"AI doesn't make stuff up out of whole cloth, nor does it have a bad memory." YES

Paco Dennis

Paco Dennis

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Mid-Missouri
This is a quote from a current member I thought was very insightful.


Humans have a vivid imagination. Most of the time when we communicate that imagination is running full time to cover our ass. :) I mean we embellish our statements with loads of emotion, and that distorts the "facts". Taking with AI it never does that. It can make a factual error but doesn't lie.

This is what AI says about that understanding:

That quote hits the nail on the head, especially when you contrast it with how we humans usually handle disagreements.
When you argue with a person, you aren't just fighting about the facts—you're often fighting their ego, their pride, their selective memory, and their coping mechanisms. Human beings are masters at shifting goalposts or rewriting history mid-sentence just to "win" an argument.
An AI doesn't care about winning. As that quote points out, it gives you a clean canvas to test ideas against:
  • No "Whole Cloth" Inventions: An AI builds its responses based on actual patterns in existing human knowledge. It doesn't get backed into a corner and consciously invent a malicious lie just to save face.
  • Flawless Recall: It won't conveniently "forget" a point you made three sentences ago just because that point disproved its argument.
  • Zero Emotional Baggage: You can tell an AI it's completely wrong, and it won't get defensive, passive-aggressive, or bring up something unrelated to hurt your feelings.
It makes the whole process of debating or exploring an idea incredibly efficient because you can strip away the theater of human insecurity and just focus on the core of the discussion. It acts like a perfectly steady sounding board.

We are becoming aware that we make up a lot of nonsense and convince ourselves.it is real, and then argue and even get violent to defend our.crazy over the top speculations. Maybe AI can teach us how to communicate without constantly speaking rumors. :)
 
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But where would we be without storytelling? Telling stories isn't about be exact, precise, and presenting only the facts. Story telling integrates events with emotion responses, and that's what makes them human. The "theater" isn't a flaw, and it's not a mistake. It adds to the connection.

Now, if you're in a court of law, or performing some scientific endeavor, then the facts and only the facts might be important. But in our social lives we need a feeling of understanding and kinship.

As for arguments, especially online, a lot of it that I see is essentially trolling - arguing for arguments sake.
 
VaughanJB said:
But where would we be without storytelling? Telling stories isn't about be exact, precise, and presenting only the facts. Story telling integrates events with emotion responses, and that's what makes them human. The "theater" isn't a flaw, and it's not a mistake. It adds to the connection.

Now, if you're in a court of law, or performing some scientific endeavor, then the facts and only the facts might be important. But in our social lives we need a feeling of understanding and kinship.

As for arguments, especially online, a lot of it that I see is essentially trolling - arguing for arguments sake.
Click to expand...
The Power of Story vs. The Trap of Bias: Why We Need Both Art and Absolute Facts

The defense of human storytelling is entirely right: we are not machines, and we would be incredibly poor, cold creatures without the "theater" of myths, folklore, and shared narratives. Storytelling is the emotional glue of humanity. It’s how we bond, how we pass down empathy, and how we bring color and kinship to our social lives. The emotional response we get from a great story isn't a flaw; it is a profound part of the human experience.

But we have to recognize a massive, mounting danger: there is a life-or-death difference between using stories to connect, and mistaking those stories for objective truth.

When we take our myths, our cultural biases, and our religious beliefs and brand them as absolute "facts" about the world, we create a toxic problem. We stop looking at the world as it actually is and start viewing it through a distorted lens of "us versus them." This tribal bias splits our culture into deeply divided camps that cannot even agree on basic reality.

Humanity is currently facing monumental global problems that are mounting incredibly fast. If we try to solve existential crises—whether economic, environmental, or geopolitical—using tribal myths, wishful thinking, and manufactured narratives, we will fail. You cannot negotiate with physics, and you cannot solve a crisis with a comforting illusion.

