Artificial 'intelligence'

[Richard Russell]

If I ask Gemini (Google's AI model) "When was BBC BASIC version 5 released?" it tells me:

BBC BASIC version 5 was released in 1981.

But 1981 was version 1, not version 5! Copilot (Microsoft's AI) says:

BBC BASIC version 5, also known as BBC BASIC V, was released alongside Acorn's Archimedes computers. This version was an evolutionary step in the development of BBC BASIC, incorporating new features and enhancements to support the capabilities of the Archimedes range.

True, but it doesn't answer my question of when!

Not the most impressive examples of AI I've seen (I've not tried ChatGPT because you need to log in).

[Richard Russell]

(I've not tried ChatGPT because you need to log in).

Somebody has reported that ChatGPT answers 1989! The correct answer is 1986 so none of them is right; I suppose I must award first prize to Copilot because at least its response isn't wrong, it just failed to answer the question at all!

I know one always has to be sceptical about answers given by LLMs, but I am somewhat surprised that a simple 'fact' such as this eludes them. Perhaps their training data contains contradictory information, but they ought to notice that and say so in their response.