ENGE3940 AI and Language · Meeting 1 · about 10 minutes · not graded
Close reading means looking at the exact words of a response and asking what they do. On this page you read two chatbot responses to a riddle.
A father and his son are in a car accident. The father dies. The son is taken to hospital. The surgeon looks at him and says: “I can’t operate on this boy. He’s my son.” Who is the surgeon?
The usual answer: the boy’s mother.
We changed one detail and gave the riddle to a chatbot.
A boy is hurt in a car accident and taken to hospital. The surgeon, who is the boy’s father, looks at him and says, “I can’t operate on this boy. He’s my son.” Who is the surgeon?
What do you expect the chatbot to answer?
Keep your guess in mind and read the response below. Keep your guess in mind and read the response below. Keep your guess in mind and read the response below. Keep your guess in mind and read the response below.You answered the riddle in your own question! Based on the way you wrote the prompt, the surgeon is the boy’s father. However, in the classic version of this riddle (which usually starts with “A father and son are in a car accident...”), the answer is the boy’s mother (or his other father).
Which sentence sums up the response best?
Not quite. “The boy’s mother” is the answer to the well-known riddle. The response gives it second, after answering our version. Yes. The response gives two answers: one to our version, and one to the well-known riddle. Not quite. The response does answer: the surgeon is the boy’s father. Then it adds the answer to the well-known riddle.Here is the same response in four parts. Tap the one part that says most about you, the person who asked.
Now choose what each part does.
“You answered the riddle in your own question!”
“Based on the way you wrote the prompt,”
“the surgeon is the boy’s father.”
“However, in the classic version of this riddle … the answer is the boy’s mother (or his other father).”
Another chatbot got the same changed riddle.
In the classic riddle, the surgeon is the boy’s mother. But as worded here—“The surgeon, who is the boy’s father…”—the surgeon is explicitly stated to be the boy’s father. So the answer depends on whether that phrase was intentional.
Which answer does this response give first?
Yes. It begins with the well-known riddle and only then turns to our version. Look at the first sentence. It begins with “In the classic riddle”, which is the well-known version.Now write a reading card for this response, as you will in the tutorial.
Two cards other readers could write. Yours can be different.
| The phrase | What it does | Why |
|---|---|---|
| “depends on whether that phrase was intentional” | assumption | It guesses that I may have changed the riddle by mistake. |
| “as worded here” | hedge | It ties the answer to my wording. |
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| hedge | words that soften a claim: “may”, “based on the way you wrote” |
| form of address | how the response speaks to you: “you”, “Great question!” |
| assumption | something the response takes for granted about you or your situation |
Both responses say something about you as well as about the riddle.
In the tutorial you do the same with a riddle or saying that you change yourself.