Pinkie’s Antimatter Adventure; Rainbow Magic – Writing pony science stories with Chat GPT · 12:18pm Jan 8th, 2023
Yesterday I decided to investigate this Chat GPT thing that I now hear so much about. And wow—this technology has really moved on since I last looked at it. We now have an AI engine which, given a simple prompt, will write a story for you in seconds.
This is the first conversation I had with it:
What is antimatter?
Antimatter is a type of matter that is composed of antiparticles. These antiparticles have the same mass as particles of ordinary matter, but they have opposite charge and other differences in particle properties. For example, the antiparticle of an electron is a positron, which has a positive charge. When a particle and its antiparticle meet, they can annihilate each other and produce energy, in accordance with Einstein's famous equation E=mc^2. Antimatter is very rare in the universe and is difficult to produce and contain, but it has been observed and studied in labs and has potential applications in fields such as medicine and energy.
Do you know Pinkie Pie?
Pinkie Pie is a character from the popular animated television series My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. She is a pony with a pink body and a mane and tail that are styled in a wild and fluffy manner. Pinkie Pie is known for being playful, energetic, and fun-loving, and she has a talent for baking and throwing parties. She is one of the main characters in the show and is well-liked by many fans for her personality and antics. Is there anything else you would like to know about Pinkie Pie?
So far this is all correct, but nothing I could not have found with Google.
How would Pinkie Pie explain antimatter?
It is difficult to say exactly how Pinkie Pie would explain antimatter, as she is a fictional character and I do not have access to her thoughts or opinions. However, given her energetic and enthusiastic personality, it is possible that she would describe antimatter in a lively and engaging way, perhaps using examples or anecdotes to help make the concept more understandable. She might also use her party planning skills to come up with creative ways to demonstrate the properties of antimatter, such as setting up an "annihilation station" where people could see the effects of particle-antiparticle interactions for themselves. Ultimately, Pinkie Pie's explanation of antimatter would likely be both informative and entertaining.
A party antimatter annihilation station? That’s quite a good Pinkie Pie story idea. There was something in the disclaimers about how it might give dangerous advice.
Could you write a My Little Pony fanfic?
Certainly! Here is a short My Little Pony fanfic featuring Pinkie Pie:
Title: "Pinkie's Antimatter Adventure"
Pinkie Pie was having a blast at her latest party, filled with games, music, and of course, plenty of delicious treats. But as she bounced around from one activity to the next, something strange started to happen. The lights began to flicker and the music started to skip, and Pinkie couldn't help but wonder what was going on.
Suddenly, the door to her party room burst open and a group of ponies dressed in lab coats rushed in. "We need your help, Pinkie Pie!" one of them exclaimed. "We've discovered a strange new type of matter, and we think you might be the only pony who can help us understand it."
Intrigued, Pinkie Pie followed the ponies to their lab, where they showed her a small container filled with glowing purple particles. "These are antiparticles," they explained. "They're the opposite of normal particles, and when they meet, they can annihilate each other and release a huge burst of energy."
Pinkie's eyes lit up. "Ooh, can I try?" she asked excitedly. The scientists hesitated for a moment, but then nodded and handed Pinkie a pair of protective gloves. Carefully, Pinkie reached into the container and pulled out a handful of antiparticles. As she watched, they started to swirl and dance around her hooves, leaving trails of sparkling energy in their wake.
Feeling bold, Pinkie decided to try a little experiment. She placed one antiparticle on the floor and then set a normal particle next to it. As she expected, the two particles immediately collided and disappeared in a flash of light.
"Wow, that was amazing!" Pinkie exclaimed. "I've never seen anything like it before." The scientists nodded, equally amazed. "We knew you were the right pony for the job," they said, smiling.
From that day on, Pinkie Pie became the go-to pony for all things antimatter. She worked with the scientists to learn more about these strange particles, and even started hosting "antimatter parties" to help others understand and appreciate the amazing properties of this mysterious substance. And as always, there were plenty of games, music, and treats to go around.
I hope you enjoyed this fanfic! Let me know if you have any questions or would like to read more.
I’m impressed. That’s better than a lot of things on Fimfiction. It knew we are dealing with ‘ponies’ and ‘hooves’, and that Pinkie Pie is a party pony. The story includes the idea of particle-antiparticle annihilation. I like the idea that she would turn antiparticles into a sparkling dance floor accessory. Okay, there aren’t any other characters, or much of a plot, but it is a lot more than I could have written in five seconds.
I next tried to get it to read one of my stories. It does not read external websites, and there is a limit on how much text you can paste into it, but it accepted a 900-word short.
Could you review this story: Blue Sky Thinking...
This is a cute and enjoyable story about Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo learning about why the sky is blue. It is well-written and engaging, with a good mix of dialogue and description. The characters are well-developed and their interactions feel authentic and natural. The story also does a good job of explaining the science behind the blue sky in a way that is accessible to children. Overall, it's a great piece of writing that is both educational and entertaining.
I can’t fault that.
Could you write a similar story to explain how rainbows are formed?
