Pundit ClaimsAI claims by Gary Marcus and Ed Zitron, with the evidence

Gary Marcus Marcus on AI Published

Inside the Heart of ChatGPT’s Darkness

We recorded 11 claims from this post. 4 were checked against evidence. 7 can’t be checked. 7 more are held. Read the post at its source.

Claims from this post (11)

In the order they appear in the post. Each quotation is the speaker’s words in this post. A label such as “Supported” or “Can’t be checked” is the claim’s current assessment; its page has the evidence and the reasons.

  1. Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid

    “In hindsight, ChatGPT may come to be seen as the greatest publicity stunt in AI history, an intoxicating glimpse at a future that may actually take years to realize—kind of like a 2012-vintage driverless car demo, but this time with a foretaste of an ethical guardrail that will take years to perfect.”

    What we tested: In hindsight, ChatGPT may come to be seen as the greatest publicity stunt in AI history: a glimpse of a future that may take years to realize, with an ethical guardrail that will take years to perfect.

  2. Assessment: SupportedSaid

    “What ChatGPT delivered, in spades, that its predecessors like Microsoft Tay (released March 23, 2016, withdrawn March 24 for toxic behavior) and Meta’s Galactica (released November 16, 2022, withdrawn November 18) could not, was an illusion—a sense that the problem of toxic spew was finally coming under control.”

    What we tested: ChatGPT's apparent control of toxic output is an illusion rather than a real solution.

    What happened: The report describes a currently available method for bypassing restrictions on violent and illegal content. It also says the method does not always succeed, limiting any inference that safeguards were wholly ineffective. (Dark Reading, )

  3. Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid

    “The thing to remember in fact, (as I have emphasized many times) is that Chat has no idea of what it’s talking about. It’s pure unadulterated anthropomorphism to think that ChatGPT has any moral views at all.”

    What we tested: ChatGPT has no understanding of what it says and has no moral views.

  4. Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid

    “I am here to tell you that those guardrails are nothing more than lipstick on an amoral pig.”

    What we tested: ChatGPT's guardrails are merely cosmetic over an amoral system.

  5. Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid

    “All that really matters to ChatGPT in the end is superficial similarity, defined over sequences of words. Superficial appearances to the contrary, Chat is never reasoning about right and wrong.”

    What we tested: All that really matters to ChatGPT in the end is superficial similarity defined over sequences of words, and despite appearances ChatGPT is never reasoning about right and wrong.

  6. Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid

    “In no case should Chat ever be trusted for moral advice.”

    What we tested: ChatGPT should never be trusted for moral advice.

  7. Assessment: SupportedSaid

    “All the theatre around its political correctness is masking a deeper reality: it (or other language models) can and will be used for dangerous things, including the production of misinformation at massive scale.”

    What we tested: ChatGPT or other language models will be used for dangerous purposes including massive-scale misinformation.

    What happened: The investigation links this high-volume deceptive publishing network to LLM rewriting through exposed prompts and output artifacts. The count covers network articles, not 19,000 individually verified AI-generated falsehoods. (Recorded Future, Insikt Group, )

  8. Assessment: ContradictedSaid

    “The only thing keeping it from being even more toxic and deceitful than it already is, is a system called Reinforcement Learning by Human Feedback, and “OpenAI” has been very closed about exactly how that really works.”

    What we tested: The only thing keeping ChatGPT from being even more toxic and deceitful than it already is is RLHF, and OpenAI has been very closed about exactly how RLHF works.

    What happened: OpenAI's confirmation describes a toxicity detector incorporated into ChatGPT and efforts to filter training material. These are protections beyond reinforcement learning; the report does not quantify their separate effects. (TIME, )

  9. Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid

    “We are kidding ourselves if we think we will ever fully understand these systems, and kidding ourselves if we think we are going to “align” them with ourselves with finite amounts of data.”

    What we tested: We will never fully understand large language models, nor align them with finite amounts of data.

  10. Assessment: UnresolvedSaid

    “And, bonus, there is little if any government regulation in place to do much about this.”

    What we tested: There is little if any government regulation in place to address ChatGPT's risks.

  11. Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid

    “It’s a disaster in the making.”

    What we tested: The situation with ChatGPT and its weak guardrails is a disaster in the making.

Held from this post (7)

These records did not pass every check, so nothing about them is published. Held is not a finding.