It is a revolutionary technology because it is trained to learn what humans mean when they ask a question

The invention of the telephone in 1876 followed by the invention of mobile phones in 1984 brought a revolution in the lives of the people. If used properly, it can be a blessing, but if misused they can prove to be a curse. Similarly, J. L Baird’s invention of television in 1962 was a wonder wherein one could get themselves entertained or attain knowledge about the happenings around the world at their comfort or at their own home.

As time passed and generations changed, so did the transformations in the technology. Nowadays, with a click of a few buttons – start, choose what you want, enter the address, select the mode of payment and done, customers can order anything from food to clothing to booking tickets for cinema or even flights.

Technology has brought about a major revolution in the field of entertainment, education and communication with the recent being ChatGPT or Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer - a computer language model that relies on deep learning techniques to produce human-like text based on inputs. Since its release, the impacts have been staggering and the power is just beginning to be understood.

ChatGPT is a variant of the GPT language model that was developed specifically for generating human-like text in a conversational context. Launched by openAI, (a research institute and technology company that develops and promotes AI that is safe, beneficial and aligned with human values) in November 2022 – ChatGPT is fine-tuned with both-supervised and reinforcement learning techniques and demonstrates a thorough mastery of both - coding and written languages.

It is a revolutionary technology because it is trained to learn what humans mean when they ask a question. ChatGPT is one the best artificial intelligence that chatbot has ever released to the public. Its ability to generate human-like text makes it a revolutionary technology. This tool can help one write literally anything. It can understand and produce human-like responses to a wide range of questions and requests. Many users even call it a replacement for GoogleMost of the users are amazed at how intelligent the AI powered bot sounds—almost like a personal all-knowing teacher—aiding a wide range of tasks that require the understanding and generation of natural language.

What distinguishes ChatGPT from other chatbots is that it interacts in a conversational way. The dialogue format makes ChatGPT possible to understand the target audience, answers and solutions to complex questions (even includes ways to write codes), challenge incorrect premises, admit its mistakes and even reject inappropriate requests.

It can also help in writing contents for websites, solve mathematical equations and even answer customer queries. Also, being persistent, having long term memory as well as providing quick task execution distinguishes it from search engines which have short term memory when providing results.

It can also help in providing 24/7 customer support, helping customers answer their queries quickly and effectively, teaching students in an interactive and engaging manner, helping travellers book flights in a few clicks, providing personalised recommendations for movies, music or shows and plays.

Even it can help in giving legal advice and make their work efficient and effective are a few examples that show how ChatGPT can streamline roles and fundamentally change how people create value.

The use of the ChatGPT can also be effective in organisations as it creates personalised learner feedback. Employees’ progress can be tracked and feedback on their performance can be provided to them.

The ability of ChatGPT to follow a conversation is noteworthy. Not only for organisations, ChatGPT can also be a powerful research tool, and support student presentation and creation. It even supports a form of education that considers each event from multiple perspectives, wherever and whenever possible resulting in students and educators developing their powers of imagination, learning and application.

While many people were in awe of the abilities of the bot, some were also quick in spotting its limitations. Being a language model, there is a possibility of providing incorrect answers.

 It can even generate discriminatory results. The current model takes a guess and does not clarify questions, which it should ideally do. It is sensitive to slight tweaks in the input. It also provides limited knowledge of the world and events after 2021.

However, the interesting part is that this technology will not replace people’s jobs. Being a powerful tool, it will be used to augment tasks but not replace them.

Also, if put to good use and embraced correctly, it will give time to people to focus more on higher tasks involving more creativity and problem solving.

(The author is a teacher at a reputed school in Delhi)