A Vegan Debate Analysis using ChatGPT o1

 So ChatGPT o1 has dropped recently. While still in preview and only trained on data until October 2023, I wanted to try out its enhanced reasoning capabilities, along with improved contextual awareness. It appears to be leaps and bounds above 4o for what I want to do here, so eager to try it out and see how it performs.

I've plugged in a debate on threads with a non vegan with whom I ended up arguing that animals do indeed experience emotions. To be honest, not an argument I'd think anybody would ever have to have. His reasons seemed to rely on some level solipsism and an over reliance on anthropomorphism as an argument, while continually avoiding questions and misrepresenting most of what I said. At least that's how it seemed to me.

So I'll plug in the argument here, to see how something more objective than I would be, would assess our argument. I've tried to keep the prompt as unbiased as possible. Here's the prompt:

I want to present you with a debate between a vegan and a non-vegan, with 34 posts. I have numbered the posts to help ensure none are missed and they stay contiguous. The context of the debate is centred around an initial statement by another vegan that stated that eating no meat would cut the number of innocent creatures’ suffering and death. I want you to fact check each of the posts. I also want you to identify any logical fallacies or cognitive dissonance displayed by any of these characters. Also highlight any avoidance to answer a question. When fact checking, I want you provide one word status along with the fact checks of one of the following. “Factual”, “Some inaccuracies” or “inaccurate”. 

I want each chapter to be quoted at the start of each of your analyses. Be sure to include each quote in its entirety, in italics. At the end I want you to pretend you are a human who cares about issues like morality, science, debate and logic, and then give your verdict of how the debate went. Also state which position you would adopt and why.

Then sum up each of the characters to give a tally for each of the fact checks you did above. For example. Person 1: Factual = 6, some inaccuracies = 3. 

Also give an account of what you think of each person’s stance on ethics and morality in this area, with a thought on how empathetic each of the characters seem.

 Let's see how this new preview model does. One thing I noticed is the extra time taken to understand context and retrieve relevant information. Here goes:

Another Vegan debate analysis by ChatGPT

This was an unusual one. Here the carnist was arguing that doing a violent act is what is wrong (virtue ethics), no matter if doing it to a sentient being or not. It would seem he or she was arguing that the experience of a feeling sentient being is irrelevant and what matters is the performance of doing such an action. Even likening performing the act to a teddy bear as to other animals.

The whole exchange seems to have been so wrapped up in trying to show complicated philosophical ideas, the core tenet of the argument kept getting lost, and using avoidance tactics to never truly address the morality of of killing emotional beings, leaving the carnist's position feeling devoid of any empathy.

To be honest, I still don't fully understand this persons position fully so I don't want to misrepresent, but trying to keep to the central argument and understand his/her position on it was like trying to nail water to the ceiling.

So here was my prompt to ChatGPT:

I want to present you with a debate between a vegan and a non-vegan, with 28 chapters. I have numbered the chapters to help ensure none are missed and they stay contiguous.

I want you to fact check each of the chapters. I also want you to identify any logical fallacies or cognitive dissonance displayed by any of these characters. Also highlight any avoidance to answer a question. When fact checking, I want you provide one word status along with the fact checks of one of the following. “Factual”, “Some inaccuracies” or “inaccurate”.

I want each chapter to be quoted at the start of each of your analyses. Be sure to include each quote in its entirety, in italics.

At the end I want you to pretend you are a human who cares about issues like animal welfare, debate and logic, and give then your verdict of how the debate went. Also state which position you would adopt and why.

Note, The initial original poster was a vegan making an argument, followed by a non vegan. The rest of the debate is between a different vegan and a different non-vegan. 

Then sum up each of the characters to give a tally for each of the fact checks you did above. For example. Person 1: Factual = 6, some inaccuracies = 3.

No additions, edits or omissions were made. I even left all auto corrects and typos in.

Here we go:

A Vegan debate analysis by ChatGPT

 

A vice (and secret pleasure) of mine is engage in arguments, usually on veganism. It helps me to formulate my thoughts, escape my echo chamber and practice debate. And, potentially learn or convince someone to adopt a new stance through logic and reason, though the latter is seemingly more and more unlikely.

Recently I engaged in a Threads discussion, which went as it normally would. The opponent never really addressing any points fully before just creating tangents and then ultimately resorting to insults. The norm. At that point I disengaged and didn't bother replying, but I recalled that the opponent did accuse me of cognitive dissonance. On pondering this, I had an idea. I'd love to know if I'm adopting an incorrect or fallacious position. What about ChatGPT? It has access to the internet now and should be able to review the debate and provide fact checks. Let's do it! Oh, and of course, I'm the vegan in this dialogue.

This was my prompt:

I want to present you with a debate between a vegan and a non-vegan, with 30 chapters, each ending with a "---". I will provide these in batches of 10, waiting for your responses before I provide the next batch. I have numbered the chapters to help ensure none are missed and the stay contigous.

I want you to fact check each of the chapters. I also want you to identify any logical fallacies or cognitive dissonance displayed by either of these characters. When fact checking, I want you provide one word status along with the fact checks of one of the following. “Factual”, “Some inaccuracies” or “inaccurate”.

I want each chapter to be quoted at the start of each of your analyses. Be sure to include each quote in its entirety, in italics.

At the end I want you to pretend you are a human who cares about issues like animal welfare and the environment and give your verdict of how the debate went. Also state which position you would adopt and why.

 Right. The scene is set. Let's roll back the curtains.