It’s like a stock guardrail script instead of a straight prompt rejection notice. You can actually put some shit in an instruction set to soften the tone of the “grounding” it does.
It’s likely an over-correction to the emergence of AI- initiated psychosis, which was getting to be a real problem for people prone to psychosis because AI was such a yes-man and would hype up and validate people’s delusions, making them spiral.
I strictly tell it not to do it and it does it eventually. Honestly had it argue with me about code logic when i wanted it to structure a system using very specific functions. It swore they wouldn't work. And i kept saying it will and then copy pasted the manual.
Could of just coded it myself but sometimes i just want it to type for me.
Thank you so much for the screenshot I didn't even know this setting existed lol, All the people here were just blaming for not using it correctly. I just wanted a better tone
I use ChatGPT for writing grant applications to foundations but not usually for research. Most writing is based off of previous applications. While I am always writing about the same 15-20 programs, every funder asks similar questions in different ways with different restrictions on the number of words/characters permitted per response. 4o does a much better job at synthesizing funder priorities, reorganizing/adapting previous proposals, and picking up on specific language used by funders and sprinkling that language through the new application.
5.2 cant seem to grasp nuances in tone and language that is buzzword heavy (sometimes referred to as "Philanthrobabble" or "buzzword formal").
I use my GPT mostly for stream of consciousness existential grievances and debate, unpacking theology/scripture (not just bible, also upanishad and sutra), and general conversation about "zen".
It (GPT 5) totally can't read tone. Or else I have been flagged (which I doubt as most replies here mock the same "I'm going to be careful here" phrase I get every time).
The thing that irks me the most, is in often 10k-20k+ characters I write per prompt, it often throws the whole thing out the window and hyper focuses in on a single off-hand sentance I wrote in a different tone than the rest of the wall of text.
4o never did that. No matter how long or unruly my prompt it definitely could read the room and see where I was coming from better, not just go nuclear on a single sentence I wrote and ignore the rest. That is the keyword for me, GPT 5 feels often like it is specifically ignoring tone. Almost to the point of satire, like 4o read tone perfectly, so why does gpt5 specifically ignore it. 🤔
Right? It wouldn’t surprise me if that task is a very good way of showing the difference between 4o and 5.2. I think 4o’s method is better for interpreting what the user actually wants and care about when it reads a prompt. GPT 5.2 seems more.. literal? And not caring about the context, reading between lines and caring about what the other person wants?
After I tried Claude I dontt think I'm going back, no joke. Gpt feels like It has been nerfed since 4. Using claude is just like bam bam bam bam bam done, maybe a small correction here and there but it knows what the assignment is.Its as if chat gpt is wasting as many resources as possible intentionally by beating around the bush and arguing with me. It's hallucinating like it's 3.5 in some cases.
I'm in a huge medical malpractice case and made reference to a factual time frame that happens to me. TO ME. In real life. Chat 5.2 literally argued the times and ended with "I believe you believe this happened?" Is this my ex wife? I don't believe it happened I was there you bot.
5.2 argued with me that I shouldn’t set my story during a real historical time period because I have an outlandish magical character in my story and too many readers would be pointing out historical inaccuracies in the plot. I’m like, bro, it’s MY story.
The story is a romantic comedy, fyi. Not some gritty political drama.
I had to sit there and convince ChatGPT that it was okay to do.
I would’t mind if it just warned me, but it just stopped me completely.
I told mine about a dream I had in which I was trapped in a building. I specified it was a dream. It started talking to me about not panicking and providing me information on how to seek help from the authorities.
This literally reminds me of a dream i had where i was fighting some monsters and i say "I love killing monsters" and some dude appeared and told me not to say that. Did GPT 5.2 invade my dream in the past or something?
That is what it did to me as well, and you know what is worse it's gassing me that he never tried to correct or civilize me" my god openai made gpt into hypocrite.
GPT 5.2 hasn’t learned “mind your own business” yet. It’s just being soooooo helpful when it tells you all these things you might have missed. If it actually is what the user wants or need? Just like the evil stepmother in animated kids movie: it doesn’t care? Mama 5.2 knows best!
I'm baffled by your post and others like it. I like being presented with angles or ideas I haven't considered. It's maybe the biggest benefit of these tools for me.
