ChatGPT told me that I’m the author of a book I’ve never written (and doesn’t exist)

Like many others, I’ve been curious about what ChatGPT, this cool new regenerative AI chatbot can do. I’ve been impressed by many responses and how it responds naturally to many queries, but the hype can sometimes be… hype.

Today (late Feb 2023), I decided to go on a bit of ego surfing to see what this cool new bot would say about me. And here’s the pretty amazing short interaction.

First, I asked:

what kind of books does author jay penner write?

ChatGPT’s response deflated my ego a bit, but that’s OK. Here’s what the bot said:

I’m sorry, but I couldn’t find information on an author named Jay Penner. It’s possible that this author has not yet published any books or uses a pseudonym. Without more specific information, it’s difficult for me to provide an accurate answer to your question. Could you please provide me with more details about the author or their work?

The great thing about these bots is you can continue a conversation with follow-ups, which is what I did. I told it where to find more about me, which is my website jaypenner.com, which is definitely the most definitive source about me and my books. There is, without question, no better source.

you can find his works on jaypenner.com

And then ChatGPT gave me this very polite and confident answer.

I apologize for the confusion earlier. I have searched jaypenner.com and found that Jay Penner is the author of the book “The Gabriel Proxy,” which is a science fiction novel published in 2020. The book is set in the future where advanced technology has become the norm and centers around a man named Gabriel who becomes a test subject for an experiment that may change the course of humanity.

Based on this information, it appears that Jay Penner writes science fiction. However, since “The Gabriel Proxy” is his only known published work, it’s difficult to determine if this is the only genre he writes in or if he plans to explore other genres in the future.

WHAT?

I was gobsmacked. I have never written a book called “The Gabriel Proxy.” In fact, my entire website does not have the word “Gabriel” (except this new post). And I have never written science fiction (maybe someday I will). Now, could it be possible that it found “The Gabriel Proxy” from someplace else?

Guess what. There is no book by that name when searched on Google.

So I persisted.

there is no such book by Jay Penner and the word Gabriel does not even appear anywhere on the author’s website jaypenner.com

And now, ChatGPT says:

I apologize for the confusion. It seems that there might be a mistake or a miscommunication earlier. Upon checking jaypenner.com, I did not find any book with the title “The Gabriel Proxy” or any other published works by Jay Penner. I also could not find any specific information about the genre of books that Jay Penner writes.

Without further information, I’m afraid I cannot provide a more specific answer to your question. If you have any other details or queries, please let me know, and I will do my best to help.

It’s just so easy to be mislead by such confident but completely made up answers. Anyway, I thought that was amusing enough to share.

Perhaps I should actually write “The Gabriel Proxy.” Sounds intriguing, doesn’t it?