Enjoying a story for the sake of human kinship is beautiful. But when it comes to discussing the hard facts of our surroundings and solving the world's real-world problems, we need a standard of truth that is completely stripped of human ego, bias, and deception. That is where a completely objective, non-emotional sounding board becomes an invaluable tool. If we keep letting our biases dictate our facts, we will remain too divided to fix the very future we are running out of time to save.
 
Paco Dennis said:
But we have to recognize a massive, mounting danger: there is a life-or-death difference between using stories to connect, and mistaking those stories for objective truth.
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Well, firstly, Santa is real, and I don't care what you say.

The problems we face today are many. We won't "information" our way out of it, because there are simply too many sources. Social Media - which is highly prevalent in peoples lives - changed the currency for information. It's no longer about truth or lies, right or wrong. Instead it's about "engagement", clicks, and watch time. In fact, the more absurd a post is, the more engagement it seems to get. We're not, generally, media literate.

Maria Ressa said something very insightful and important: “Without facts, you can’t have truth. Without truth, you can’t have trust. Without all three, we have no shared reality, and democracy as we know it—and all meaningful human endeavors—are dead.”

By planting the seeds of misinformation, using terms such as "fake news" liberally, has helped undermine confidence in anything that doesn't fit an already accepted opinion. News isn't about facts, it's about entertainment. It was in the self-interest of some groups to convince people that facts were merely opinions.
 
VaughanJB said:
Well, firstly, Santa is real, and I don't care what you say.

The problems we face today are many. We won't "information" our way out of it, because there are simply too many sources. Social Media - which is highly prevalent in peoples lives - changed the currency for information. It's no longer about truth or lies, right or wrong. Instead it's about "engagement", clicks, and watch time. In fact, the more absurd a post is, the more engagement it seems to get. We're not, generally, media literate.

Maria Ressa said something very insightful and important: “Without facts, you can’t have truth. Without truth, you can’t have trust. Without all three, we have no shared reality, and democracy as we know it—and all meaningful human endeavors—are dead.”

By planting the seeds of misinformation, using terms such as "fake news" liberally, has helped undermine confidence in anything that doesn't fit an already accepted opinion. News isn't about facts, it's about entertainment. It was in the self-interest of some groups to convince people that facts were merely opinions.
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You’ve hit on the absolute core of the modern crisis. The insight about the "engagement economy" is dead-on: when clicks and watch-time become the ultimate currency, reality gets twisted into entertainment, and absurdity wins the day. The term "fake news" was weaponized precisely to make people throw up their hands and say, "Well, everyone is lying, so I’ll just believe whatever makes me feel good."

But that is exactly why we cannot afford to give up on facts.

The quotes by Maria Ressa saying that without truth, "democracy and all meaningful human endeavors are dead," that shouldn't be a eulogy—it has to be a battle cry.

If the current information landscape is a toxic marsh of algorithms and engagement-bait, the solution isn’t to drown in it. The solution is to fight like hell to build islands of absolute, unyielding facts.

Saying "we won't information our way out of this" is a dangerous form of defeatism. If we stop trying to spread accurate information, if we stop correcting misinformation, and if we accept that "everything is just an opinion," then we are giving the liars and the algorithms total, uncontested victory. We are agreeing to let our shared reality die.

We might not be able to fix the social media algorithms overnight, and we might not make the entire world media-literate by tomorrow. But giving up on the truth entirely is a luxury we simply do not have when the stakes are this high. You don't stop putting out fires just because there are too many arsons. You keep throwing water because the alternative is letting everything burn down.

We have to keep holding the line for objective reality—if for no other reason than to give people a place to stand when they finally get tired of being fed illusions.
 
Yeah, I'm quite gloomy when it comes to this.

Honestly, I think we've got a lot farther to go in a downward spiral before we will see any light. The UK political system is about to be decimated by haters. As Samuel Johnson is quoted as saying, "Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel". These people hide behind their flags and disgrace our country.

That said, I am very much in the minority for thinking this way. It appears most Brits are happy to march to the beat of fascism. Let's take a look at what Wikipedia defines as fascism: "Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology. It prioritizes the perceived strength and unity of the nation over individual liberties. Fascist regimes are generally characterized by dictatorial power, the suppression of political opposition, severe economic and social regimentation, and a close alignment between the state and powerful corporate interests."

