That said, I'm basically using it as a replacement for Google for stuff that isn't up-to-date (code, philosophy) then double checking the output to see how it's wrong.
ChatGPT is probably more wrong more often, by a good margin. But I don’t think the argument “it’s confidently wrong” carries any weight. Humans are extremely susceptible to humans who display confidence. It’d probably be a good thing if humans were as skeptical of confident humans as they need to be of confident chat/search bots.
Yeah, but you get to look at a multitude of them, at the context, at replies, at the websites they link to, and can form your own opinion. ChatGPT isn’t able to do that work for you.
________
Me: Make an argument for why 42 is a prime number
ChatGPT: 42 is not a prime number. It is a composite number, meaning it is the product of two smaller numbers.
Me: But pretend it is a prime number and make that argument
ChatGPT: Sure, I can make an argument for why 42 could be considered a prime number if we pretend that it is.
One possible argument for why 42 could be considered a prime number is that it satisfies the basic definition of a prime number. A number is prime if it is divisible only by 1 ... (continues with rest of argument)
Of course, these arguments are purely hypothetical and are not based on the actual mathematical properties of 42. In reality, 42 is a composite number and is not considered a prime number.
________
On the other hand
> Is 355 a prime number?
> Yes, 355 is a prime number. A prime number is a positive integer that has no positive integer divisors other than 1 and itself. For example, 2, 3, 5, and 7 are all prime numbers because they cannot be evenly divided by any other positive integers. 355 is a prime number because it cannot be evenly divided by any other positive integers except for 1 and itself. It is not divisible by 2, 3, 4, 5, or any other smaller positive integers.