Debate Devil
AI
debate practice chatbot
SHOW HN2023
84points
83comments
#761of 3,109 in 2023
Top 25%of 2023 by points
How HN took it
RoastedHalf or more of the comments are critical
7 positive, 11 neutral or asking, 1 mixed, 29 critical, out of 48 comments about the project. Thread score -0.43.
Execution: 1 for, 22 againstIdea: 5 for, 4 againstDesign: 1 for, 3 against
The thread, comment by comment
Each row is a top-level comment and its replies, in HN's order. Select a cell to open that comment on HN.
positive neutral or mixed critical about another commenter or something else the maker
What HN said
What people liked
Good idea for rubberducking and practicing arguments
From 3 comments
This seems like a very useful way to rubberduck ideas that are not yet well formed. I like it! Are there limits to a conversation? The input prompt disappeared in the middle of…
collinvandyck76 on HNI think this is genius. Thank you. This is the best use I've ever heard of for an LLM. Online "debates" are always abysmal. People talking past each other, repeating arguments…
jfengel on HNthis seems like it might be useful for arguing on HN
turmeric_root on HN
Clean, no-login user experience
From 1 comment
Setting the actual product aside for a moment, I must commend this as one of the most outstanding demonstrations I have encountered on Hacker News in recent memory. The seamless…
user00012-ab on HN
Objections
AI judge declares winner inconsistently or favors the AI regardless of argument quality
From 4 comments
1. I have a character limit, it doesn't 2. It throws multiple arguments at you 3. Then it stops the debate after a certain point 4. It repeats its arguments 5. then the AI judge…
Brendinooo on HNThe AI ended up conceding my initial position word for word, and yet the AI judge said the AI won.
aerhardt on HNFairly terrible. I asked the AI to defend Nazism (I said it was bad), it refused to do so, "agreed" with me that Nazism is bad, then, when I pointed out that this means I won the…
boringuser2 on HNVery neat idea. However the debate I tried was farcically bad. The bot just provided "facts" that go counter to any statistics on the matter. Then the "AI judge" ruled the bot to…
numbers_guy on HN
Arguments are shallow, repetitive or factually wrong
From 4 comments
It just spouts fake news and propaganda, and then seems to get stuck in a loop when its challenged in a way it can't respond to.
danpalmer on HNIt isn't great. I argued "the sun is hot" - lots of ways to argue against this, but it got stuck on basically repeating "that might not be the case" followed by statements that…
Chris2048 on HNVery neat idea. However the debate I tried was farcically bad. The bot just provided "facts" that go counter to any statistics on the matter. Then the "AI judge" ruled the bot to…
numbers_guy on HNThe AI's core tenet to my assertion "Python is an awful language for beginners" (due to whitespace formatting and having a non transparent "this"-self- having to manually be…
SillyUsername on HN
Character limit for user is much lower than the AI's
From 2 comments
The AI writes many paragraphs but I am limited to just a tiny response. That is frustrating.
calderknight on HNThe character limit for the user being dramatically lower than the AI’s limit is really annoying, otherwise I had fun with this!
virgildotcodes on HN
Stays within guardrails and doesn't argue all sides
From 2 comments
It won’t actually argue all sides of an issue. Take any controversial one, and it stays inside its guardrails no matter which opinion you want it to counter.
mrjbq7 on HNFairly terrible. I asked the AI to defend Nazism (I said it was bad), it refused to do so, "agreed" with me that Nazism is bad, then, when I pointed out that this means I won the…
boringuser2 on HN
Name 'Devil' is an odd choice
From 1 comment
I wouldn't use a product called "devil". Like why take a concept that's evil incarnate and associate it with your product when there's a million other names to choose from.
user3939382 on HN
Requests
Ability to share conversation transcripts without an account
From 2 comments
Is there a way to share my transcript?
rain1 on HNVery cool! I asked "Is there a God?" on Devil's advocate mode and won! Prompt: Is there a God? To begin, the AI asked me what my thoughts on the existence of God were: My…
sunnysidedown on HN
Persona that uses logical fallacies for practice
From 1 comment
I gave this a try and it’s really pretty cool. Something I am looking for is the ability to have a debate with someone who purely uses logical fallacies. It would be interesting…
minimally on HN
Allow longer user responses
From 2 comments
The AI writes many paragraphs but I am limited to just a tiny response. That is frustrating.
calderknight on HNThe character limit for the user being dramatically lower than the AI’s limit is really annoying, otherwise I had fun with this!
virgildotcodes on HN
Questions
Can the AI judge ever rule the user wins?
From 1 comment
1. I have a character limit, it doesn't 2. It throws multiple arguments at you 3. Then it stops the debate after a certain point 4. It repeats its arguments 5. then the AI judge…
Brendinooo on HN
Is there a limit to conversation length?
From 1 comment
This seems like a very useful way to rubberduck ideas that are not yet well formed. I like it! Are there limits to a conversation? The input prompt disappeared in the middle of…
collinvandyck76 on HN
Alternatives named
Plain ChatGPT
From 2 comments
zero value add to a regular chatgpt besides some kind of web wrapper around it
wellthisisgreat on HNThe AI's core tenet to my assertion "Python is an awful language for beginners" (due to whitespace formatting and having a non transparent "this"-self- having to manually be…
SillyUsername on HN