration of your point. The other commenter is making very large assumptions and the goalpost is moving so fast it might actually be on wheels. Oh and a new slippery slope just dropped : using ChatGPT will now worsen your communication skills (for unspecified reasons, according to bad communicators wholly unfamiliar with the matter at hand).

              I think you missed an opportunity. It would have been much simpler to post “Does anyone else think AI kinda bad ?” and raked in all the accolades and upvotes.

              • JamesStallion
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                3 months ago

                Slippery slope? My very first statement was about communication skills and we have been talking about that ever since.

              • ContrarianTrail@lemm.eeOP
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                3 months ago

                Well I’m saying non-critical things about gen-AI on Lemmy of all places. I can’t say I expected any other kind of response. Thus unpopular opinion.

                • Zos_Kia@lemmynsfw.com
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                  3 months ago

                  I’m saying non-critical things about gen-AI on Lemmy of all places

                  so brave lmao

                  I’ve been dreaming of a place like Lemmy for 20 years, and i had a lot of theories about what it would be. But i would never have predicted how salty it is. I swear 3 conversations out of 4 just descend into snark and name-calling, it’s a fucking shame if you ask me. It really is one of the least welcoming places of the whole internet.

                  • ContrarianTrail@lemm.eeOP
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                    3 months ago

                    It really is one of the least welcoming places of the whole internet.

                    Agreed. And ironically, it’s coming from the group that often applauds themselves for being so accepting of different people. Until those people think differently, of course, or, worse, vote differently. Then they roll out the guillotines.

                    Ruthlessly blocking people who behave that way helps a little, but you need to block hundreds before it makes a noticeable difference. Unfortunately, it’s quite a blunt tool and causes a lot of collateral damage as well.