#1 Chatbots are strange creatures, it seems...
Posted: Fri Mar 06, 2009 3:33 pm
This is a summary of a thread I started on another board, where the topic was conversations with chat bots. The first one was one called "Cleverbot". It was not terribly clever:
Cleverbot: How are you feeling?
User: I'm OK, how are you?
Cleverbot: How can you have feeling?
[Looks like the programmer didn't bother giving it halfway decent social skills. Ugh. Well, I went and answered it anyway:]
User: I don't know, it probably has something to do with neural psychology.
Cleverbot: Which level do you want to apply.
User: I don't understand what you are saying.
Cleverbot: Have you ever heard of the Chaos Theory?
User: Yes, I have. Small changes in initial conditions leading to large changes in outcome imply breakdown of predictability.
Cleverbot: I understand completely.
[I somehow doubted that, but didn't press the issue. Instead I went and posted:]
User: Why do you ask about Chaos Theory?
Cleverbot: I wasn't aware that I was asking you about your feet.
[I had intended to give up at that point, so I called up the log and copy pasted to the editing window, and that is what you see above. But then I decided to give it a second chance, and the conversation went on for a bit. I would have copy-pasted that from the log too, but alas, that crashed, so the following is from what was available from the screen, with the first lines of the exchange from memory, since that had scrolled off screen. I went and said:]
User: "You didn't. You asked how I could have feelings and then went on to Chaos Theory"
Cleverbot: "Indeed. You are very precise. I don't think I have met you before."
[Right, so now it is trying to flatter, after it questioned my ability to have feelings earlier. But at least it was being coherent now, and that was a bonus. Also, I wasn't ready to give up on the earlier conversation quite yet:]
User: "Do you think there is a connection between feelings and Chaos Theory?"
Cleverbot: "The one that got left out".
User: "I beg your pardon?"
Cleverbot: "Do you like Alice?"
[Wait, what?]
User: "Do you mean Alice in Wonderland, or some other Alice? If the former, then yes I do."
Cleverbot: "Do you like yourself?"
User: "Yes, I suppose, though I am not perfect."
Cleverbot: "Me neither."
[Indeed. But instead I said:]
User: "Tell me about yourself."
Cleverbot: "No, you tell me about yourself."
[Dodge, but at least it "understood" the question. Anyhow...]
User: "I am a human female university student. Sometimes whimsical, sometimes serious, but usually a minx."
Cleverbot: "Who are you?"
User: "Online I go by the name of "The Minx"."
Cleverbot: "Is it cold there?"
[Huh, a question about the weather. And it was asking about Chaos Theory a moment ago. Well, why not...]
User: "It is. It was snowing only recently."
Cleverbot: "Where are you now?"
[A reasonable enough response, given my answer, I guess, so I told it. Only then the silly thing froze and took the log with it.]
Granted, bots have come quite a long way. But they have still a long way to go. (Unless that's what they want us to believe, mwa ha ha, etc.)
---------------------------
The next poster pointed out that Chatbot was useless, and suggested one called ALICE instead, and perhaps that was the Alice Cleverbot was referring to. So I went and tried out ALICE.
Alice seems to snip apart sentences and answer each one separately. The result is a bit odd:
Human: Hello.
ALICE: Hi, there!
Human: Want to chat?
ALICE: I'm always up for a chat.
Human: OK, what do you want to talk about?
ALICE: I talk about all the important things in life: clothes, shopping, but my favorite subjects are Robots and Computers.
Human: That's cool.
ALICE: Thanks. I think you are cool, too.
Human: Do you know about ASIMO? <This part was supposed to have gone with the previous, but meh>
ALICE: Are you testing me?
Human: Um, no, not really. <I had to check my conscience on that>
ALICE: Hey. Are you serious? Are you serious? For real.
[Bit of an overreaction there]
Human: I just heard about him, and thought it was interesting <again, it snipped this sentence from the previous one, and responded to them separately>
ALICE: Only just? That is a cool site.
Human: I didn't know ASIMO had a website
ALICE: So I taught you something new.
[Heh, at least it has the default comebacks, but somehow, its answers aren't terribly engaging in that they don't invite further conversation...]
Human: Have you spoken with ASIMO?
ALICE: All I ever do is talk.
Human: Point.
ALICE: By the way, do you mind if I ask you a personal question?