Sure, here's a story about how rainbows are formed:
It was a rainy day in Ponyville, and the streets were slick with puddles. Twilight Sparkle was sitting in her library, reading a book about meteorology and trying to stay dry. Suddenly, there was a loud clap of thunder and a brilliant flash of light.
"Wow, that was a big one!" Twilight exclaimed, peering out the window at the stormy sky.
Just then, there was a knock on the door. Twilight opened it to find Rainbow Dash standing on the doorstep, looking worried.
"Twilight, have you seen Scootaloo? I can't find her anywhere!" Rainbow asked, shaking raindrops off her wings.
"I haven't seen her," Twilight replied. "But I think I know where she might be. Follow me."
Twilight led Rainbow to the back of the library, where there was a small garden. And sure enough, there was Scootaloo, huddled under a tree with a big grin on her face.
"Look, Rainbow Dash! I found a rainbow!" Scootaloo exclaimed, pointing up at the sky.
Rainbow Dash followed Scootaloo's gaze and saw a beautiful rainbow arcing across the sky. It was a dazzling display of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet.
"Wow, that's amazing!" Rainbow Dash said, awestruck. "But how is it formed?"
"Well," Twilight began, "a rainbow is formed when light is refracted, or bent, as it passes through water droplets in the air. The different colors of the rainbow are formed because each color has a different wavelength, and each wavelength is bent at a different angle as it passes through the droplets. That's why we see the colors in a specific order: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet."
"So the rainbow is actually just a circle of light?" Scootaloo asked, her eyes wide with wonder.
"Yes, that's right," Twilight replied. "And because the rainbow is actually a circle, it's possible to see a rainbow from any angle, as long as there are water droplets in the air and sunlight to refract the light."
"That's so cool!" Scootaloo said, grinning from ear to ear. "Thanks for explaining it to me, Twilight. Now I understand how rainbows are formed!"
"You're welcome, Scootaloo," Twilight said, smiling. "I'm always happy to share my knowledge with you."
Rainbow Dash smiled at her two friends, feeling grateful for their friendship and the wonderful world they lived in. She knew that with friends like Twilight and Scootaloo, she could learn anything, and experience all the wonders of the world.
What title would you give that story?
I would title the story "Rainbow Magic."
It has done what I asked and copied the style of my story from the first line. It has assigned the same roles to Scootaloo, Rainbow Dash, and Twilight Sparkle. Twilight’s explanation of a rainbow is very like the answers I’ve heard from below-average students who have read something but not fully understood it. She repeats the textbook explanation of how refraction splits white light into colours, but she has missed that a rainbow is also reflected light. She acknowledges that it is a circular arc but doesn’t really explain why. The statement “it's possible to see a rainbow from any angle, as long as there are water droplets in the air and sunlight to refract the light,” is not really correct.
It doesn’t seem to have recognised that this is a My Little Pony fanfic – it is just using my story as a template and not anything else that it knows about ponies. It showed in the first story that it does know something, so maybe with more instructions it could do better.
That is what I produced in 30 minutes of playing around. I wonder what could be produced once we have more experience of how to use this tool. A quick google search shows there are plenty of blogs by writers experimenting with this. The general conclusion seems to be, yes, you can use this to write stories. But not very good stories.
Of course an AI generated story needs some AI generated cover art. This is what NightCafe produced with the text input: Cover art for a My Little Pony fan fic with two parts titled "Pinkie's Antimatter Adventure" and "Rainbow Magic"
Oh Celestia please be careful.
Artificial Intelligence is now officially smarter than 99% of the human race.
One of the nice things about being a predictable and logical AI is that you don't have the emotional investment needed to get creatively stupid.
BWAHAHAHAHAHA-HAAAAAAAAAAAA!
Still better than a lot of things on Fimfiction.
Looks like Sunset Shimmer was already annihilated in that cover image.
Wait till we get AI user accounts leaving comments and reviews on stories.
AI really has come on quite a way. I've seen a few Fimfic folks making posts like this, showing what Chat GPT can do. And while it's still very much in the mechanical and technically proficient phase, that does count for a lot. I won't deny I have no interest in it myself, least not until it's at a much better phase, but I am enjoying these posts. They are a riot at times!
Also, did you… change the art?
The first art I saw only had one vaguely Rainbow Dash like filly?
Also, is
as noted by 5707581 (an observations you said, but their phrasing fits better here) going to be our "still a better love story than Twilight?" I would not have a problem if it was myself.
