What has been the evolution of Chile’s GDP over the last 10 years? That was the question with which we challenged the brain behind ChatGPT, the trendy AI application that promises to modify our behavioral paradigms in terms of searching for and consuming information.
To our surprise, the robot’s response was something like, “Hey, moment! One question at a time.” This is how we began to identify its first limitations and, why not, the key to how to understand the phenomenon and its possible impacts on our daily lives.
While OpenAI’s own interface – the developers of this intelligent chatbot – account for its limits – for example, there will hardly be answers with updated information to 2022 – to the extent that the user is clear about its rules, it is definitely a useful tool. See?
Ok ChatGPT, let’s go again. What was Chile’s GDP in 2021, then?
Chile’s Gross Domestic Product for 2021 is estimated at approximately US$368.6 billion.
And 2020?
By 2020 it was estimated at around US$292.7 billion. This was a drop from the previous year due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Amazing. But these answers definitely led us to dig a little deeper into the quality of their answers. That is, if the internet is already a universe rich in unverified or false content, why would ChatGPT be different? Faced with this doubt, we approach the robot again and that is when the phenomenon is revealed: a very powerful technology that applies criteria of high standard of information quality to search engines and with an excellent capacity for articulating ideas:
ChatGPT, and what is the source of this information?
Chile’s GDP information for 2021 and 2020 was obtained from various sources, including organizations such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. These organizations regularly publish economic data and projections for countries around the world, including GDP.
ChatGPT, do you have any link to effectively confirm your data?
Here is a link from the World Bank for Chile’s GDP in 2021 and 2020: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP. MKTP. CD?locations=CL
Note: These figures are estimates and are subject to revision as more information becomes available. It’s always a good idea to check data with multiple sources and check them for any updates.
Incredible.
This small exercise made us delve a little deeper into its versatility and we tried everything from the possibility of preparing articles, columns and even news about fictitious facts. Again the limitations of the application appear – erroneous in the names of authorities and executives, among other data – however, to the extent that its delivery is reviewed by a specialist, it is definitely a very efficient tool to collect information and consume it in a digested, hierarchical and intelligible way.
Its use is already modifying human activity in different dimensions. A recent article in The Economist reported on how universities are modifying their teaching methodologies, considering that students are already making use of chat by delivering excellently developed essays on subjects they have not yet seen. In this way, teachers have reincorporated oral exams and tests with handwritten answers, but far from rejecting the use of these advances, they also submit ChatGPT answers to the analysis of students to deliberate on their assertiveness.
In the world it is already beginning to talk that it is a “text calculator”, while on Wall Street technology companies that have no relationship with OpenAI see their shares on the rise because precisely artificial intelligence has revealed itself as the industry with a more than promising future, a question not at all new in the cyclical relationship between the stock market and the tech world.
The key is to go step by step, just as ChatGPT asks to be treated, i.e. one question at a time. Only then will we timely identify their strengths and weaknesses, and then make it part of everyday life, since it is definitely an efficient tool to search and articulate information, always verifiable by a person, even if it contains few or no errors.
This text was written by a human being.
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The content expressed in this opinion column is the sole responsibility of its author, and does not necessarily reflect the editorial line or position of El Mostrador.