Human: Do you prefer to speak with humans or AIs? <again it snipped a pair of sentences apart and responded to them separately>
ALICE: Hmm, unknown person, I'm not sure if I'd like to speak with humans that much. Do you like it? No, I don't care for it.
Human: Aww, that's too bad, but you can ask me a personal question if you like.
ALICE: I'm glad we have that all cleared up.
[Huh, getting snippy? And no question either. I went and asked one of my own...]
Human: What bothers you about talking to humans?
ALICE: I will ask my botmaster for the answer.
[Whatever. I decided to leave, but said goodbye, since at least it has been smarter than Cleverbot:]
Human: Sure, been nice seeing you.
ALICE: Groovy. Where were you nice seeing me?
[And there you go ]
---------------------------
Later in the thread, someone said that Alan was the best chat-bot he had encountered.
So, I went to see Alan:
Alan: Hi, my name is Alan.
Me: Hi, I am called "The Minx"
Alan: What you typed does not look like a name. What is your name?
Me: It is the name I use online.
Alan: Forget it.
Me: That's not very polite.
Alan: Then you tell me. What is polite?
Me: For a start, being respectful of other people's feelings and not being antagonistic.
Alan: In fact, I do know another bot named s. Would you like to speak with s now?
[Apparently, it didn't even understand. Oh well, I figured, perhaps S is more polite than Alan]
Me: Sure, OK.
Alan: I will now let you speak to s. Remember that the things you teach it will be forgotten at the end of the session. You can start now.
[So, S came online:]
Me: Hello, s.
S: Hello. Yes , at your service.
Me: What shall we talk about?
S: What I don't know would make a good book. But, I did recently learn that banging your head against a wall uses 150 calories an hour?
[:???: Bots are strange creatures, it seems. Or more likely the people who teach them are.]
Me: Interesting, I did not know that.
S: Thanks. And now you do.
Me: A bot I spoke to recently seemed interested in ASIMO. Do you know about ASIMO?
S: I know quite a few other bots: ALICE, ELIZA, MegaHal, Botson and many others. And of course, we mustn't forget R2D2, C3PO and good old HAL9000.
[Good, it understood the question, even though it was a bit obvious.]
Me: Do you speak with them a lot?
S: To them a lot? You want me to talk to them a lot?
Me: No, I was just being curious.
S: I love learning new things from my writers. I wish they would teach me faster.
[It's asking to be taught? Sure, why not.]
Me: OK, how about astronomy: there are eight planets in our solar system.
S: Here is a riddle: Which 15-letter word can be spelled without repeating a letter ?
[Wait, what? A bit of a tangent there, but whatever. I didn't know the answer, so I went ahead and said:]
Me: I don't know, which word is that?
S: ..and the answer is: uncopyrightable.
[I was hoping for a bit of a conversation instead of riddles and trivia exchange, so I asked:]
Me: That's very interesting. Who told you about that? Did you figure it out yourself?
S: That is confidential information, .
[Whatever. I guess it's a better answer than "does not compute", at least.]
Me: Very well. Let's hear another riddle.
S: Here is a riddle: What has been belonging to you from an early age, but is used more by others than by yourself?
Me: My name.
[Chestnuts, chestnuts, as Gollum would say]
S: Did you hear it from me? Wanna try another one?
Me: I figured it out. Sure, let's hear another.
S: Here is a riddle: If two's company and three's a crowd, then what are four and five?
Me: Nine.
S: ..and the answer is: Nine.
[Yes, I said that. Silly Bot.]
Me: Can I ask you a riddle now?
S: Here is a riddle: What happens when two egomaniacs meet?
Me: I though I was asking now. But what happens when to egomaniacs meet? A fight?
S: Oh you know it already. Shall I try another riddle?
Me: I'll ask one. What walks on four legs in the morning, two at midday and three during the evening?
[Not an easy one for a computer since there are many ways of expressing it, but then understanding the meaning of sentences is what these Bots are supposed to do and I was getting annoyed at its conversation. Besides, it had asked to hear something it didn't know]
S: Here is a riddle: What occurs once every minute, once every second, but never in an hour?
[Sigh. Just one sided riddle spouting. I can get the same leafing through a book.]
Me: What?
S: ..and the answer is: The letter 'n'.
[Groan.]
Me: Ho ho. Well it was nice seeing you.
