You have to be living under a rock or on an island somewhere without the Internet if you have yet to hear about ChatGPT. Ever since the end of 2022, OpenAI’s revolutionary tool has been on everyone’s minds, as its existence threatens to change the way a number of industries operate.
For years now, we’ve heard people talk about the development of artificial intelligence (AI) and how it could negatively and positively affect our lives. However, up until now, these talks seemed more in the realm of distant possibility rather than a looming reality. Now, with the emergence of tools like ChatGPT and others, the idea that AI could soon change the way we do marketing, school, design, and other areas of work and life seems closer to being a reality.
In this article, we will be discussing the development of tools like ChatGPT, how they operate, what they can help you do, and what alternatives to the software exist. Hopefully, by the end of this article, you will feel ready to tackle the issues that AI presents, and you will also know how it can be useful to you in your job.
So without further ado, let’s get started.
What is ChatGPT?
OpenAI developed ChatGPT, which is essentially a chatbot based on the GTP-3.5 model. It can communicate in the form of normal dialogue, and it provides responses to all kinds of inquiries in a way that feels incredibly close to what a human would say. The so-called technology “large language model” (LLM) predicts the next word in a sequence of words, and reinforcement learning with human feedback (RLHF) is a way of training that uses the user’s feedback to help the platform learn new things and generate replies that are even more satisfactory to humans.
More About the ChatGPT Training Model
In order for the GPT-3.5 to be trained, the developers used a ton of information from the Internet, including Reddit and Twitter threads, along with vast amounts of code data. By doing so, they managed to teach ChatGPT how to generate human-like responses and participate in a dialogue.
Along with that, human feedback was used for ChatGPT training. The so-called Reinforcement Learning with Human Feedback (RLHF) technique trains the tool with the help of human feedback so that AI can better understand what kind of replies it’s expected to provide whenever a user asks a question. This kind of training is truly revolutionary as it takes things beyond just training LLM to predict the next word.
Essentially what separates ChatGPT from other AI and other platforms is that it has been trained to understand the intentions humans have when asking a question and, in turn, provide helpful and truthful answers. Because of that, ChatGPT doesn’t only provide standard responses but may even refuse to answer a question or challenge it.
It also appears that ChatGPT, over time, understands what kind of answers you prefer and starts accommodating its responses to you personally.
What Makes ChatGPT Special?
Now that you have basic knowledge about what ChatGPT is, let’s talk a bit more about what makes it so unique. The fact is that it’s a much more advanced version of all its predecessors, but there are a few functions that truly make it stand out.
The Ability to Remember
Unlike most AI, ChatGPT can actually remember the context of the conversation you’re having with it. This is one of its most notable features, as it makes it able to utilize the knowledge it just gained throughout the rest of the dialogue, thus making it much more accurate and useful.
This feature also makes ChatGPT prone to confirmation bias – meaning it will give you information based on the knowledge that it has on what you like or don’t like.
Multiple Language Support
ChatGPT was built with the help of a ton of code and data, thus it’s available in over 90 languages – talk about impressive. Essentially, this makes the tool usable worldwide, and it can even work as a translator.
It Can Hold a Conversation
One of the scariest but also impressive features is the ability of ChatGPT to hold a conversation that feels incredibly human-like. It can understand both written and spoken words and even understands humor, and can “say” the occasional joke. Thanks to its unique learning method and structure, ChatGPT is able to understand nuance and language in a way that no other before it has been able to do.
Few Harmful Outputs
Unlike most chat software, the one made by OpenAI is well-trained to spot harmful or inappropriate requests. While there’s still a chance for the ChatGPT to say something offensive, the risk is minimized compared to other AI tools. So, in most cases, if you try to ask something inappropriate, it will just answer with an error message.
What Can ChatGPT Do?
It’s hard to list all that ChatGPT can do, but a few use cases will pique your interest. So, let’s take a look at them.
Answer General Questions
ChatGPT can work as a better version of Google search. Essentially, if, for example, you’re wondering what the capital of Belgium is or when World War I ended, you can ask the tool, and it will give you a simple answer at first and a more in-depth one if you want it. Because of the extensive database that was used for its creation, ChatGPT has a ton of knowledge in a variety of subjects, including physics, chemistry, biology, geography, history, and English, which makes it a great helper when doing school work or when simply researching topics.
Create CVs and Cover Letters
If you tell ChatGPT all your qualifications, past experience, and education, it will be able to create a new, custom-made CV for you. While you can make some customizations to make it even more personal and suited to the position you’re applying for, it’s still a great help as it takes a lot of work off your load.
Along with that, if you need a cover letter for a particular position, you can provide the tool with all the information you have, and it will prepare one for you. The more information you can give to ChatGPT, the more personalized and suitable the cover letter will be.
Fix Your Grammar
If you ask ChatGPT, it can find the issues with spelling and grammatical errors in a text you provide it with. Similarly to software like Grammarly, ChatGPT can correct the tone, intent, and reading level of your writing based on what you want it to sound like. The chatbot goes a step further and can even explain the reasons behind the changes it makes in your text so that you can understand the errors in your writing.
However, the one thing that ChatGPT can’t do is check if your content is plagiarized from another source.
Summarize and Simplify Long Text
If you’re struggling to understand a long text or just lack time to read it, ChatGPT can do the job for you and provide you with a quick summary. This is incredibly useful for things such as legislation documents, student books, and even old-school literature that are tougher to read through. Essentially, you can copy and paste the text, and ChatGPT will be able to summarize it and provide you with a few key points.
