AI is everywhere and, supposedly, will help the government reduce the number of public servants and change the way the government works. But what is the point of being polite to a machine?
Gemini’s ‘‘short answer’’ was ‘‘technically no, but psychologically yes’’. Each AI fundamentally agreed with that summary.
Claude explained it thus: ‘‘Each conversation starts fresh. Claude has no persistent memory between sessions, no emotional state that builds up, and no mechanism by which politeness literally improves the quality of a response. Saying ‘please’ doesn’t trigger a hidden ‘try harder’ mode’’.
Claude also said a politely worded prompt tends to be more clearly phrased, which can lead to a more useful answer.
Copilot said polite phrasing often included more context and it was more likely to mirror the style. ChatGPT said politeness could sometimes help a little for communication quality, even if ChatGPT did not care.
Being polite makes the interaction feel more natural, and that’s a valid reason for doing so. Mind you, such civility is difficult when AI, as is its wont, sometimes gives plain wrong responses. It pays to ask for sources and check them.
Where does that leave AI’s apologies? A machine cannot have remorse, whatever the effusive words. Perhaps we should accept them simply as useful notifications that mistakes have been registered.
No matter. Civis will largely proceed with politeness for one basic reason. Courtesy and friendliness are habits, and habits are best reinforced by regular use.
Neglect them, and we risk becoming harsher. Abrupt communication is a pattern, and one that can spill into how we treat real people.
Civis, though, won’t be speaking courteously when turning on the washing machine.
One survey last year found 70% of respondents were polite to AI. Most said they’re nice because it’s the right thing to do.
That’s encouraging in one way. We can be polite when expecting nothing in return.
However, 12% said they were courteous to protect themselves in case of robot uprisings.
They can argue, as others can, that erring on the side of politeness costs nothing.
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Civis must be alert and more careful when trimming this column.
Last week, Civis discussed the quote ‘‘in the middle of every difficulty lies opportunity’’. To save space, one sentence about this sentiment being expressed in different ways over the years was cut.
By the middle of last Saturday, reader John Penno was on the case to make that point. He also noted that the sentiment is a central tenet of Stoicism, expressed in slightly different words by Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius some 2000 years ago.
Stoicism teaches there is no such thing as a truly ‘‘bad’’ situation, only your perception of it. Aurelius summarised this as ‘‘what stands in the way becomes the way’’. In other words, every obstacle is an opportunity to practice virtue, build character and advance.
John’s favourite version, one he suspects his friends are thoroughly tired of hearing, is ‘‘let every threat be an opportunity’’. It’s long been a family motto.
Meanwhile, Civis had better be ‘‘a lert’’. The world loves lerts.
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More from the cute things young children say file.
Grandfather’s waterworks troubles landed him in hospital, where he was fitted with a catheter. His 4-year-old granddaughter caught part of a conversation and was not to be left out.
‘‘I’ve got a caterpillar, too,’’ she said.
Civis welcomes any cute kid comments from readers — polite or otherwise.
