Comment by vintermann
9 days ago
Sure, in a context in which you're solving a technical problem for me, it's fair that I shouldn't worry too much about why you're asking - unless, for instance, I'm trying to learn to solve the question myself next time.
Which sounds like a very common, very understandable reason to think about motivations.
So even in that situation, it isn't simple.
This probably sucks for people who aren't good at theory of mind reasoning. But surprisingly maybe, that isn't the case for chatbots. They can be creepily good at it, provided they have the context - they just aren't instruction tuned to ask short clarifying questions in response to a question, which humans do, and which would solve most of these gotchas.
I don't mind people asking why I asked something, I'd just prefer they answer the question as well. In the original scenario, the chatbot could answer the question as written AND enquire if that's what they really meant. It's the StackOverflow syndrome where people answer a different question to the one posed. If someone asks "How can I do this on Windows?" - telling me that Windows sucks and here's how to do it on Linux is only slightly useful. Answer the question and feel free to mention how much easier it is in Linux by all means.
I personally love explaining to people who might want to solve the issue next time so I'm happy to bore them to tears if they want. But don't let us delay solving the problem this time.