On Tue, 11 Jul 2023 17:52:23 -0700, Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com>
wrote in
<1355189357.710815914.593934.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal- september.org>:

On Tue, 11 Jul 2023 17:52:23 -0700, Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com>
wrote in
<1355189357.710815914.593934.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal- september.org>:

Dan Espen <dan1espen@gmail.com> wrote:

Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> writes:

Just tried ChatGPT. I said “write a short story in the style of
Lovecraft.”


I got:
“In the quaint coastal town of Innsmouth, a sense of foreboding hung
heavy in the air. The townsfolk, with their bulging eyes and grotesque
features, whispered of forbidden secrets that lay buried beneath the
murky depths of the sea.

James Sinclair, an intrepid scholar of the occult, had arrived in
Innsmouth with a burning curiosity to uncover the truth behind the
town’s whispered tales. Armed with a notebook and a determined spirit, >>> he began his investigation, delving into the town’s dark history.”

I’d give it, at best, a C-. “He” knew who Lovecraft was, but the style
and language doesn’t sound at all close.

Considering that a machine generated that response, I think that's
amazing.

And scary.

Maybe I should have let it finish.

Prompt:
"write a story in the style of lovecraft, with eldritch horrors and things
out of space, in collegiate english"

Results:

https://chat.openai.com/share/9ea29e8e-85ab-42bc-96ba-bd9a09108374

Note Cc: to comp.ai.shells

_ _ _[ ChatGPT4 ]_ _ _ _
Amid the echoing chambers of temporal infinity, in a quaint New England township of Dunsmith, an event of such singular and unutterable terror transpired that, to recount it in full measure, would strain the very boundaries of human comprehension and invite unspeakable horrors into the minds of those who dare to contemplate it. This account, which I offer
with profound hesitation and in the spirit of the direst warning, pertains
to a certain antiquarian, Ephraim Stout, and the profoundly unearthly
horror that he unwittingly awakened from the ebon abysses of uncharted reality.

Stout, a scholar of no small reputation, was known for his fervent and obsessive study of obscure cosmic phenomena. He had accumulated an
impressive array of esoteric manuscripts and cryptic, runic tablets; the
most notable among these was the notorious "Libro Oscuro," rumored to
contain wisdom not of this Earth, a chronicle of truths whispered from the beyond by the Old Ones themselves, the monstrous deities lurking beyond
the veil of our known universe. The dusty volumes of his library bore testimony to his thirst for knowledge, as dangerous and forbidden as it
was.

On a night both unfathomably dark and oppressively silent, illuminated
only by the pallid, silver glow of a baleful gibbous moon, Stout
discovered a series of cryptic incantations within the eldritch pages of
the "Libro Oscuro." In his unquenchable thirst for truth, the scholar committed the fatal error of uttering aloud the ancient, forbidden verse,
one that should have remained dormant, confined to the crypt of silence forevermore.

Reality wavered and trembled as the dreadful incantations filled the room, sounding out in a voice that was far from human, yet born of human folly.
The solid New England air pulsated, warping in an unholy rhythm, as a tear
in the very fabric of reality split the darkness, spewing forth a cascade
of eerie luminescence, a phosphorescent emerald, cold and otherworldly.

From that dire rift emerged horrors so antithetical to terrestrial life
that to gaze upon them was to teeter on the precipice of madness.
Amorphous, cyclopean entities, made of darkness and the space between
stars, oozed through the breach, their bodies a nauseating paradox of
solid shadow and swirling galaxies. Their single, baleful eyes shone with
the pitiless indifference of a universe uncaring and uncomprehending of
human existence.

As the alien horrors descended upon the hapless antiquarian, reality
twisted and contorted around them. The room extended into infinity, the
floor replaced by the star-strewn abyss, and the sky transformed into an eldritch tapestry depicting cosmic horrors far beyond the comprehension of man.

The elder beings moved through our reality as a man might move through
water, each motion sending ripples through the world, distorting and reshaping. Their ghastly whispers filled the air, recounting
incomprehensible truths of the universe that rendered human knowledge insignificant.

In his final moments, Stout felt the horrifying comprehension of our universe's insignificance, an infinitesimal speck amidst an infinity of galaxies, peopled by beings older than time, entities who held existence within the palm of their monstrous, nebulous forms. His mind, unable to process the monstrous truth, fractured under the strain, shattering into a million shards of lunacy.

With the culmination of Stout's descent into madness, the beings withdrew, dissolving back into the rift with a nauseating slither. In their wake,
they left behind a man broken, a library touched by eldritch influences,
and an echo of their malevolent whispers, forever imprinted on the walls
of Dunsmith.

To this day, those who wander into the house, now left abandoned, tell
tales of eerie whispers and a chilling presence, a lurking horror waiting
in the dark corners of the mind. Thus stands a warning to those who seek knowledge best left undiscovered, for the universe is old and vast, and we
are but insects in the face of its eldritch truths.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _

Again, Cc: comp.ai.shells
--
-v

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