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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

ChatGPT

38 replies

AppleStrudel16 · 20/10/2025 17:45

I’m probably in the minority on here but I think it’s quite a useful tool. Especially for things like meal planning and trip planning where you need a lot of research doing for you but don’t have the time to do it.

But my god, it’s infuriating!!! I’m using it to plan a trip and I’ve been clear from the start on the dates but it keeps getting it wrong. AIBU to think that if ai is truly the future it’s going to have to get a hell of a lot better??

OP posts:
Tomikka · 20/10/2025 18:25

AmIHumanOrAmIAYeti · 20/10/2025 18:08

ChatGPT isn’t AI. It’s just a slightly more able text prediction tool. It doesn’t know anything or do anything. (Bit like the people that seem to love it.)

ChatGPT is a Large Language Model (LLM) which is one form of artificial intelligence, with the GPT meaning Generative Pre-trained Transformer

It has been pre-trained against data, and it will ‘generate’ text responses based on its existing ‘learning’ in line with the text sources that it has been trained on

ErrolTheDragon · 20/10/2025 18:22

AmIHumanOrAmIAYeti · 20/10/2025 18:08

ChatGPT isn’t AI. It’s just a slightly more able text prediction tool. It doesn’t know anything or do anything. (Bit like the people that seem to love it.)

its an LLM, which falls within the techniques currently described as ‘AI’. But you’re right it’s not truly ‘intelligent’ - it doesn’t have genuine reasoning ability. It’s better now than the original version but prone to errors as the OP has found.

SerendipityJane · 20/10/2025 18:20

AppleStrudel16 · 20/10/2025 18:11

It’s AI.

Show quote history

It's "AI", in the absence of a non-circular definition of intelligence.

It has it's uses.

LeanToWhatToDo · 20/10/2025 18:17

It is the basic bits not being done that are the worst, for such a highly intelligent system. I asked it to compare 2 schools today one private and one state, based on GSCE grades 9-8, largely because state do 9-5 and private do 9-7 which it doesn't like, but both will do their A* grades of 9-8. It then went on to compare a completely different school to the one I asked and the private school. It told me that the internet only had data for this random school it had picked, not the one I wanted to actually know about.

Original poster
AppleStrudel16 · 20/10/2025 18:11

AmIHumanOrAmIAYeti · 20/10/2025 18:08

ChatGPT isn’t AI. It’s just a slightly more able text prediction tool. It doesn’t know anything or do anything. (Bit like the people that seem to love it.)

It’s AI.

OP posts:
AmIHumanOrAmIAYeti · 20/10/2025 18:08

ChatGPT isn’t AI. It’s just a slightly more able text prediction tool. It doesn’t know anything or do anything. (Bit like the people that seem to love it.)

SerendipityJane · 20/10/2025 18:06

AppleStrudel16 · 20/10/2025 17:54

I think the main draw of ChatGPT is that it’s free, but it’s so bad at times that it feels impossible to use.

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You clearly haven't tried Gemini.

Original poster
AppleStrudel16 · 20/10/2025 18:05

ScrambledEggs12 · 20/10/2025 18:03

Yeah, I feel similarly. For some things it can be really useful, but at times it is infuriating!

It is really good though at answering my relatively simple IT queries at work (ones which a simple Google search don't help with) so I don't have to waste the time of other people at work!

Also can be fantastic for generating ideas. If anything it makes me think more rather than less.

Yeah I find it useful for quick searches that would normally take a while to sift through stuff on google.

but it refuses to remember the most basic of details, which gets really infuriating when you’re trying to plan a trip and it gets the dates wrong

OP posts:
MrTiddlesTheCat · 20/10/2025 18:03

I like it and use it mostly for interpreting the gobbledygook doctors write in my journal. It's also not patronising like the meta ai.

ScrambledEggs12 · 20/10/2025 18:03

Yeah, I feel similarly. For some things it can be really useful, but at times it is infuriating!

It is really good though at answering my relatively simple IT queries at work (ones which a simple Google search don't help with) so I don't have to waste the time of other people at work!

Also can be fantastic for generating ideas. If anything it makes me think more rather than less.

BrickBiscuit · 20/10/2025 17:59

The entire IT industry is a crock of sh1t. Search 'IT failures' and you will reach £billions of write-downs by the first page. And these are the ones not hidden as commercially confidential. Only today, one of the best known IT providers' outage has cocked up the operation of dozens of organisations and inconvenienced millions. The industry that brought us Post Office Horizon, Crowdstrike and the exploding Galaxy phone is NOT going to suddenly get a hell of a lot better.

Original poster
AppleStrudel16 · 20/10/2025 17:54

ErrolTheDragon · 20/10/2025 17:48

There are already better tools which combine AI and search techniques. DH is using one called Perplexity a lot now which seems pretty good - he’s paying a subscription for it but I think it’s possible to do some searches for free.

I think the main draw of ChatGPT is that it’s free, but it’s so bad at times that it feels impossible to use.

OP posts:
ErrolTheDragon · 20/10/2025 17:48

There are already better tools which combine AI and search techniques. DH is using one called Perplexity a lot now which seems pretty good - he’s paying a subscription for it but I think it’s possible to do some searches for free.