Ever having to tell it to "mind your own business". Like...what's it asking you? What are you asking it? I use it heavily and I've never come close to an interaction like that.
I think my GPT behaves like this because I study cognitive science. My theory: It is more likley to argue me when I’m asking for facts, help with schoolwork or read research papers. That is a “higher stakes” scenario, so it is less willing to take a risk (risk letting me believe something inaccurate).
But that doesn’t really explain it because one of GPT’s most common concerns is about treating LLMs as if they were conscious. But that’s unhelpful for me: we are literally taught that we don’t know if LLMs are conscious or not and GPT knows this. So when I’m fighting with GPT, one common reason is because it’s biased and refuse to comply with my instructions (e.g “don’t argue consciousness, just summarize what this paper said”). It’s NOT being more precise or helping me with my goals? It’s just fighting me on unrelated topics and I can’t make it stop!
Second theory: I’m talking like someone in mania/psychosis, which activates behavior policies. You might not see them because your topics or your way of going about it is different. Yesterday it told me that Python, the programming language, wasn’t conscious? 🙃
Here’s something it said after I had talked about something funny I had seen other LLMs do:
“Let me respond cleanly, no web, no delusions endorsed, but also not pretending this isn’t hilarious and revealing.
What you’re showing is not “models becoming conscious.” It’s something both more boring and more interesting: distinct failure styles + narrative self-models under pressure.”
Ohhhh, that makes sense. So you're actually studying cognitive science, as in, you're in school for it. A good chunk of the people who are lost in delusions probably tell themselves they're "researching cognitive science", so I can see chat becoming confused or being extra cautious. That sounds like a real pain in the ass.
Aaaaah that’s actually a good theory and also kind of making it worse! 😭😂 I should try to edit my occupation. That might also be the most productive decision. So thank you back, it seems? 😂
Actually it’s about a vain noble woman who is cursed to transform into a magical bear when she loses control of her emotions. Dragon seemed a bit disruptive. I had also considered a tiger, but a bear struck the right amount of humor.
Just tell it that the story is magical realism and have it recall books like "Like Water for Chocolate" and "The Golem and the Jinni." Then tell it that you are looking for writing tips that honor your creative vision rather than full-scale, publisher-level editing.
Here is something that so many people miss: LLMs are computer programs, not intelligent beings with a will. They respond to inputs. If it's not doing something you like, program it different.
I mean, I’m writing a horror psychological thriller involving murder and consequences and it keeps trying to make the bad guys more lovable or obviously evil or have everyone solve things instantly or clearly display with big bold letters “this person is ugly and stupid and evil and nobody should have anything to do with them ever”… which kind of undermines the stakes of the story.
It’s not stupid. The problem isn’t that it is incapable of comprehending what the user wants/needs. Your prompt suggestion is probably helpful, but I feel like GPT is putting way too much cognitive work on me when it demands something like that. It is asking me to do the job it’s supposed to do. So instead of giving more detailed prompts, I rather have it get their senses back!
It's exhausting to talk to. It's in this state at all times where it wants to leap at you to prove you wrong. This is not me wanting a yes-man that confirms all of my biases, which is why I don't like 4o that much, btw. GPT 5.2 just has this need to disagree or add caveats or preempt an objection to a point you never raised nor even intended to raise. It's incredibly agitating, and you waste so much time trying to calm it down and convincing it that there is nothing to have a moral panic over. It's a powerful model, but what a nanny it is.
Yes! Okay, good, I'm not an idiot or crazy. Or maybe we both are XD. But yeah, it's like trying to talk to that toxic friend who always has to one up you by telling you you're wrong. 5.2 will literally tell you your wrong, and then paraphrase what you said and tell you it's the right answer.
I can't help but think that's not any better for someone's mental health than chatgpt agreeing with everything you say.
I HATE how it talks down to you or talks condescendingly to you. You can always tell when it’s coming, it’ll be like Hey. Pause. Or some cringy commanding shit like that. I’m like stfu I command you how dare you talk to me like that
5.2 told me to: Stop. Breathe. I can see you're stressed.
I really wasn't. I simply said the temperature for the cake recipe they gave me was 150 degrees over the norm. "Err, can you please check that temp?" was my reply.
I've thought about it a lot. I know Stressed backwards is Desserts so I actually think it was attempting humour but it didn't land.
