EDITOR’S NOTE: We asked ChatGPT to write a poem in the voice of children’s author Dr. Seuss. Here is how we outlined our poem to the A.I. writing platform, and then what the automated “Dr. Seuss” wrote (word for word, nothing changed).
First, our specific instructions:
“Write a 200 word poem in Dr. Seuss style in first person about a man who complains that every time he takes a trip in his motorhome something breaks. He is beside himself. And not to mention that he can never find somewhere to get the problems fixed.”
Okay, the poem; it took ChatGPT about 20 seconds to write.
By fake Dr. Seuss
In a motorhome I take my trip,
With joy and cheer, I set to skip.
But oh, the tale that I must tell,
Of troubles that I know so well!
With every mile, a new sound creaks,
A squeak, a groan, my poor heart speaks.
For every time, it seems, I roam,
Something breaks, I’m far from home.
I’m beside myself, you see,
In wrenching, wailing misery.
Oh, dear motorhome, my trusty friend,
When will your madness ever end?
And when I seek a helping hand,
To mend the woes across the land,
No soul can fathom my despair,
No wizard’s wand, no magic prayer.
Oh, Dr. Fix-It, where are you?
A whiz with wrench, a genius true.
To mend my home on wheels so grand,
And let me roam this wondrous land.
But until that day, I’ll soldier on,
With hope that soon the wails are gone.
For in my motorhome, I’ll find,
The joy that troubles left behind.
* * *
What do you think? Did our Dr. Seuss write a wonderful poem, or something, well … not quite so wonderful? Please leave a comment.
##RVT1128
Amazing poem for just a few seconds of computing work. I think it met your input criteria.
Mind blown, again! 🙁
Cute!
It’s ok but—The good Doctor it ain’t
I agree. It starts out like a normal Dr. Seuss poem but the end just doesn’t hit the mark.
Done in 20 seconds? That’s just plain scary for it’s implications of what can be written and posted to social media.
That poem was so good and yet, so scary!
It’s remarkable and so readily abusable! We MUST devise methods for detection of “countereit journalism” or all literature is doomed.
I agree completely. AI is getting so good, in many cases we may not be able to tell what’s AI generated and what’s not. Now AI can even mimic a voice, a picture…how do we tell anymore what’s real and what isn’t?
😶👎👎
That’s pretty darned good!
It sounds as trite as anything I could cobble together—much more slowly. Not quality work JR.
I think Johnny Robot enjoyed this assignment more than some others he has undertaken. Perhaps robots like poetry. I’d like to see him take a crack at A.E. Houseman E. E. Cummings.
Impressive.
Nice. Would never have known no human wrote this if you had not told me.
👍
That is very very impressive. I remember my 6th grade teacher in 1969 predicting that computers would control everything by the year 2000. She may have been a few years off but would definitely give your poem an A+
great for as quickly as it was written. Overall, this is the work of an average middle school kid