577
Nearly half of U.S. adults believe LLMs are smarter than they are.
(imaginingthedigitalfuture.org)
Well, if somebody thinks this, it's kind of true isn't it?
this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2025
577 points (96.9% liked)
Technology
66975 readers
4427 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related content.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
No. People think things that aren't smarter than them are all the time.
Remember that 54% of adults in American cannot read beyond a 6th grade level, with 21% being fully illiterate.
21%
What the fuck
I will do you one better, HOW THE FUCK?
No, 21% struggle with basic literacy skills. They're illiterate, but not fully illiterate.
Our education system in the USA is so bad. 😔
Good thing we nuked the Dept of Ed
People can improve literacy in adulthood if they try.
Nearly half of llm users are dumber than they seem
Only half?
Yeah thereabouts
Nearly half of U.S. adults
Half of LLM users (49%)
No, about a quarter of U.S. adults believe LLMs are smarter than they are. Only about half of adults are LLM users, and only about half of those users think that.
to be fair they're American and they're LLM users, so for a selected group like that odds are they really are as stupid as LLMs.
As far as I can tell from the article, the definition of "smarter" was left to the respondents, and "answers as if it knows many things that I don't know" is certainly a reasonable definition -- even if you understand that, technically speaking, an LLM doesn't know anything.
As an example, I used ChatGPT just now to help me compose this post, and the answer it gave me seemed pretty "smart":
what's a good word to describe the people in a poll who answer the questions? I didn't want to use "subjects" because that could get confused with the topics covered in the poll.
"Respondents" is a good choice. It clearly refers to the people answering the questions without ambiguity.
The poll is interesting for the other stats it provides, but all the snark about these people being dumber than LLMs is just silly.
LLMs don't even think. Four year olds are more coherent. Given the state of politics, the people thinking LLMs are smarter than them are probably correct.
Next you'll tell me half the population has below average intelligence.
Not really endorsing LLMs, but some people...
load more comments
(1 replies)
moron opens encyclopedia "Wow, this book is smart."
If it's so smart, why is it just laying around on a bookshelf and not working a job to pay rent?
And you know what? The people who believe that are right.
Note that that’s not a commentary on the capabilities of LLMs.
It's sad, but the old saying from George Carlin something along the lines of, "just think of how stupid the average person is, and then realize that 50% are even worse..."
load more comments
(10 replies)
load more comments
(1 replies)
For anyone wondering.
I'm starting to think an article referring to LLM as AI is s red flag, while them referring to them as LLM is a green flag.
Always has been
oh my god 49% of LLM users are pathologically stupid.
and still wrong.
Still better than reddit users...
where do you think these idiots spend their time?
I try not to think about them, honestly. (งツ)ว
you're a healthier person than I.
If you don't have a good idea of how LLM's work, then they'll seem smart.
load more comments
(13 replies)
Half of all voters voted for Trump. So an LLM might be smarter than them. Even a bag of pea gravel might be.
load more comments
(7 replies)
If I think of what causes the average person to consider another to be “smart,” like quickly answering a question about almost any subject, giving lots of detail, and most importantly saying it with confidence and authority, LLMs are great at that shit!
They might be bad reasons to consider a person or thing “smart,” but I can’t say I’m surprised by the results. People can be tricked by a computer for the same reasons they can be tricked by a human.
So LLMs are confident you say. Like a very confident man. A confidence man. A conman.
load more comments
(1 replies)
i guess the 90% marketing (re: linus torvalds) is working
The average literacy level is around that of a sixth grader.
This tracks
view more: next ›