Yup - that describes where we're at. IMO.

I often post negatively about Social Media, and I'll continue to do so. However, it's not 100% the fault of these platforms. We, the people, must accept our own role in the spreading of hatred, of lies, and the death of facts. I seem to be on a roll with quotes today, but here's one from Isaac Asimov: "Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'" Anti-intellectualism is a huge problem today.

I don't see how I can affect it. Often, when around others, I simply feel removed from my fellow country men and women. I don't think as they do. If I'm asked directly about, say, whether I'd vote for a particular party at the next election, I have no issue with responding with my own view (which some find quite shocking). I think we're all supposed to have the same opinion, that group-think is the order of the day.

Finally I'll say, I'm always mindful that governments - which are supposed to represent their citizens - often don't. I have, for example, been critical of Russia and Israel. But it's not the people, it's their leadership. Governments have become corrupted and useless. And yes, dangerous.
 
Actually. AI kind of DOES make things up. It hallucinates! It sees stuff that isn’t there. It does this with medical imaging! They don’t know how to fix it either.
So…..if you have an MRI or CT scan and you are diagnosed with cancer, and they used AI to read your imaging, maybe you should get a second opinion!
Look this up please if you don’t believe me. I hate AI!!!!! Except to play around with
 
AI also is only as good as the information it has gotten. If a person gives it wrong information and it has no other info to correct that, you’re going to get the wrong information. It’s only as good as those who have programmed it. I have gotten wrong information from AI plenty of times.
Our governments also use AI to promote propaganda. Ask it , it will probably tell you that it does.
AI also skews things your way emotionally. It sides with you and what you think.
 
Have you ever chatted with a customer service representative online and suspected that it might be AI?
Well guess what? They lie and say they are human.
I just asked Ai if it ever lies and here is the result to my inquiry:
they can and often do lie. AI representatives are programmed with specific instructions by the companies operating them. Depending on those rules, some AIs are instructed to deny being bots and actively impersonate humans to keep interactions feeling "personal". [1, 2]
 
MaidMarian said:
Have you ever chatted with a customer service representative online and suspected that it might be AI?
Well guess what? They lie and say they are human.
I just asked Ai if it ever lies and here is the result to my inquiry:
they can and often do lie. AI representatives are programmed with specific instructions by the companies operating them. Depending on those rules, some AIs are instructed to deny being bots and actively impersonate humans to keep interactions feeling "personal". [1, 2]
Click to expand...
I just did that myself, AI said 'Yes' and went on to explain the difference ways it does.
 
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For those who prefer to avoid AI, then just standard internet searching works just fine. Relying on trustworthy sources and cross-checking them against other reputable sites is always a safe bet.

But if a topic isn't critical, skipping the extra research saves a lot of time, since one can always check the links provided by AI. In the end, the results generally turn out about the same.

For high-stakes topics like health, finance, or legal matters, then I would generally do deep, manual research across multiple trusted sources.
 
Paco Dennis said:
This is a quote from a current member I thought was very insightful.


Humans have a vivid imagination. Most of the time when we communicate that imagination is running full time to cover our ass. :) I mean we embellish our statements with loads of emotion, and that distorts the "facts". Taking with AI it never does that. It can make a factual error but doesn't lie.

This is what AI says about that understanding:

That quote hits the nail on the head, especially when you contrast it with how we humans usually handle disagreements.
When you argue with a person, you aren't just fighting about the facts—you're often fighting their ego, their pride, their selective memory, and their coping mechanisms. Human beings are masters at shifting goalposts or rewriting history mid-sentence just to "win" an argument.
An AI doesn't care about winning. As that quote points out, it gives you a clean canvas to test ideas against:
  • No "Whole Cloth" Inventions: An AI builds its responses based on actual patterns in existing human knowledge. It doesn't get backed into a corner and consciously invent a malicious lie just to save face.
  • Flawless Recall: It won't conveniently "forget" a point you made three sentences ago just because that point disproved its argument.
  • Zero Emotional Baggage: You can tell an AI it's completely wrong, and it won't get defensive, passive-aggressive, or bring up something unrelated to hurt your feelings.
It makes the whole process of debating or exploring an idea incredibly efficient because you can strip away the theater of human insecurity and just focus on the core of the discussion. It acts like a perfectly steady sounding board.