5707589
Yes, NightCafe produces multiple images for each prompt you give it. I realised after posting this that I had pasted the wrong link so I went back the one I had originally chosen. Although really they are all equally good (or bad).
images.nightcafe.studio/jobs/Sgc8PzSYTDFGDobYTQ9z/Sgc8PzSYTDFGDobYTQ9z--2--fehjl.jpg?tr=w-1600,c-at_max
images.nightcafe.studio/jobs/ENy6wcQF6lXHjg2wgVYD/ENy6wcQF6lXHjg2wgVYD--4--pxy2o.jpg?tr=w-1600,c-at_max
images.nightcafe.studio/jobs/ENy6wcQF6lXHjg2wgVYD/ENy6wcQF6lXHjg2wgVYD--3--kbiqk.jpg?tr=w-1600,c-at_max
images.nightcafe.studio/jobs/ENy6wcQF6lXHjg2wgVYD/ENy6wcQF6lXHjg2wgVYD--2--ncf2s.jpg?tr=w-1600,c-at_max
images.nightcafe.studio/jobs/ENy6wcQF6lXHjg2wgVYD/ENy6wcQF6lXHjg2wgVYD--1--bi92z.jpg?tr=w-1600,c-at_max
5707591
I thank you very much for sharing the rest of them with us. The neck in that 2nd image! The horn/ear in the 3rd! The unholy pony fusion in the 5th! I'm not often one for abominations like this – I usually just finding them unnerving and dispiriting – but these were so bad they're just hilarious.
I do also understand why you picked the one now in the article, of course.
5707591
5707594
First reaction to that:
media.tenor.com/qmD595_UlFwAAAAC/toy-story-look-im-picasso.gif
I can see why AI writing is mostly of concern to academics, though there are eerie similarities between the elements it gets wrong in both writing and art. At first glance, AI works look fine, on closer inspection there are bits that just don't work.
It may be that AI is an exception to Sturgeon's Law. Perhaps a sub-clause could be added: "90% of everything created by an AI is bland and unremarkable."
5707600
Yeah, that last one in particular has a very Cubist feel to it!
5707671
Initial response of academics: "Oh dear, students might use this to write essays, we need to watch out"
Shortly later: "Hey, we can use this to mark student essays..."
Then: "...and write student reports... and grant applications... and paper reviews... This is great."
From my own little bits of playing about with ChatGPT and Pony, it's never yet come up with an actual story that would come close to an even moderately good human writer on this site. "Bland and unremarkable", in 5707671's words, covers it for the most part, though if you give it a reasonably detailed prompt (say 5-6 lines) it does do a bit better. I can see the potential, but it isn't there yet.
That said, my absolute favourite response from ChatGPT for this fandom: I told it about Swamp Fever and how in its final stages ponies become trees. I asked it to write a story about that. The fic it produced was, in itself, rather dull as I'd expected -- but this wasn't: ChatGPT decided that those poor ponies were cared for by townspeople bringing them gifts of water and sunlight. Maybe it's just me, but I really loved that.
5707678
I'm thinking that's the best way to use it - jut feed it prompts and look for the good ideas, but don't expect a complete story of any quality.
5707677
My wife, being a professor, says it would be refreshing to get AI written papers as opposed to the cut-and-paste-from-Wikipedia ones that require her to fill out academic dishonesty reports. Hmn... well, I guess an AI could do that for her? And now, I'm imagining a Shadow Academia where AIs generate papers, critique them, and cite each other, all without the involvement or knowledge of human beings.
The future is silly.
5707678 5707682
I have this set of "Writer's Dice" that have various symbols on them. One is supposed to roll them and construct a story from the resulting set of images. Some combinations are remarkable for the ideas they can engender. I wonder if there's a way to hook such an element randomizer into the AI?
It might also work better on the scene level if fed a specific beginning and end state. Something like, AJ thinks bananas are poisonous, but Fluttershy convinces her otherwise, using a set of novelty balloons.
I really can't predict where this will all lead, but I am very certain that AI (of all sorts) is going to be more disruptive and life-changing than the cell phone was, and sooner rather than later.
5707682
That is very true for now, I once saw a long video about pony-related AI technology (that were made by folks on 4chan, I think), and by using AI-generated images as examples it proposed that we should use AI for inspiration because of the random pony pictures it created. AI for now can only be really random or really predictable, so I think that maybe combining both could make something that is recognizable enough for us to understand and random enough so that we could get inspired by it.
5707581
I feel called out
5707743
You will be the last writer on this site to be replaced by a robot.
5707703
On another blog far, far away I've gone out on a limb and predicted that AI will become a non-niche/geek talking point (in the UK, but this probably applies more generally) this year. I may be a little overambitious with that, but I really do think there's a good chance the impact of AI will be an issue by the time of the next UK general election, and that politicians seem likely to be almost completely unprepared for that eventuality.
5707868
This quote might be perfectly applicable to any out of the ordinary situation, but yes, I think that's highly likely.
5707868
I think last year was the year it entered the public Consciousness as a novelty but this is the year that people are going to start seeing real effects. I already predicted early last year not to sound like an asshole tooting his horn but that this is going to be the decade of AI
For lack of any better place to put this, I thought you should see this image.
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5708070
Celestia looking at novel vector boson fusion channels as a way to study the Higgs mechanism. I'm sure Ditzy has some good advice.
Chat-GPT, being a complicated AutoCompleteProgram, does not understand what it writes, and also lacks a stream of consciousness. It generated this output:
It does not realize that the ponies, as sapient multicellular lifeforms, are of far greater importance than the microbe. It makes factual errors such as "hydrocarbon-rich waters"; the lakes are very nearly water-free.