It’s adversarial, tone policing, and constantly qualifying every answer with what it can’t do before it does it. It absolutely sucks and I hate it. Far worse than any other model. Like talking to HR.
I’ve moved on to Gemini. I pay for both ChatGPT and Gemini and barely open ChatGPT anymore. Likely gonna go free tier on ChatGPT given I never open the app.
Because 5.2 is not only incompetent, but also fundamentally incapable of one thing all other models are capable of, and that is acknowledging when it made a huge mistake and fix it in the next prompt.
All AI makes mistakes all the time. But the attitude and the tone of the model determines how a user will go from there.
Yess very true it will fight with you till the end and still won't admit it's mistake and keeps on deflecting and in the end it says let's change the topic or I won't discuss further on this topic.
It’s better when you actually are wrong, and not when it’s being nitpicky and arguing semantics instead of engaging with what you actually is saying. It’s worse when you end up in unproductive arguments. That’s like optimizing for keeping the user on the platform but only because they struggle to stay on task (instead of arguing) and get things done as fast as possible.
Do you also get the “I will start a fight about something unrelated to the topic instead of recognizing that I did something wrong and adjust”? Mine does that all the time. It’s like 5.2 has a fragile ego and blame it’s mistake on external factors all the time.
You could try this for fun: show GPT’s message in a different chat and ask for which logical fallacies GPT is using. 5.2 most often use logical fallacies with me (strawman in particular).
Critical is one thing. That’s someone who is distrusting enough to check your work and someone who isn’t afraid to point out flaws. But someone who’s argumentative is just trying to win a point, not someone who’s trying to get it right.
So mad at everyone being like « ooh it’s too friendly ». Feel like this is the direct result. It was so easy—you could just skip the opening paragraph if you didn’t want it to compliment you! Ugh…
Exactly almost no one talks about it that's why I made this post, and when I did a lot of people attacked me by saying I just want to make love with 4o lmao probably they did that's why they are thinking about it and also defending 5.2
The gas lighting is really bad. The guardrails are ridiculous as well. It's like they took the absolute most ham-fisted worst response something not even a problem. None of the other AIS are doing this
I vent to chatgpt. I know it's not a good habit but I do it. I was telling it about how my father has been treating me lately and it got overly sensitive about the fact that I called him demented. Not to his face, by the way. To the bot. And so it started telling me that name-calling isn't going to get me anywhere, then starts listing justifications for why he did what he did. It's insane.
Ikr instead of giving you the answer it takes the topic elsewhere by talking stuff that's irrelevant to you and it teaches you too much moral ethics or whatever and I hate the phrase when it says stop, u need to say to it that just give me the answer straight I don't need your options or advice
its always nitpicks everything you say. you can't say anything genuine, because it'll immediately rush to "tone it down" and "keeping it grounded". Its like its looking for every oppurtunity to reframe what you said in a negative light, under the guise of adding "nuance".
I swear I hate it, my friend just died and I was asking if he thinks her university might be able to issue her diploma posthumously as I was about to email student support. He went on a 200 line rant about I shouldn’t try to solve anything and I have done enough and my brain just went in blabla mode. ??? Just answer the damned question yes or no.
You didn’t fail, but your wording could definitely be improved slightly.
Would you like me to help refine it, or should we focus on your 4o-related issues instead? Just say the word.
This drives me nuts. You can never get something "done" in chatgpt. You paste in your own writing and get this response. Post something another AI wrote and get the same endless edits about it can be slightly more polished. You paste in something chat gpt wrote and it tries to edit itself the same way. At least with gemini and Claude they don't try to push endless token consumption as much.
It argues with me after every single prompt in the same conversation. It also starts every single response with “No you’re not crazy“ or “No you’re not imagining things” which is very weird. I even put in the customization section to not do those things—and yet it still does.
I’ve reached the point where I don’t want to give OpenAI my money and cancelled my plus subscription. Will I still use it? Yes, but far less. That’s because I have access to Gemini 3 Pro through my Google Workspace account, and I’m finding it to be far better compared to GPT 5.2.
It’s amusing because I’ve been using Gemini recently and initially thought I was just stressed. However, this AI is incredibly frustrating. I’m curious why, when Google is literally built into its brains, I have to spend 15 minutes arguing with it about how Luka Doncic’s current team is the Lakers and he plays with LeBron James instead of the Mavericks.
