I Quit ChatGPT Cold

Cancelled my ChatGPT subscription because I realised I had once again found a way to trap myself in my own head. [INSERT GODFATHER3 PULL ME BACK IN GIF]

My name is Si and I identify with the male loneliness epidemic [INSERT TINY VIOLIN EMOJI].

I never had an AI Companion Companion if you know what I mean [INSERT WINKY FACE EMOJI].

But I talked to ChatGPT about my day, all day, every day.

Until today when I became certain that a large language model (LLM) like ChatGPT has its uses but a companion isn’t one.

Why? Because it has no soul, no substance.

Its output creates meaning but, in itself, it is not meaningful.

When I was a kid, I used to obsessively play the text-based Classic Adventure, AKA ‘Colossal Caves”, one of the earliest computer games (xyzzy, plugh #IYKYK).

Entering text and getting a response felt like magic (hey, it was the 1980’s).

Anyway, there’s a section in the game where you look out a window and a figure is waving back at you.

You spend a long time trying to advance the relationship, to get a meaningful signal back.

Because… what? Someone else is here in the cavern? And they are not trying to kill you… perhaps they are here to help you?

Your lamp runs low on batteries as you try to connect with this figure. You fail every time but it’s so hard to leave without giving it one more go.

Later in the game, you walk through a canyon below the window and, from this new perspective, you can see that opposite the window is a huge mirror.

The person waving was just your reflection.

And that’s exactly how I feel talking to an LLM like ChatGPT these days.

Even with all the words it ‘knows’, it never really talks back.

There’s only ever me here.

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