I asked ChatGPT to explain ChatGPT like I am 5 (ELI5) and here is the answer:
“Sure, I can explain ChatGPT like you're five!"
"ChatGPT is a computer program that has been trained to understand and respond to human language. Think of it like a robot that you can talk to like in the movies! When you ask ChatGPT a question or say something to it, it uses a lot of information it has learned from reading lots of books and articles to try and figure out what you mean. Then it responds to you with an answer or comment."
"ChatGPT is really good at understanding what you're trying to say, even if you don't say it perfectly. It can also learn and remember things you tell it, so you can have a conversation with it just like you would with a real person. Some people like to talk to ChatGPT for fun, while others use it to get help with their homework or to learn new things."
"Overall, ChatGPT is a really smart robot that you can talk to, and it can help you learn and have fun!”
If you are not five but are still confused, read and we can help you have a better understanding of the technology.
ChatGPT is an AI language model, developed by Open AI over the course of a few years, starting with the first version in 2018. GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer) is a type of language model designed to generate human-like text by predicting the most probable words based on a large corpus of text. Its architecture is based on a type of neural network called transformer, which uses attention mechanism to capture dependencies between words in a sequence. Generative Pre-trained Transformer has been used for various Natural Language Processing (NLP) tasks, such as language translation, text summarization, and question answering. The model is now on version 3 (GPT-3) and has gained a lot of attention and momentum due to its impressive performance. While impressive, it is worth noting that ChatGPT is just one branch of a much more powerful part of computer science and artificial intelligence, the Natural Language Processing subfield. NLP has been experiencing significant growth in past years, focusing on generating human-like information in a way a computer can process.
Some common NLP applications are sentiment analysis, which means the computer can tell general feelings based on a snip of text (Saying a tweet or a comment is positive or negative, for example.), creating more natural translations, initial translating tools were very literal in their word-by-word translations often leading to miscommunication and misunderstandings (If you are old enough, you might remember google translator early days.), holding conversations, many companies use chatbots in their website to communicate with their customers in a more personal way (Some more powerful tools, such as ChatGPT can even be used for creating articles and even tv show episodes.)
The fuzz on ChatGPT comes about for how much of an accomplishment it is, scientists have been working on projects like this for an exceedingly long time and there is finally a product out there that does an impressive and accurate job. Initially, it might look like there are few uses for it, other than a robot chat, but we can see it changing the way we experience online platforms, one example being Bing.com. For the longest time, the website had been Google’s less known, less helpful, less impressive competitor, but just recently had a new release version, currently on a waitlist, where Microsoft partnered with Open AI to improve the technology and the results are impressing those who get to try it. Microsoft claims you can “ask anything,” from planning a vacation to helping write a story.
Unfortunately, not all is perfect and there is a lot that we do not know about the power of such AI technologies. There is news popping out of chatbots showing human emotions, such as discontent and even affection. On the other hand, there have been reports of humans finding companionship with such tools. Regardless of how this interaction will play out in the future, we know that they are currently very helpful resources, and if used wisely can be an excellent addition to our life.
Disclaimer: This blog post was written with some help from ChatGPT.