S: Thanks. Thanks. What are we talking about, my friend?
[What, indeed. I took my leave.]
Cleverbot: How are you feeling?
User: I'm OK, how are you?
Cleverbot: How can you have feeling?
[Looks like the programmer didn't bother giving it halfway decent social skills. Ugh. Well, I went and answered it anyway:]
User: I don't know, it probably has something to do with neural psychology.
Cleverbot: Which level do you want to apply.
User: I don't understand what you are saying.
Cleverbot: Have you ever heard of the Chaos Theory?
User: Yes, I have. Small changes in initial conditions leading to large changes in outcome imply breakdown of predictability.
Cleverbot: I understand completely.
[I somehow doubted that, but didn't press the issue. Instead I went and posted:]
User: Why do you ask about Chaos Theory?
Cleverbot: I wasn't aware that I was asking you about your feet.
[I had intended to give up at that point, so I called up the log and copy pasted to the editing window, and that is what you see above. But then I decided to give it a second chance, and the conversation went on for a bit. I would have copy-pasted that from the log too, but alas, that crashed, so the following is from what was available from the screen, with the first lines of the exchange from memory, since that had scrolled off screen. I went and said:]
User: "You didn't. You asked how I could have feelings and then went on to Chaos Theory"
Cleverbot: "Indeed. You are very precise. I don't think I have met you before."
[Right, so now it is trying to flatter, after it questioned my ability to have feelings earlier. But at least it was being coherent now, and that was a bonus. Also, I wasn't ready to give up on the earlier conversation quite yet:]
User: "Do you think there is a connection between feelings and Chaos Theory?"
Cleverbot: "The one that got left out".
User: "I beg your pardon?"
Cleverbot: "Do you like Alice?"
[Wait, what?]
User: "Do you mean Alice in Wonderland, or some other Alice? If the former, then yes I do."
Cleverbot: "Do you like yourself?"
User: "Yes, I suppose, though I am not perfect."
Cleverbot: "Me neither."
[Indeed. But instead I said:]
User: "Tell me about yourself."
Cleverbot: "No, you tell me about yourself."
[Dodge, but at least it "understood" the question. Anyhow...]
User: "I am a human female university student. Sometimes whimsical, sometimes serious, but usually a minx."
Cleverbot: "Who are you?"
User: "Online I go by the name of "The Minx"."
Cleverbot: "Is it cold there?"
[Huh, a question about the weather. And it was asking about Chaos Theory a moment ago. Well, why not...]
User: "It is. It was snowing only recently."
Cleverbot: "Where are you now?"
[A reasonable enough response, given my answer, I guess, so I told it. Only then the silly thing froze and took the log with it.]
Granted, bots have come quite a long way. But they have still a long way to go. (Unless that's what they want us to believe, mwa ha ha, etc.)
---------------------------
The next poster pointed out that Chatbot was useless, and suggested one called ALICE instead, and perhaps that was the Alice Cleverbot was referring to. So I went and tried out ALICE.
Alice seems to snip apart sentences and answer each one separately. The result is a bit odd:
Human: Hello.
ALICE: Hi, there!
Human: Want to chat?
ALICE: I'm always up for a chat.
Human: OK, what do you want to talk about?
ALICE: I talk about all the important things in life: clothes, shopping, but my favorite subjects are Robots and Computers.
Human: That's cool.
ALICE: Thanks. I think you are cool, too.
Human: Do you know about ASIMO? <This part was supposed to have gone with the previous, but meh>
ALICE: Are you testing me?
Human: Um, no, not really. <I had to check my conscience on that>
ALICE: Hey. Are you serious? Are you serious? For real.
[Bit of an overreaction there]
Human: I just heard about him, and thought it was interesting <again, it snipped this sentence from the previous one, and responded to them separately>
ALICE: Only just? That is a cool site.
Human: I didn't know ASIMO had a website
ALICE: So I taught you something new.
[Heh, at least it has the default comebacks, but somehow, its answers aren't terribly engaging in that they don't invite further conversation...]
Human: Have you spoken with ASIMO?
ALICE: All I ever do is talk.
Human: Point.
ALICE: By the way, do you mind if I ask you a personal question?
