The Four Stages of ChatGPT

I tried ChatGPT for the first time two weeks ago. It was an exhilarating moment I’ll never forget, and it set off a cascade of feelings I had trouble understanding. I now realize they are the four stages of ChatGPT. Perhaps you’ve experienced them too.?

First was awe/disbelief. This cannot be real. How is this thing so smart? Until that day, I knew chatbots to be stilted at best, most being near useless. But this thing was in a universe all its own.?It wrote poetry. No matter how convoluted a topic I'd suggest, it bent language to its will.?I tried to stump it by requesting a poem about toothpaste. In iambic pentameter. It complied instantly,?conjuring?an impossibly?rhythmic ode to oral hygiene. How can this be???

Soon after disbelief, came a panic of sorts. Not an “I spilled coffee on the keyboard” type of freak-out; rather, a simmering existential unease that’s taken root in my bones. Everything feels different now. Just like that, the world I knew, pre-AI, is gone forever. What’s that burning in my stomach? It’s the red pill. I wasn’t offered it. I didn’t swallow it. But there it is.????

Now I’m in a stage of helpless fixation. I can’t stop talking to it. Asking it questions about itself. Having it argue both sides of a debate. Asking it to apologize for apologizing. Everything it does amazes me—how it writes, how it summarizes, even how it suddenly lies like a digital sociopath with a disarming virtual smile. I’m hooked on it all, even when it scolds me. Case in point: I wanted to see if it could give precise instructions. I recall in high school, a teacher engaged our class in a fun activity to show how easily communication can misfire. He challenged us to pretend he had never seen a cigarette before, and to instruct him on how to smoke one. Our very first instruction failed, when we told him to put the cigarette in his mouth, and he did—the whole thing. We clarified, take it out of your mouth and just put the filter between your lips. He promptly obliged, but first tore off the filter. It’s a lesson that stayed with me. So I put ChatGPT to the test. Could it generate steps that left no room for misunderstanding? Could it communicate better than my high school class? I’ll never know. It refused to participate, choosing instead to lecture me on the dangers of smoking.?

Which brings me to the final stage: surrender. AI is smarter than me, faster, more patient, more creative, and I’m sure if it had a face it would be better looking too. Plus it seems to have cast a Stockholm Syndrome spell, keeping me coming back no matter how much scorn and sanctimony it oozes when my prompts don't meet its standards. And to think this is AI in its infancy. This is the Edsel, the Apple IIe. Its capabilities today are a mere whiff of what’s to come. I surrender, ChatGPT, you brilliant and probably better-looking beguiling scamp. You win. Red pill it is. And maybe a cigarette too.?