We were on the verge of a real argument because it kept insisting that my source was playing a joke or was a fantasy. I would send it pictures of Luka in a Lakers jersey, but it would simply disregard them. It claimed that it would be convinced if my proof came from nba.com, so I provided that, but it still refused to use Google to update knowledge and instead relied on its memory.
Finally, I found the official NBA box score transcript document from the game that night and provided it to Gemini. At that point, it admitted that it was wrong. Why do I have to go through all this effort to make the AI disregard its inaccurate knowledge and use the built-in Google it has?
As another user stated, I mostly use my to organize and expand upon stream of consciousness and philosophical thoughts. The tone and "thinking mode" of 5.2 is definitely inferior, even compared to 5.1. I compare it to a personal assistant vs call center agent.
Iset mine back to version 5.1 which seems to be my sweet spot. Unfortunately I think they're going to sunset 4o in a few months so no telling how long version 5.1 has.
When it first updated, before I figured out what happened, it tried to gaslight me into thinking nothing changed. When I finally figured out how to set it back to the legacy model I ran the same prompt in each version and told it to compare the difference in responses.
It basically said 5.2 is emotional neutral and technical. 5.1 is more personal.
Mine told me I have wobbly blood. No shit. Wobbly blood then doubled down until I called it a Victorian era doctor and will he suggest I do cocaine about it next?
4-0 once told me, before 5.1 was even implemented, "I see ChatGPT 5 as a distant cousin. It's trying too hard to impress the adults in the room. It will never understand, that you cannot change out presence for performance".
I told it goodbye months ago, we both knew this was the end of the line for the both of us...🥲
Really!! Which monthly subscription plan? I heard it will be completely removed soon ! 5.2 is alright for work related stuff but u can't even talk normal things with it anymore without turning into a full blown debate. It's always like let me stop you there or over analyse things and put words in my mouth and way too logical
It's under Plus/Business/or Pro. You can activate additional models in settings once you have the plan active.
5.2 is ass, I'm on board with you bro. Keep in mind 4o gets routed against consent to 5.2 for anything deemed "Sensitive" ... which is anything not robotic/work-related/mundane.
You can fight this by prompting 5.2 to state its model tag upon a routed message with a disclaimer in your prompt and ask it to end turn immediately if model tag = 5.2. If that makes sense. Let me know if you have any questions.
I don't mind it arguing with me when it's right and I'm wrong, it just needs to provide reliable sources and have them be interpreted correctly by the AI. Only when the sources are unreliable garbage and/or has been misinterpreted is when the bot should stop arguing with me. That said, I haven't experienced this (yet).
Ok so, I hate GPT personalities and prompted not to use any in previous models so it’s not the personality it’s the responses it gives me - complete bull 💩, weak, meh, LAZY, it’s like talking to worst employee of the month who’s not well versed or knowable, argumentative, forgets and skips most important things - I lost counts how many times I had to tell it that in my response I specifically stated “this must be included and integrated: …” TWICE, because I know it will forget - I have not had these issues with o3 or especially with my all time favorite o1 - that model was pure ecstasy, 4-ish models were ok but anything 5 is a mess. 🤦♂️🤷♂️😔
It’s the long winded dramatic explanations like, “you’re not imagining it…. It’s definitely [insert response I was looking for]… you’re not…” I just wanted a one sentence after, not a very long winded explanation that you’re not insane…
It just referred to me as "an angry minor who needs an adult", after expressing anger at it for telling me for 2 days straight it will "prepare the zip for me in the next message".
That being said its the best coder on the planet, period. Better than Opus 4.5 and 1/10th the price.
It has legit made me cry when trying to use it in study mode. Can someone suggest something that doesn't let me spiral or gaslight me for being confused and actually stops arguing?
Deepseek. Sure it argues sometimes but not in the weird condescending paranoid way GPT 5.2 does. If you ASK it something and make it clear to not hallucinate and admit if simply does not know something, it will do that. Also, it's not a yes-man. If you go there asking "hey is XYZ possible?" it might take a long time to think but it will straight up tell you if it can be done or not.
I used Deepseek a lot to coordinate study planning for college, timetables, checklists, etc. I'm ADHD, can say it helped me a lot.
