this post was submitted on 05 Jul 2025
366 points (99.2% liked)

Fuck AI

3358 readers
2128 users here now

"We did it, Patrick! We made a technological breakthrough!"

A place for all those who loathe AI to discuss things, post articles, and ridicule the AI hype. Proud supporter of working people. And proud booer of SXSW 2024.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

A few colleagues and I were sat at our desks the other day, and one of them asked the group, "if you were an animal, what animal would you be?"

I answered with my favourite animal, and we had a little discussion about it. My other colleague answered with two animals, and we tossed those answers back and forth, discussing them and making jokes. We asked the colleague who had asked the question what they thought they'd be, and we discussed their answer.

Regular, normal, light-hearted (time wasting lol) small talk at work between friendly coworkers.

We asked the fourth coworker. He said he'd ask ChatGPT.

It was a really weird moment. We all just kind of sat there. He said the animal it came back with, and that was that. Any further discussion was just "yeah that's what it said" and we all just sort of went back to our work.

That was weird, right? Using ChatGPT for what is clearly just a little bit of friendly small talk? There's no bad blood between any of us, we hang out a lot, but it just struck me as really weird and a little bit sad.

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

this is not just friendly small talk, but questions like this are aimed to make people talk about themselves, in a way tell other people what kind of person they are. what superpower you'd have, what animal you'd be, what you would do with a million dollars, what one book/album you would take to an island to read/listen to forever...

these don't have a right answer and they reveal something about the people discussing it. asking a machine like it's some puzzle to solve is extremely fucking weird. the lengths people go to just not to use their noggin is concerning.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 hour ago

It sure revealed something about the person who used ChatGPT, so mission accomplished.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 hours ago (2 children)

There is a lot of novelty in “let’s ask the thing” and always has been.

Magic 8 ball is one sillier example that comes to mind.

But asking Siri dumb shit, asking Alexa dumb shit.

Now if they used ChatGPT instead of having their own original thoughts … weird.

Maybe they’re uncomfortable in that situation and just wanted to add a novel response.

To your point, yeah it’s weird, but it doesn’t have to be.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 hours ago

That was them using ChatGPT instead of having their own original thoughts, wasn't it? That's what struck me as so weird.

[–] HugeNerd 1 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

Oh I am greatly entertained by asking various AIs "which animal has the most anuses" etc

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

You can't leave us hanging. What's the best answer you got?

[–] HugeNerd 1 points 1 hour ago

The animal with the most anuses is the marine worm Ramisyllis multicaudata. This worm has a branching body structure, with each branch ending in a separate anus, resulting in hundreds of anuses.

I giggled like a simpleton at "resulting in hundreds of anuses". Guess what I asked here

The question is a bit misleading, as most mammals have only one scrotum. However, when discussing the animal with the largest testicles relative to its body size, the tuberous bush cricket (Platycleis affinis) stands out. Their testes can account for up to 14% of their body weight, according to BBC Earth Explore.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 43 minutes ago

Dont use these situations to put the 'weird' label on the guy.

[–] mysticpickle 7 points 3 hours ago

Dunno, sounds more like it was passive aggressive signal that he wasn't interested in the conversation to me.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

This made me think of that "I Think you Should Leave" sketch where Tim Robinson's character feels left out at the office for not having a funny YouTube video to watch, so the next day he tells them he has one and it's a video he created and posted the night before with only one view and they all immediately know he made it but he pretends he just found it lol

[–] HugeNerd 8 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

I'd be a thistle tortoise beetle.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Ooh, never heard of those. Yknow it's interesting, I don't think many people pick bugs for this question!

[–] HugeNerd 6 points 4 hours ago (2 children)

It has a penis longer than its entire body. Before I get eaten by a bird, I want to parade that thing around.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 hours ago

Looks like the infants also make shields around their body from their own feces which really resonates with me

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago
[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

You're asking an objective question in a very biased against AI community. Are you sure you're asking a legit question or are you just asking the question here to get the answer you want? Just a thought.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 hours ago

Of course I wanted to vent, you're taking this as a much more objective question than I intended. I intended it as mostly rhetorical because, yes, it's obviously very weird lol

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

Take your friend out back, put a bullet in their head.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

Ironically this might have been more interesting back in the GPT2 days, when it would generate accidentally hilarious text in response to many prompts.

Nowadays the output is "better" and utterly boring and soulless, less chaotically off topic, without a hint of creativity or personal relevance, and delivered with a grating fake "jovial" tone. This is besides the awkward break in flow to pause a conversation to interact with an app.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 hours ago

The tone is so fucking infuriating lol

[–] [email protected] 10 points 5 hours ago

It's weird yes lol. Something about someone using AI in casual conversation is very... Unnatural. Friend of mine loves to generate AI images and a reaction. I hate it

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

At my last new job orientation, we went around the room and did this. I said capybara, because I like their personalities. They're chill. The room fell silent.

Speaker: "...you all sure are picking interesting ones."

Move on to next person.

Kinda the opposite of an ice-breaker, really. More of an icy-silence-creating exercise to kick things off.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 hour ago

Not really relevant, but: I feel like maybe capybaras are so chill and friendly because they know predators will attack and eat the other critters gathered around instead of them.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 7 hours ago (3 children)

Don't leave us hanging OP, what's your fursona?

[–] [email protected] 10 points 7 hours ago (3 children)

Hahaha, sorry, I know the suspense must be killing you 😂 I said binturong, because they're my fave animal, and the one time I saw one in real life it just lay around sighing and huffing which is sort of my lifestyle choice too

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 hours ago (2 children)

Awww, it looks like a red panda after crawling out of a tar pit!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 hour ago

She ain't getting out of no tar pit with that broken wrist.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

They so do!!!

They have prehensile tails and their glands smell like popcorn! Apparently, I didn't shove my face in there to test tbh

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

and their glands smell like popcorn

- I would be a binturong!

- Why?

- ...because they're cute? Yeah, let's go with that.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 hours ago

Unfortunately, I did give the glandular answer 😬 you're telling me you didn't pick your answer due to glands? What was your answer? 👀

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 13 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

I dont think this is an AI problem.

It's just a human interaction / small talk problem, which have existed since the dawn of time.

I personally have no idea what animal I would be and I doubt id really get involved in that conversation, beyond whatever it took to be polite and not unpleasant.

I wouldn't have asked chatgpt because I hate chatgpt, but I can imagine why someone would do that as a polite non-answer.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 7 hours ago

Yeah I can see that, it's definitely one of those annoying and inane questions.

In this context though, we're friendly and have known each other for multiple years. We've definitely had more pointless conversations, which is why this interaction in particular stood out to me as particularly weird!

[–] [email protected] 9 points 7 hours ago (2 children)

It's happening, I have friends who are picking up this habit as well.

One was scared about the remarks of Iran a few weeks ago, and asked ChatGPT whether they would move war to Europe. As if this software trained on Internet bullshit was the Oracle of Delphi.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 hours ago

Clearest example of outsourcing thought to an AI model

[–] [email protected] 31 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

"Jackson, what the fuck was that? Don't ever do that again. Fucking ew."

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›