[Tweeters] Marymoor Park weekly walk to turn to ChatGPT for future reports.

[J Christian Kessler]

a brilliant response.  but I expect that Tweeters will soon be flooded with
2nd hand binos, scopes, etc. for sale.  should I update my 28 year old
Swarovskis?  just for my yard list, or can I learn how to use ChatGPT for
that too?  is this something WOS or the former Seattle Audubon can help
with?

Chris Kessler

On Sat, Apr 1, 2023 at 9:32 AM Robert O'Brien <baro at pdx.edu> wrote:


> I totally support Chat-Birding as well..  The savings in Birding Equipment

> alone is worth it.  Binos,Scopes, Cameras, Night-vision Imaging, Recording

> Equipment, the list goes on and on.  I ain't no spring chicken any more and

> it was becoming a real chore to lug all this equipment around. I'm assuming

> here, of course, that the Chat Box will also produce photos, recordings,

> distinctive field marks, etc.  of the rarer species that I can keep in my

> Birding Scrapbook.   I am also guessing that Bird Lists from hard-to-bird

> places will also be available.  For instance I've always been reluctant to

> bird Cartel-ridden areas of Mexico.  But, via the Chatbox I can now search

> for the Imperial Woodpecker,  And this will also open up Birding Areas in

> hostage-periled areas of Russia, China, Iran....  The sky is the limit.

> (For instance, I could search for Black Swifts on their South

> American wintering grounds where they fly for months without ever

> landing.)  Such a joy to live in the modern world where human intelligence

> is a thing of the past.     Bob OBrien  Portland

> P.S. After all, I was never all that smart myself.

>

>

>

> On Sat, Apr 1, 2023 at 7:25 AM Tom Benedict <benedict.t at comcast.net>

> wrote:

>

>> I totally support this change. The savings in fuel and time costs alone

>> justify it and the positive effects on global climate change are

>> immeasurable.

>>

>> Tom Benedict

>> Seahurst, WA

>>

>> On Apr 1, 2023, at 06:15, Matt Bartels <mattxyz at earthlink.net> wrote:

>>

>> Marymoor Park, in Redmond WA, is leading the way in AI-fueled birding.

>>

>>  With the weekly Marymoor bird outings beginning their 30th year,

>> Michael Hobbs, leader of the walk, announced a major change in how future

>> walks will proceed. Beginning in April, ChatGPT will be used in lieu of

>> birders in the field to generate the weekly bird reports.

>>

>> ChatGPT has exploded in popularity this year as the first widely used

>> example of narrow AI. It appears capable of producing near-human sounding

>> plausible narratives using a LLM in response to user questions. Hobbs, no

>> stranger to technological advances, had just the dataset to train ChatGPT

>> on – namely, his website https://www.marymoor.org/BirdBlog.htm. With

>> weekly reports for years of consistent birding outings at Marymoor Park, it

>> contained patterns the AI would easily be able to learn from.

>>

>> “Honestly, it takes very little work to train ChatGPT to produce reports

>> -- arguably better reports than we humans can produce”, Hobbs

>> reported.  ChatGPT reviews past Marymoor reports for the week and broader

>> trends on eBird and produces a near-perfect report for future weeks. Hobbs

>> is now working to incorporate weather data into the model as well for

>> better precision.”

>>

>> Although he has already had ChatGPT produce the reports for each week in

>> 2023, he is keeping future reports a closely held secret, saying “Afterall,

>> the joy of being a birder is reading about other people’s birding stories,

>> whether to smile at the absurd misses or to groan about the birds you

>> missed by staying home that day. I wouldn’t want to take that away.”

>>

>> He will offer one clue to the future though: May the 4th – go to

>> Marymoor on that date.

>>

>> Faced with the prospect of AI produced bird reports, the Washington Bird

>> Records Committee and the eBird reviewer community have tentatively agreed

>> to treat reports seriously. Said one member “Seriously, if the quality of

>> detail produced by ChatGPT is as convincing as I’ve seen, it will be a step

>> above many reports we look at already.”

>>

>> While some are hesitant, others welcome the coming change. “Anything that

>> might lessen the stress mobs of birders disturbing nature is constantly

>> producing would be a step forward,” says one formerly avid birder. Others

>> are less excited about the changes – ChatGPT has not helped things with

>> some of its more public failures – Academics have pointed

>> <https://oxford-review.com/chatgpt-making-up-references/> to papers

>> produced with footnotes created out of whole cloth. A recent article

>> <https://www.huffpost.com/entry/kevin-roose-ai-chatbot_n_63eeb367e4b0063ccb2bcc45> saw

>> the reporter holding an extended conversation w/ the AI that led to the

>> reporter being urged to leave his spouse for the bot – And ChatGPT is

>> suspected to be behind the new awkward renaming choice of some local

>> birding groups already.

>>

>> For now, Hobbs says he’ll continue to walk at Marymoor weekly, but he

>> looks forward to stepping away and allowing the bots to continue his legacy

>> – “Imagine all those Thursdays I could sleep in” he says wistfully.

>>

>> Matt Bartels

>> Seattle, WA

>>

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-- 
"moderation in everything, including moderation"
Rustin Thompson
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