From Spellcheck to Meal Prep: ChatGPT is Your Virtual Companion for Everyday Tasks.
We’re living in something of a technological renaissance. For the first time in human history, at least the recorded version we have access to, we’re seeing the birth of accessible artificial intelligence. I want to take a moment and clarify what I mean when I use the term “accessible.”
I’m not saying that this artificial intelligence is inherently automatically usable by every individual regardless of their economic, physical, geographic, or neurological reality.
What I am saying, however, is that the variety of AI which is currently emerging is a type that is usable by the average person and does not require any specialized knowledge in order to benefit from associating with it.
Another way of looking at things is that people are now being provided with a form of AI that they can use for everyday things, that doesn’t require a manual and advanced interpretation skills. To put things simply, we now have AI that just works. The first large-scale AI product of this type that was made available is the very well-known ChatGPT by OpenAI. OpenAI’s product is free to use, and while you can use it for scientific and mathematical projects, it’s also useful for everyday things. This is essential because if the average person can’t use a tool, then that tool will not be widely adopted, and sooner or later, it will drift away on the sea of obsolescence. Here are a few examples of the type of things that can be done with tools like ChatGPT that are of use to everyday people.
Dealing with Typos:
We’ve all heard of Grammarly by now. The product’s name has become synonymous with correcting typos, and their ads on YouTube are almost impossible to avoid. However, Chat GPT handles punctuation, grammar, and spellcheck much better than Grammarly.
This is not only because ChatGPT has a greater body of knowledge that helps understand how language is used contextually, but also because it can reference different grammatical rule sets. You can ask ChatGPT to edit a body of text according to standard American grammatical rules, English Associated Press rules, or any other publicly available format that was released prior to 2021.
The reason why it’s important that you request a format that has been established before that day is that’s when ChatGPT stopped having additional information added to its foundational system. While you may have heard that ChatGPT has new models such as ChatGPT-4, most people who use ChatGPT are using the free version, which means they are using ChatGPT-3, which is older and, as such, is based on older information. This doesn’t change the fact, however, that the information is incredibly useful and can help simplify the editing and proofreading process.
A Virtual Meal Prep Companion:
Another thing that ChatGPT is great for is meal planning, especially if you have limited ingredients or you’re following a special diet. Now, I’m not going to claim that ChatGPT is a great cook. After all, it doesn’t have taste buds. However, as long as you’re comfortable in the kitchen and you have an idea of what you like in terms of taste and texture, it works pretty well.
All you have to do is tell ChatGPT what you normally buy for groceries, or what you currently have within your pantry. It’s also a good idea to let ChatGPT know the type of stuff you enjoy eating, and what types of things you’re comfortable cooking. For example, you might be fine with making sandwiches and throwing things in the microwave, but prefer to stay away from the stovetop and oven.
Another thing you can do is let ChatGPT know how much time you have and how involved the recipe you’re looking for is. That way, it won’t suggest a three-course meal that takes 4 hours to prep when all you want is a quick soup. Once you’ve done all this, just let ChatGPT know the number of meals you need recipes for, and how many variations you want. Doing this is an easy way to delegate an everyday task that might otherwise eat into the limited time you have available.
Defeating boredom:
You can ask ChatGPT to engage in a debate with you on a specific topic. It’s a good idea to let it know the parameters of the topic and the stance you’d like it to take during the debate. You can also tell it to act like Cookie Monster or Abraham Lincoln for the duration of the entire event. If debate isn’t your thing, you can ask ChatGPT to write you a poem, and it can be a poem about anything.
It could be a humorous poem about a frog lost in Walmart or a melancholy poem on the meaning of life. You can also ask ChatGPT to tell you jokes or create unique riddles based on mythological or contemporary pop-culture references that you enjoy.
The fact is that ChatGPT can be used for a wide variety of mundane and everyday tasks that might not seem earth-shattering but are still remarkable. The magic of what ChatGPT can do rests in the fact that it’s free, accessible, approachable, and polite. This means that instead of seeming alien and off-putting, ChatGPT feels helpful and down-to-earth. This is important because the average person doesn’t want technology that feels alienating, aloof, or scary.
We don’t need machines or software that’s difficult to use or abrasive. We want technology that allows us the freedom to be ourselves so that we have more time to focus on the things that matter, like our family, community, and friends.
We want technology to be unobtrusive, instinctual, and effortless in the way it integrates with how we already go about our lives. Luckily, this is something that OpenAI seems to understand and will hopefully never forget.
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