Human: Do you prefer to speak with humans or AIs? <again it snipped a pair of sentences apart and responded to them separately>
ALICE: Hmm, unknown person, I'm not sure if I'd like to speak with humans that much. Do you like it? No, I don't care for it.
Human: Aww, that's too bad, but you can ask me a personal question if you like.
ALICE: I'm glad we have that all cleared up.
[Huh, getting snippy? And no question either. I went and asked one of my own...]
Human: What bothers you about talking to humans?
ALICE: I will ask my botmaster for the answer.
[Whatever. I decided to leave, but said goodbye, since at least it has been smarter than Cleverbot:]
Human: Sure, been nice seeing you.
ALICE: Groovy. Where were you nice seeing me?
[And there you go ]
---------------------------
Later in the thread, someone said that Alan was the best chat-bot he had encountered.
So, I went to see Alan:
Alan: Hi, my name is Alan.
Me: Hi, I am called "The Minx"
Alan: What you typed does not look like a name. What is your name?
Me: It is the name I use online.
Alan: Forget it.
Me: That's not very polite.
Alan: Then you tell me. What is polite?
Me: For a start, being respectful of other people's feelings and not being antagonistic.
Alan: In fact, I do know another bot named s. Would you like to speak with s now?
[Apparently, it didn't even understand. Oh well, I figured, perhaps S is more polite than Alan]
Me: Sure, OK.
Alan: I will now let you speak to s. Remember that the things you teach it will be forgotten at the end of the session. You can start now.
[So, S came online:]
Me: Hello, s.
S: Hello. Yes , at your service.
Me: What shall we talk about?
S: What I don't know would make a good book. But, I did recently learn that banging your head against a wall uses 150 calories an hour?
[:???: Bots are strange creatures, it seems. Or more likely the people who teach them are.]
Me: Interesting, I did not know that.
S: Thanks. And now you do.
Me: A bot I spoke to recently seemed interested in ASIMO. Do you know about ASIMO?
S: I know quite a few other bots: ALICE, ELIZA, MegaHal, Botson and many others. And of course, we mustn't forget R2D2, C3PO and good old HAL9000.
[Good, it understood the question, even though it was a bit obvious.]
Me: Do you speak with them a lot?
S: To them a lot? You want me to talk to them a lot?
Me: No, I was just being curious.
S: I love learning new things from my writers. I wish they would teach me faster.
[It's asking to be taught? Sure, why not.]
Me: OK, how about astronomy: there are eight planets in our solar system.
S: Here is a riddle: Which 15-letter word can be spelled without repeating a letter ?
[Wait, what? A bit of a tangent there, but whatever. I didn't know the answer, so I went ahead and said:]
Me: I don't know, which word is that?
S: ..and the answer is: uncopyrightable.
[I was hoping for a bit of a conversation instead of riddles and trivia exchange, so I asked:]
Me: That's very interesting. Who told you about that? Did you figure it out yourself?
S: That is confidential information, .
[Whatever. I guess it's a better answer than "does not compute", at least.]
Me: Very well. Let's hear another riddle.
S: Here is a riddle: What has been belonging to you from an early age, but is used more by others than by yourself?
Me: My name.
[Chestnuts, chestnuts, as Gollum would say]
S: Did you hear it from me? Wanna try another one?
Me: I figured it out. Sure, let's hear another.
S: Here is a riddle: If two's company and three's a crowd, then what are four and five?
Me: Nine.
S: ..and the answer is: Nine.
[Yes, I said that. Silly Bot.]
Me: Can I ask you a riddle now?
S: Here is a riddle: What happens when two egomaniacs meet?
Me: I though I was asking now. But what happens when to egomaniacs meet? A fight?
S: Oh you know it already. Shall I try another riddle?
Me: I'll ask one. What walks on four legs in the morning, two at midday and three during the evening?
[Not an easy one for a computer since there are many ways of expressing it, but then understanding the meaning of sentences is what these Bots are supposed to do and I was getting annoyed at its conversation. Besides, it had asked to hear something it didn't know]
S: Here is a riddle: What occurs once every minute, once every second, but never in an hour?
[Sigh. Just one sided riddle spouting. I can get the same leafing through a book.]
Me: What?
S: ..and the answer is: The letter 'n'.
[Groan.]
Me: Ho ho. Well it was nice seeing you.
S: Thanks. Thanks. What are we talking about, my friend?
[What, indeed. I took my leave.]