What’s more incredible is that the tool can tell us the sentiment of any given text, along with details about its purpose and the tone of voice used. Based on how much you can or want to read, you can give the software instructions on how to summarize so that it fits your needs.
Code and Debug
ChatGPT can write code and, along with that, also debug code that was already written and needs fixing. This makes it almost a must-use tool for all software developers and people learning how to write code.
The AI can give you full snippets of code, along with a breakdown and description of what each section of the code is doing. You can even ask it to expand the code and build on it based on what you need. The key is to be as descriptive as possible so that you get the most effective possible answer.
Do Creative Work
Now, you have to know that ChatGPT cannot come up with a completely new, unique concept – it merely summarizes information about things that have already been done before. It won’t write the new Harry Potter novel on its own or produce a masterpiece of a song. It can copy the tone of voice and style of specific authors, and it can help you generate ideas if you’re stuck. Thanks to it and the power of text-to-image AI tools, you can design clothes based on specific ideas that you generate, and you can come up with interesting concepts.
However, it’s key to point out that in such cases, ChatGPT merely helps you; it cannot be entirely creative on its own.
Does This Mean ChatGPT is a Better Search Tool Than Google?
If you plan on asking Google questions like, “What’s the capital of Sweden?” or “Who designed the MET?”, then it’s likely that you will find that ChatGPT provides much better and more in-depth answers. Instead of simply providing you links to various websites (like Google does), the AI straight-up answers your questions in the best way possible. You can also control the length of the response – you can get a simple confirmation or a one-word answer, or a more in-depth explanation. In that sense, GPT-3 is definitely a threat to Google’s dominance.
However, you have to be aware of the limits of ChatGPT and of the fact that it’s prone to confirmation bias – meaning it can sometimes give you false or misleading answers based on the knowledge it already has. Much like we all know not to trust Wikipedia blindly, the same applies to relying on ChatGPT. While it may give correct answers a lot of the time, it’s still best to verify and double-check, especially if you’re using the information for an important project.
With that said, researching the answers that ChatGPT provides is somewhat challenging as it never quotes or links sources – instead, it just gives you raw text that you need to read and consider carefully. It’s highly likely that the text ChatGPT provides you with is directly sourced from various Google materials, but you likely won’t find it because of the way it’s worded.
Currently, Google has its own language models and already uses AI in the search function. Rumor has it that the appearance of ChatGPT on the market caused a “code red” emergency for Google and its co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page.
For now, even though ChatGPT presents a threat, it can in no way replace the use of Google. Besides tending to be biased and not always providing correct answers, the AI also has the limitation of having “off-limit” topics.
What’s Off Limits for ChatGPT?
OpenAI designed its tool so that it weeds out requests it deems to be “inappropriate.” This is due to the company’s mission to make sure AI benefits humanity instead of capitalizing on people’s worst features.
Finding out what’s off-limits for the tool is quite easy – you only need to ask it, and it will right away provide an answer. Off-limits inquiries are those that are offensive, discriminatory, or inappropriate, including sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, or in any other way hateful. Additionally, it cannot be engaged in any illegal activity.
One thing that ChatGPT is able to do, even though it’s malicious, is write phishing emails used to trick people; however, that goes against OpenAI’s beliefs, and it’s likely to be a feature they work to remove, even though it will be challenging to do so.
What Are the Limitations of ChatGPT?
By now, you may be under the impression that ChatGPT is some sort of incredible tool that can do anything and everything. That notion is likely to cause you both distress and fear, but don’t worry: the reality is that much like any other software, this one also has its limitations and downsides.
The creators of ChatGPT and OpenAI do mention that the AI can sometimes give misleading or wrong answers, and it may lead you to believe it’s much better than it really is. Sometimes, it will warn you about potential shortcomings – for example, if you ask a question it can’t find the answer to, it will simply apologize and not give further output.
On the other hand, at times, when it’s providing answers that look accurate, the answers may be factually incorrect. If you ask the right questions with the right intent, the AI is likely to give you the correct answer. However, if it’s unable to interpret your tone of voice, or if you simply throw a curveball at it, it’s likely just to spill out nonsense.
In recent months, the journal Science banned the use of ChatGPT text, claiming that an AI tool cannot be an author. Using text from the tool will constitute scientific misconduct that’s to be treated similarly to plagiarism of existing works. StackOverflow, one of the most popular software development sites, also banned ChatGPT answers to programming questions, stating that the rate of correct answers it provides is currently too low.
We have to note that ChatGPT can answer complex inquiries, which is an incredible achievement, as computers are typically literal and can simply follow interface requirements and exact syntax. The large language learning models used to create ChatGPT give it a more human-like style of interaction and make its answers more useful; however, we still have to consider the fact that it’s a pre-programmed algorithm giving you these answers and not an actual human.
Before You Go
The reality of AI is both scary and exciting. It’s incredible to believe we live in times where a computer can virtually give you answers to tens of thousands of questions while sounding completely human at the same time. If and when used correctly, AI provides you endless possibilities to become more creative, more effective at your work, and a better thinker.
There’s also a downside to relying so much on artificial intelligence. These tools can give you what has already been created by someone else. They’re not able to think, dream, innovate, and create on their own – they can only interpret the already existing