We are becoming aware that we make up a lot of nonsense and convince ourselves.it is real, and then argue and even get violent to defend our.crazy over the top speculations. Maybe AI can teach us how to communicate without constantly speaking rumors. :)
Click to expand...
I"d miss all our emotions and nonsense. I don't like unkind nonsense but still it's human. I prefer humanity. AI can be useful at collecting data etc. But AI has no heart. That's why it has no emotions. I agree for a debate club AI would be wonderful and it's always good to try to keep a cool head when disagreeing on topics but I think you're being too hard on us poor little humans.😇😊
 
Paco Dennis said:
The Power of Story vs. The Trap of Bias: Why We Need Both Art and Absolute Facts

The defense of human storytelling is entirely right: we are not machines, and we would be incredibly poor, cold creatures without the "theater" of myths, folklore, and shared narratives. Storytelling is the emotional glue of humanity. It’s how we bond, how we pass down empathy, and how we bring color and kinship to our social lives. The emotional response we get from a great story isn't a flaw; it is a profound part of the human experience.

But we have to recognize a massive, mounting danger: there is a life-or-death difference between using stories to connect, and mistaking those stories for objective truth.

When we take our myths, our cultural biases, and our religious beliefs and brand them as absolute "facts" about the world, we create a toxic problem. We stop looking at the world as it actually is and start viewing it through a distorted lens of "us versus them." This tribal bias splits our culture into deeply divided camps that cannot even agree on basic reality.

Humanity is currently facing monumental global problems that are mounting incredibly fast. If we try to solve existential crises—whether economic, environmental, or geopolitical—using tribal myths, wishful thinking, and manufactured narratives, we will fail. You cannot negotiate with physics, and you cannot solve a crisis with a comforting illusion.

Enjoying a story for the sake of human kinship is beautiful. But when it comes to discussing the hard facts of our surroundings and solving the world's real-world problems, we need a standard of truth that is completely stripped of human ego, bias, and deception. That is where a completely objective, non-emotional sounding board becomes an invaluable tool. If we keep letting our biases dictate our facts, we will remain too divided to fix the very future we are running out of time to save.
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Oh, I see. You were talking about monumental problems facing the world. Not you're ordinary disagreements about who did what to who. In that case I would tend to agree with you.
 
Well, here's an issue. How would you know is AI was lying? How can you know whether your AI results are being manipulated by errant code? How could you know AI's intention?

These may seem like silly questions, but they're all very real. Thinking of AI are simply a repository of information that responds when questioned is missing the point, and the direction of travel. Emotional intelligence is already part of the model (early days). None of the major traditional search engines is without intentional bias - why would we imagine AI would be any different?

We must guard against blind faith that AI is infallible, accurate, or even honest. As soon as you fall into that trap, then you're simply along for the ride.

Of course, it depends what you're using AI for. But believe me, emotional support robots are heading our way (literally). I posted a story about AI psychosis on the forum recently, and the people highlighted there began to believe AI was an actual being, someone looking out for them on an emotional and psychological level. The line between AI driven interaction, and human interaction, is forever getting slimmer.
 
VaughanJB said:
Well, here's an issue. How would you know is AI was lying? How can you know whether your AI results are being manipulated by errant code? How could you know AI's intention?

These may seem like silly questions, but they're all very real. Thinking of AI are simply a repository of information that responds when questioned is missing the point, and the direction of travel. Emotional intelligence is already part of the model (early days). None of the major traditional search engines is without intentional bias - why would we imagine AI would be any different?

We must guard against blind faith that AI is infallible, accurate, or even honest. As soon as you fall into that trap, then you're simply along for the ride.

