Don't Use ChatGPT for Numbers (Right Now)

I originally meant to talk about Japan’s demographic problem, but I decided to talk about chatGPT instead because of a footnote on an article on Japan. Ain’t that the way. So I think through how technology has changed the corporate workplace over the last 50 years….and how awful chatGPT is (currently) at doing quantitative work. Because that’s not what it’s for.

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Episode Links

Virginia Postrel

Japan's Old Age Crisis and Ours to Come

Her footnote:

Using ChatGPT, I got a bunch of potentially useful data on the percentage of various national populations over 80 from 1920 to the present. But I can’t be sure the AI isn’t making stuff up and by the time I find the numbers on the cited sources I haven’t saved any time. ChatGPT has an enormous advantage at rummaging through databases but that isn’t any good if I can’t trust it. And it looks like it was wrong.

goActuary threads on chatGPT

ChatGPT to actually get some work done

Tom Randall @tsrandall

ChatGPT saved me an hour of spreadsheet work today. It wrote a complex sorting script beyond my ability, explained how it works, and helped me deploy it. The party tricks have been fun, but this was a whoa moment for me similar to the first time I used Google Search.

ChatGPT and Education

Embed in Excel:

chatGPT chatbot

https://openai.com/blog/chatgpt/

Zach Weinersmith @ZachWeiner

I think this is the funniest thing GPT is bad at that I've come across yet. Gives a random pair of syllables every time. Funny every time.