ChatGPT and Chomer Lidrush
providing context in prompts
I’ve written earlier about the limitations of ChatGPT’s divrei Torah.
It will come up with superficial sermon. However, just as in other tasks, given enough context and guidance, it can be used to quickly produce polished prose.
Someone recently needed to create a dvar Torah for a yahrzeit, based on content selected from a certain perek in Taanit.
Unguided, it will produce nonsense and make stuff up. “Please generate an inspirational dvar Torah about one afflicted with boils, as discussed in Arachin 4a, and as discussed by Rashi” and it tells something inspirational me about Iyov’s boils and how he suffered yet stays steadfast, entirely unrelated to Arachin 4a, and to the fact that a מנוול ומוכה שחין are evaluated the same as anyone else in their general class of human.
However, this was the winning prompt:
In Taanit, the Mishnah states, "The mishna continues: One may not decree a fast on the community starting on a Thursday, so as not to cause an increase in prices. If the first of a series of fasts is on a Thursday, then on Friday everyone will come to purchase their food for after the fast and for Shabbat, which will allow the storeowners to take advantage of the crowds and raise their prices. Rather, the first set of three fasts is on a Monday, Thursday, and the following Monday, and the second set of three is on a Thursday, Monday, and the following Thursday. Rabbi Yosei says: Just as the first three fasts do not begin on Thursday, so too, neither the second set nor the last set starts on a Thursday. Instead, all the series of fasts begin on a Monday."
Please turn this into a dvar Torah about the importance of considering the impact on others.
With this, I gave it chomer lidrush, some raw material, namely a Mishnah. That was cut and paste. And I spotted a direction to take it. The inspirational aspect of considering impact to others. I shouldn’t take on chumras where I’m imposing the effects on others.
Here is what ChatGPT generated:
Certainly! Here is a possible dvar Torah (speech or discourse on Torah) based on the passage you provided:
The Mishnah in Taanit teaches us an important lesson about the importance of considering the impact of our actions on others. Specifically, the Mishnah states that it is forbidden to decree a fast on the community starting on a Thursday, as this could lead to an increase in prices.
Why is this the case? The reason given is that if the first fast of a series is on a Thursday, people will come to purchase food for after the fast and for Shabbat, and the storeowners may take advantage of the crowds and raise their prices. In other words, the actions of the community in observing the fast could have unintended consequences for others, specifically the storeowners.
This passage reminds us of the need to be mindful of the ways in which our actions can affect others, and to consider the potential consequences of our decisions. It also suggests that it is important to act with integrity and to avoid taking advantage of others for our own gain.
Rabbi Yosei goes even further, stating that none of the series of fasts should begin on a Thursday, in order to avoid any potential harm or inconvenience to others. This underscores the importance of looking beyond our own needs and desires and being sensitive to the needs and concerns of others.
As we strive to live our lives in accordance with Torah values, let us remember the lessons of this passage and make an effort to consider the impact of our actions on those around us. By doing so, we can create a more harmonious and compassionate community and build a brighter future for all.
It is still somewhat repetitive, and eh, and sounds like AI generated content to those who have trained their own neural nets to act as a classifier.
But still, the human was in control, and the output was much better.
Lehavdil, I’ve been doing this a bit for my own programming, and in CS classes I teach. For instance, after showing how to write a functional React component for a Garage, which takes in Cars as props and will print out each car’s color, make and model, I demonstrate how to write a ChatGPT prompt to generate the same. Much faster, though a human should still review the code.
Then to prompt it to now use reactstrap and to make each displayed Car into a bootstrap Card, where the color will be the background color of the Card.
That’s where guidance comes in, though not the content. But I can do that to. E.g.
Here are some car in Jay Leno' car collection. 289 AC Cobra
427 Shelby Cobra
2017 Acura NSX VIN 003
1906 Advance Steam Traction Engine
1941 American LaFrance Series 600 pumper V-12 Firetruck
1916 Autocar
2011 Audi R8 V10 Spyder
2006 Ariel Atom
2009 Aston Martin DBS
2015 BAC Mono
1909 Baker Electric
1931 Bentley 8-Litre
1989 Bentley Turbo RHow would I make a website to display these?
And it gives me step by step instructions for making a react website to display these particular cars.
