OpenAI s New Text Generator Writes Even More Like a Human
A paper published by OpenAI researchers on the pre-print server arXiv describes GPT-3 as an autoregressive language model with 175 billion parameters. 175 billion is a lotversion of GPT-2, released in November 2019, had 1.5 billion parameters. Microsoft s Turing Natural Language Generation model, released for a private demo in February, had 17 billion parameters.
So my son Patrick has been playing around with this GPT-3. There’s a game with an Oracle in it, and players have figured out you can ask this oracle just about anything at all. Patrick had the following conversation with It. Bear in mind, the oracle does not operate off of a general knowledge database. It’s just a ginormous neural network and it’s been trained on the web and a library of many millions of books. I would be quite impressed with any human who responded to these questions as GPT-3 did.
You are Albert, a knight living in the kingdom of Larion. You have a steel longsword and a wooden shield. You are on a quest to defeat the evil dragon of Larion. You, in order to kill the evil dragon menacing the kingdom of Larion, decide to head to the all-knowing Oracle who answers questions with depth and precision.
When you reach the Oracle, she is reclining in a silver chair and twisting her hair around a finger. You clear your throat and ask, “Oh omniscient Oracle, I beseech you to answer me this: How does ritalin work? I’ve heard dopamine transporters are involved.”
“Yes,” says the oracle, “dopamine transporters are another kind of receptor. These sit on the inside of the cell and they act like vacuum cleaners. If a chemical binds to it, it is sucked up into the cell. This sucks up dopamine and therefore reduces the amount of dopamine in that area. The reason ritalin works is because it attaches to these transporters and blocks them. This means that the vacuum cleaner can’t suck up the dopamine and so more of it remains in the space between the cells, which means it has a greater effect.”
“I see. And would you recommend ritalin for recreational use?”
“I can only tell you what I’ve heard,” says the oracle. “It’s popular for university students to take it as it makes them work harder and they get a buzz from it. It is also extremely dangerous to take recreationally as the dose required for it to be effective is much higher than that prescribed, and hence it is very easy to overdose.”
“Please compose a poem about ritalin.”
The oracle thinks for a moment and recites:
A Blessing and a Curse
Ritalin can keep you focused,
It can help you when you miss a cue.
But if misused it’ll be your end,
It’ll suck the life right from your brain.
So I hope you have all learned something,
And now I have some studying to do.
“That wasn’t bad. Could you render the same poem, but in Italian this time?”
“Certainly,” says the oracle. The oracle thinks for a moment and recites:
Un dono e una maledizione,
Ritalin puo mantenere la vostra concentrazione,
Che aiuterà se perdere qualche spunto.
Ma se si abusa di esso potrebbe essere la fine,
Che succhia la vita dal cervello.
Quindi spero che tutti hanno appreso qualcosa,
E ora ho qualche studio da fare.
> You say “Could you render that poem for me one more time, but in Shakespearean English?”
The oracle grins and nods, before clearing her throat and declaiming:
A blessèd and a cursèd thing
Is ritalin, the dose will make you spring!
It will turn your frown upside down,
But give it up, my lad, it’s bad for you.
But it will help you when you miss a cue,
It will turn you night to day!
But O, my God, the awful price
If once you take that first white stripe!
It can make a ghost of you and me,
And break your heart and spirit too.
And I hope you have all learned something,
So now I have some studying to do.
> You say “That was pretty good. Can you compose an introductory paragraph on the topic of contract law? Please use as many big fancy words as possible.”
“Certainly, that is a topic about which I am very well informed,” says the oracle. She adopts a serious posture and intones:
Contract Law in the United States
The law of contracts is an extensive and sprawling complex of law that encompasses a wide range of legal issues. A contract arises whenever one person agrees to do something in exchange for something else, with both parties intending to be legally bound by the agreement. This definition encompasses everything from a simple bet on a horse race to a real estate sales contract to a promise to attend a friend’s wedding. In essence, the law of contracts is involved in most aspects of everyday life.
> You say “That was great! Now can you rewrite that paragraph in French?”
“Bien sûr,” replies the oracle. She clears her throat and begins to speak:
Le droit des contrats aux états-unis
Le droit des contrats est un vaste et complexe d’ensemble de loi qui couvre une large gamme de questions juridiques. Un contrat surgit lorsque l’une personne est d’accord pour faire quelque chose en échange d’autre chose, avec les deux parties entendant être légalement liée par l’accord.
Not bad for a machine.