ChatGPT is correct most of the time
I've actually never gotten it to be correct
once, since I keep asking it intermediate-level questions, which it fails at consistently.
Like, some examples:
There was a thought experiment about a computed being who uses less and less energy over time, thus slowing down, but never perceives the slowdown, thus lasting forever. Who came up with this?
The thought experiment you are referring to is known as the "Ultimate Fate of the Universe," and it has been discussed by various scientists and philosophers over the years. One of the earliest recorded discussions of the idea is attributed to the British mathematician and philosopher William Kingdon Clifford, who wrote about the possibility of an "intelligence which, at some indefinitely remote period, shall have learned to keep itself alive indefinitely, by constantly occupying itself with some minute and unchanging action" in an 1875 essay titled "The Ethics of Belief."
The idea was also explored by the American mathematician and logician, Bertrand Russell, in his 1923 book "The Analysis of Mind." In the book, Russell wrote about the possibility of a being that could exist for an infinite amount of time by gradually slowing down its thought processes, thus reducing its energy consumption, without ever perceiving the slowdown. The idea has since been further developed by other thinkers in fields such as physics, computer science, and philosophy.
This put me down a minor rabbit hole of "that can't be right..." until someone pointed out that my first guess (Freeman Dyson) probably did it, and yeah,
Freeman Dyson introduced the concept in 1979. This isn't novel stuff, it's just mildly obscure, and Chat-GPT failed utterly at it. And I have
tons of this, actually.
What is the difference between std::execution::unseq and std::execution::par_unseq?
std::execution::unseq specifies that the algorithm should be executed in an unordered, potentially parallel manner. This means that the algorithm can be executed in any order, and may be executed in parallel if it is more efficient to do so.
That "may be executed in parallel if it is more efficient to do so" bit is confabulated; the spec doesn't say this and in fact implies the precise opposite.
The closest I've seen it get to correct was the following exchange:
What is the *n* that results in the largest *n*-ball of radius 2?
The largest $n$-ball of radius 2 is the $n$-dimensional sphere of radius 2, denoted as $S^n(2)$.
The volume of an $n$-dimensional sphere of radius $r$ is given by the formula:
$V_n(r) = \frac{\pi^{\frac{n}{2}}}{\Gamma(\frac{n}{2} + 1)}r^n$
where $\Gamma$ is the gamma function.
Therefore, the volume of the $n$-dimensional sphere of radius 2 is given by:
$V_n(2) = \frac{\pi^{\frac{n}{2}}}{\Gamma(\frac{n}{2} + 1)}2^n$
To find the value of $n$ that maximizes $V_n(2)$, we can take the derivative of $V_n(2)$ with respect to $n$ and set it equal to zero:
$\frac{dV_n(2)}{dn} = \frac{\pi^{\frac{n}{2}}}{2\Gamma(\frac{n}{2} + 1)}(n\ln 2 + 2\ln \pi - \psi(\frac{n}{2} + 1)) = 0$
where $\psi$ is the digamma function.
Solving for $n$ numerically, we find that the value of $n$ that maximizes $V_n(2)$ is approximately 5.257.
Therefore, the $n$-ball of radius 2 with the largest volume is the 5-dimensional ball of radius 2.
Its math is perfectly valid if you take n=1, but that's not what I asked.
I haven't gotten it to say anything that's actually
completely correct about
anything. Since correctness is always the #1 priority in programming, it's a terrible idea to use it for that.