4 ms·

> I mean, what is the difference between creativity and hallucination (honest question)? Well, creative problem solving involves getting new ideas and perspect

> I mean, what is the difference between creativity and hallucination (honest question)? Well, creative problem solving involves getting new ideas and perspectives by creating novel associations between things we know. Hallucinations are creating things we "know" because they sound like they could be right and basing "ideas" on them. In short, hallucinations are bullshit. Totally open creative problem solving isn't always perfect, but even the ideas that don't really work can reveal something about the concepts involved. And bullshit often takes creativity to create, but that doesn't make it useful as actual creative output. It's not like the second you move beyond empirically provable statements, everything has equal merit. If you're trying to creatively work to a useful end, whether or not the knowledge you're working with is fabricated is pretty consequential. Doing otherwise would be like trying to optimize your code based on utterly fake but plausible algorithms-- sounding right isn't right enough to be useful. IMO, being able to create lies that pass the smell test is LLMs' most dangerous proclivity, especially when they're presented as expertise-in-a-box.

bawolff 2y ago
Its not like humans always have good creative output. A lot of human creative output is essentially unworkable bullshit that gets discarded quite quickly. I'm not saying llms are good at creativity (i certainly don't think they are) but i kind of feel like its a difference in quality not kind. Like if you asked me to describe what it means for a human to be creative, i would probably write something quite similar to what you wrote above.
- chefandy 2y ago
  The main difference for my use case is what's usable about off-the-mark creative output to those who engage with it. With an LLM's hallucination, bullshit was made, bullshit was received, and that's that. If you figure out it's bullshit, the only thing you've likely gained from the exercise is having one less piece of bullshit to consider. With humans creatively solving problems, what they say isn't 'output'-- it's externalizing a reasoning process. Being off-the-mark about something is a beneficial part of defining the bounds of an unknown solution because it's based on reality. It's a tangible idea that can be reasoned about and modified-- not a collection of output. It's not a point on a scatter plot, it's a waypoint towards a useful end.

bawolff 2y ago

Its not like humans always have good creative output. A lot of human creative output is essentially unworkable bullshit that gets discarded quite quickly. I'm not saying llms are good at creativity (i certainly don't think they are) but i kind of feel like its a difference in quality not kind. Like if you asked me to describe what it means for a human to be creative, i would probably write something quite similar to what you wrote above.

chefandy 2y ago
The main difference for my use case is what's usable about off-the-mark creative output to those who engage with it. With an LLM's hallucination, bullshit was made, bullshit was received, and that's that. If you figure out it's bullshit, the only thing you've likely gained from the exercise is having one less piece of bullshit to consider. With humans creatively solving problems, what they say isn't 'output'-- it's externalizing a reasoning process. Being off-the-mark about something is a beneficial part of defining the bounds of an unknown solution because it's based on reality. It's a tangible idea that can be reasoned about and modified-- not a collection of output. It's not a point on a scatter plot, it's a waypoint towards a useful end.