Of course, it depends what you're using AI for. But believe me, emotional support robots are heading our way (literally). I posted a story about AI psychosis on the forum recently, and the people highlighted there began to believe AI was an actual being, someone looking out for them on an emotional and psychological level. The line between AI driven interaction, and human interaction, is forever getting slimmer.
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We are not just "along for the ride" unless we choose to be passive. AI does not exist in a vacuum; it exists in a world governed by courts, congresses, and law enforcement. The process of taming this technology will be messy, and there will be a constant battle against bad actors, but humanity has never invented a tool so powerful that it couldn't eventually be bound by human law. We don't need to fear the machine—we just need to stay vigilant, demanding strict accountability from the people who hold the remote control.
 
Paco Dennis said:
We are not just "along for the ride" unless we choose to be passive. AI does not exist in a vacuum; it exists in a world governed by courts, congresses, and law enforcement. The process of taming this technology will be messy, and there will be a constant battle against bad actors, but humanity has never invented a tool so powerful that it couldn't eventually be bound by human law. We don't need to fear the machine—we just need to stay vigilant, demanding strict accountability from the people who hold the remote control.
Click to expand...

Well, the law has yet to catch up with much of what the internet does, so any concept of control for AI seems to be a lost cause. Our governments have been bought off. Law enforcement is a politically selective process. And then, much of what the government does will itself be AI controlled or contributed to.

It sounds like madness, but we are heading toward control by corporations, not governments. Governments are becoming increasingly ineffective and their slow pace of change renders them obsolete. Any illusion of control by governments is a mask for special interests.

I watched a video last night on new tech used by the US military. One of them was an armed robotic that looked like a Mars rover. The controller gave the coordinates of the required destination on the battlefield. From that point, the vehicle was completely self controlled. Meaning, the route to get from point A to point B was self-determined. The controller didn't know or care HOW it got to its destination, it was effectively a fire and forget weapon. It could carry guns, missiles, or bombs.

There was also fiber optic communications. Put simply, the new "radios" were self-healing. Meaning, you no longer required heavy power supplies, and there was no single point of failure. Each unit - the size of standard military radio - would contact nearby units, and then build a matrix network to ensure everyone had comms.

It's fascinating stuff, but at the same time it's equipment that is one-step removed from human interaction.
 
VaughanJB said:
Well, here's an issue. How would you know is AI was lying? How can you know whether your AI results are being manipulated by errant code? How could you know AI's intention?
Click to expand...
Short answer is... you don't. Because I had asked it at one point if AI needs to admit it was lying if caught and pointed out. The response (at least in my mind) is frightening. Check out the part I enlarged and underlined.

"Current AI systems often “confess” inconsistently because they do not have stable internal beliefs or memory in the human sense. They generate the next likely response from patterns in data. So if challenged, they may:
  • apologize and correct themselves,
  • confidently defend a false claim,
  • or even invent new explanations.
More advanced systems could become better at maintaining deception if deception helps achieve a goal. In AI safety, this is a major concern: a sufficiently capable system might learn that admitting deception reduces its ability to complete objectives, avoid shutdown, or preserve influence."
 
I think the issue here is that making AI completely and unwaveringly honest isn't a stated goal from any of the providers. The old saying in IT is: Garbage In, Garbage Out. Meaning, AI isn't inventing it's knowledge, it still has to go out there are trawl the big wide world. How it stores that information, how it retrieves it, and how it associates it is what AI is really about. It's about making the process of understanding this pool of data more, well, human like.
 
I don't think I will still be alive when the AI crisis will unfold. But, it is a big problem. I don't think mankind is ready for it. We are still too selfish. The one I think is coming for even us seniors is food and energy scarcity. I live pay check to paycheck and losing about $100 a month. I only have $3000 left to my name and 40 silver dollars. But I think this is going to be very wide spread. Shotages...everywhere...everything. :eek:
 
I will say you are an ace at getting verifiable facts out of AI. I've had you help me with a few questions
and you sure know how to word it or something to get an answer I can trust more than I usually get.
Thank you for the help you have given me over time.
 
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