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That's fair, I shouldn't have made a comment asserting the minds' of the downvoters. I wonder, if the chat is wholly correct factually, what bearing that might

by mptest 3y ago

That's fair, I shouldn't have made a comment asserting the minds' of the downvoters. I wonder, if the chat is wholly correct factually, what bearing that might have on your opinion of the source? What if in the generative response it cited the historical sources? I am not trying to make any statements on the truth of either comment, I am woefully uneducated when it comes to Israel/palestine. Just interested in the value of chat gpt convo as a source in the abstract. It feels just somewhat like when I was told not to use wikipedia in my early school days.

tsimionescu 3y ago
How would you know if the chat is "wholly correct factually", unless you look at other spurces? It is not uncommon for even it's citations to simply not exist. Wikipedia sometimes has similar problems, but it has generally gotten pretty good over the years on many topics. I still wouldn't cite Wikipedia on something so politically charged as the Israel-Palestine conflict.
- mptest 3y ago
  Definitely should've said "use as a source" not "cite". Like you note, wikipedia, and chatgpt for that matter are great not for "i need 100% confidence this is correct" queries but "i want to know where to dig deeper" queries. I wouldn't cite wikipedia itself, but I also wouldn't be shied away from a primary source found from wikipedia. And that to me makes wikipedia as useful if not more useful than the primary source itself, because if I can't find the primary source what good is it? Tree falling in the forrest and all that.
  - tsimionescu 3y ago
    Sure, but the point stands that the original poster actually cited ChatGPT as their research, which is where all the reactions cam from. They didn't say "I found these sources from ChatGPT", they just gave us a ChatGPT log as a source.
xenophonf 3y ago
> value of chat gpt convo as a source in the abstract The ChatGPT conversation has zero value as a source in the abstract. > It feels just somewhat like when I was told not to use wikipedia in my early school days. Do you understand why you should not cite Wikipedia?
- mptest 3y ago
  >The ChatGPT conversation has zero value as a source in the abstract. If your objective is to get only first hand accounts, sure. But like wikipedia it's good as a source to find where to look deeper. I disagree there's zero value there. I often use it to generate a few things I go look at more serious sources for. Surely that's some value when web search's well has been well (heh) poisoned by ads? >Do you understand why you should not cite wikipedia If you find the primary source through wikipedia, did wikipedia provide "zero value as a source"? I don't think so. Bad analogy I suppose - I meant like how wikipedia was seen as not trustworthy to use even if you just used it to find the primary sources. I guess I should've said "use as a source" wikipedia not "cite" it.
  - xenophonf 3y ago
    > If you find the primary source through wikipedia, did wikipedia provide "zero value as a source"? You aren't using Wikipedia as a source but as a partial and severely biased index of the reference material. You must still be very skeptical because you have no idea what led a page's editors to include or exclude a particular reference. Frankly, you'd be better off contacting the reference desk of your local library. That's what it's there for.

by mptest 3y ago

tsimionescu 3y ago

How would you know if the chat is "wholly correct factually", unless you look at other spurces? It is not uncommon for even it's citations to simply not exist. Wikipedia sometimes has similar problems, but it has generally gotten pretty good over the years on many topics. I still wouldn't cite Wikipedia on something so politically charged as the Israel-Palestine conflict.

mptest 3y ago
Definitely should've said "use as a source" not "cite". Like you note, wikipedia, and chatgpt for that matter are great not for "i need 100% confidence this is correct" queries but "i want to know where to dig deeper" queries. I wouldn't cite wikipedia itself, but I also wouldn't be shied away from a primary source found from wikipedia. And that to me makes wikipedia as useful if not more useful than the primary source itself, because if I can't find the primary source what good is it? Tree falling in the forrest and all that.
- tsimionescu 3y ago
  Sure, but the point stands that the original poster actually cited ChatGPT as their research, which is where all the reactions cam from. They didn't say "I found these sources from ChatGPT", they just gave us a ChatGPT log as a source.

xenophonf 3y ago

> value of chat gpt convo as a source in the abstract The ChatGPT conversation has zero value as a source in the abstract. > It feels just somewhat like when I was told not to use wikipedia in my early school days. Do you understand why you should not cite Wikipedia?

mptest 3y ago
>The ChatGPT conversation has zero value as a source in the abstract. If your objective is to get only first hand accounts, sure. But like wikipedia it's good as a source to find where to look deeper. I disagree there's zero value there. I often use it to generate a few things I go look at more serious sources for. Surely that's some value when web search's well has been well (heh) poisoned by ads? >Do you understand why you should not cite wikipedia If you find the primary source through wikipedia, did wikipedia provide "zero value as a source"? I don't think so. Bad analogy I suppose - I meant like how wikipedia was seen as not trustworthy to use even if you just used it to find the primary sources. I guess I should've said "use as a source" wikipedia not "cite" it.
- xenophonf 3y ago
  > If you find the primary source through wikipedia, did wikipedia provide "zero value as a source"? You aren't using Wikipedia as a source but as a partial and severely biased index of the reference material. You must still be very skeptical because you have no idea what led a page's editors to include or exclude a particular reference. Frankly, you'd be better off contacting the reference desk of your local library. That's what it's there for.