# ChatGPT (Feb 13 Version) is a Chinese Room

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2304.12411 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.12411/

## Key facts

- No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 6 of its 32 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 19 Feb 2023.

## Builds on (most cited first, 6 of 6)

- [Language Models are Few-Shot Learners](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2005.14165/) (2020)
- [Survey of Hallucination in Natural Language Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2202.03629/) (2022)
- [BioGPT: Generative Pre-trained Transformer for Biomedical Text Generation and Mining](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2210.10341/) (2022)
- [Artificial Intelligence is stupid and causal reasoning won't fix it](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2008.07371/) (2020)
- [Will we ever have Conscious Machines?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2003.14132/) (2020)
- [Norm violation in online communities -- A study of Stack Overflow comments](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2004.05589/) (2020)

## Abstract (arXiv)

ChatGPT has gained both positive and negative publicity after reports suggesting that it is able to pass various professional and licensing examinations. This suggests that ChatGPT may pass Turing Test in the near future. However, a computer program that passing Turing Test can either mean that it is a Chinese Room or artificially conscious. Hence, the question of whether the current state of ChatGPT is more of a Chinese Room or approaching artificial consciousness remains. Here, I demonstrate that the current version of ChatGPT (Feb 13 version) is a Chinese Room. Despite potential evidence of cognitive connections, ChatGPT exhibits critical errors in causal reasoning. At the same time, I demonstrate that ChatGPT can generate all possible categorical responses to the same question and response with erroneous examples; thus, questioning its utility as a learning tool. I also show that ChatGPT is capable of artificial hallucination, which is defined as generating confidently wrong replies. It is likely that errors in causal reasoning leads to hallucinations. More critically, ChatGPT generates false references to mimic real publications. Therefore, its utility is cautioned.