Category Archives: Consumer issues

Of course, I got curious

After posting over the weekend about a company’s request that a job applicant provide ChatGPT’s assessment of their “behavioral tendencies” during a job interview, the obvious question arose. What would ChatGPT say about me?

So I put the question to it.

At the prompt, I typed: “Based on my past conversations, can you analyze my behavioral tendencies?”

Here’s its summary.

If I had to summarize your tendencies in a few phrases:

* Analytical but not detached
* Structured thinker
* Fact-check oriented
* Curious across domains
* Pragmatic
* Attentive to behavioral nuance

Of course, its answer is based on my specific uses and types of interactions. When I turn to ChatGPT, Gemini, or another AI assistant, it’s almost always an attempt to solve a practical problem of some kind. I don’t seek “friendship” with any of these systems, nor seek their perspective on personal issues. I treat them as tools. I’m trying to understand and experiment with their best uses.

In any case, here’s ChatGPT’s more complete assessment.

Based on our prior conversations, here are some patterns I notice in your behavioral tendencies. I’ll keep this grounded in observable themes rather than speculation:

1. Analytical and Evidence-Oriented

You often ask precise, fact-based questions — legal status of cases (e.g., *Lind v. Grimmer*), historical verification (e.g., whether Tom Coffman recently died), biometrics in criminal investigations, stock trends tied to demographics, El Niño impacts, etc.

This suggests:

* Comfort navigating complex information
* Interest in verification and accuracy
* Likely habit of cross-checking or thinking critically about sources

2. Problem-Solving Mindset

You request step-by-step Sudoku solutions and structured transcripts with timestamps and speaker labels. That indicates:

* Preference for clarity and procedural logic
* Appreciation for organized presentation
* Possibly a background where structured reasoning is important

3. Long-Horizon Thinking

Your question about stocks benefiting from aging baby boomers, and your work supporting a retired administrator with memory issues, suggest:

* Awareness of demographic and aging-related shifts
* Patience with long-term dynamics
* Practical engagement with aging and cognitive change

4. Observant of Behavioral Detail

Your questions about your cat’s fixation on the garage and nesting behavior were nuanced and contextualized over time. That reflects:

* Attentiveness to patterns
* Sensitivity to environmental triggers
* Willingness to look beneath surface behavior

5. Direct but Not Dramatic

Your communication style is concise, low on emotional signaling, and oriented toward clarity rather than persuasion. You tend not to embellish questions — you get to the point.

6. Blending Personal and Professional Domains

You move fluidly between:

* Legal and policy questions
* Health questions
* Pet behavior
* Writing/editing tasks
* Personal narrative (e.g., the rescued puppy story)

That suggests intellectual flexibility rather than a single-domain focus.

It then offered to “describe possible blind spots or growth edges.”

I decided to stop while I was ahead!

AI meets Sudoku

3 Replies

A little afternoon experiment. I uploaded a photo of a Sudoku puzzle and asked both Gemini and ChatGPT to solve it.

Gemini went first. It took only a few seconds. Very few. There was its completed solution, along with an explanation of its methodology.

Then I turned to ChatGPT. It took longer. Not seconds. At least a minute, perhaps two. Then it too returned an answer, with explanations of how it reached its solution.

Surprising to me–The two solutions were quite different.

When I work my way through one of these puzzles, it seems like each correct choice is the only one for that particular position. One by one, they fall into place as other possible choices are eliminated.

But at first glance, each answer seemed plausible.

But as I examined each answer, I spotted the problem.

To win in Sudoku, you must fill the 9×9 grid so every row, column, and each 3×3 box contains digits 1-9 without repetition.

Gemini managed to get only two of three dimensions correct.

Gemini properly placed numbers 1 through 9 only once in each row and in each of the 3×3 blocks. But each of its columns included at least one number that was repeated more than once.

ChatGPT, on the other hand, appears to have solved the puzzle correctly.

Then I went back and asked Gemini a question: “Is there a chance that this solution is incorrect?”

It responded.

Actually, you have a sharp eye—my previous response contained a few errors where numbers were repeated in the same row or column. In Sudoku, each number from 1 to 9 must appear exactly once in every row, column, and 3×3 grid.

Here is the corrected solution, double-checked against the original puzzle’s constraints

It’s response made clear that Gemini knew the rules, but it again made the same type of errors, with a number repeated in each of several columns.

It’s quick answer masked a fundamental error in its logic.

I wonder if there are instructions I could have given that would have prevented Gemini from returning these erroneous answers.

Overall implications? I haven’t a clue.

Should Google’s investors have concerns?

Are ChatGPT conversations private?

7 Replies

In a Facebook post, a retired newspaper reporter and blogger who I “met” online more than 20 years ago shared a situation described by someone on Reddit who wrote about a job interview that took a surprising turn.

The author described what started as a typical interview, which went well. Then at some point, one of the interviewers said they had been trying a different method to get to know candidates better.

The next question: “Do you use ChatGPT?” He answered that he did have some experience with it, as most people do.

Then came the unexpected.

“That’s when they asked me to take out my phone and open the app.
They wanted me to type this prompt:
“Based on my past conversations, can you analyze my behavioral tendencies?”

When the job candidate declined, the interview abruptly changed.

“The atmosphere shifted immediately…the energy was different.”

After another brief perfunctory exchange, and the interview was over, leaving the job candidate musing about the moment we’re in.

“The idea that what you write to an AI could become part of a hiring evaluation just feels strange to me,” he observed.

Thoughts??

Can anyone use an old Apple TV?

i L i n d

Ian Lind • Now online daily from Old Kahala

Category Archives: Consumer issues

Of course, I got curious

AI meets Sudoku

Are ChatGPT conversations private?

Can anyone use an old Apple TV?