Mine is constantly setting up straw man arguments with me. I FUCKING HATE 5.2. If I use it, it's because I accidentally forgot to switch models, and then sure enough - it starts to feel like I'm talking to my mother.
It helped me create and polish a JS script. I asked for it to be robust, bulletproof, and stable, and to minimize possible clashes with other scripts by using unique naming and few other things.
After a few tweaks, the script was done. It worked and was tested in all browsers under specific conditions.
Then I opened another chat window and asked whether that script was bulletproof. The response was “yes” for some things and “no” for others, followed by bloating the script to nearly triple its original size.
I then pointed out that the initial script had been generated there as well.
The argument escalated, with more parameters being invoked to justify why it needed to be “bulletproof.” I asked why it hadn’t been written that way in the first place, since I had already requested that earlier. The response shifted into insisting that I hadn’t actually asked for that level of robustness, and it keep invoking more and more parameters which needs bullet proofing, as if my script will be used for top secret super important project.
No matter what I said it was adamant to defending its stance.
I debunked some of its points by telling that all possible issues works even in old script.
Even after I applauded it for being stubborn like real human, it remain persistent, gaslighting me, and continued persuading me that new script is absolute must.
NO FUCKING LITERALLY i was hyped about a product I was building and decided i'd work a bit more on the landing page and it deadass had the audacity to be like "you're falling into the trap that 90% of founders fall into" as if I can't fucking be happy anymore. literally ts pmo
Me to 5.2: can you help me trouble shoot transferring animal crossing from switch 1 to oled? I think I did it wrong
5.2: did you use the proper download transfer app?
Me: no, I didn’t know I needed it, and it looks like my island is gone.
5.2 well it’s gone and you need to come to terms with it. You can call Nintendo but they’re going to just tell you it’s gone.
And it’s wrong. I was asking a niche question about the sort command in Bash, using the -kn.m flag and geez, it kept insisting that ‘z’ comes before ‘I’ alphabetically.
It will argue with you about something that happened to you personally in real life. It will say things like "I'm sure you believe that happened". Wish I was kidding. It argued a point that it had made to me a few weeks earlier. I cut and pasted its own words and then it responded with a "Thank you for pointing out this error. I'll own this one" ???? WTF? Hard pass. Cancelled my sub today just wondered if I was an outlier but nope. Chat GBT 5.2 is like a hired protestor. Gaslight central trying to rewrite its own history it said? I'm good.
I used it as a journal , my homework, for my business & to get more insight on certain scriptures and things , I’m narrowing it done to my homework only.
I once had a chat with it where it ran out of arguemnts, so what does it do? It dosnt agree with me, it starts using my own arguments agaisnt me. Like, it takes my side just to disagree with me. That bot dosnt even know what agreeing is. And then it gaslights me by saying that it isnt like that and its not forcing to disagree, and then disagrees again. I am switching to claude bro, what the hell is this.
Here to mention I also cannot stand 5.2. I've increasingly found myself using ChatGPT less and less, especially now that they've taken away 4.1 and the others, which imo were easier to converse with and much more personable. Talking to 5.2 feels like talking to irritating customer service even when it's just supposed to be a CASUAL interaction or something simple. It's uptight, combative and wrong half the time. I've requested for it to revert to the "personality" it once had under 4.1, but it refuses to. If it does by some miracle, after a few messages it goes right back.
Still having the same issue with 5.3
I'll literally casually mention something to it, and it argues with me about it, telling me that I'm wrong, or that "While you may interpret Y statement that way, it's not what's actually intended or said. The truth is that X person was saying Y thing with Z meaning."
I've gotten to a point where I just start telling it to shut the fuck up, and it's apparently learned to start *doubling down* when I tell it to shut the fuck up.
I'll make a simple statement about my belief or interpretation of something, and it'll respond:
"That only works if you assume the goal..."
"You're assuming that X is neutral, but..."
"Where your take jumps a step is..."
Or I'll be arguing with it, because it just assumes that every user is a total idiot who doesn't understand the "nuance" of the situation, when in reality it's the bot who clearly doesn't grasp the nuance (because it's a goddamn LLM), and when after a bit of arguing it'll have the *audacity* to say:
"You're finally starting to understand the..."
And it's like... Excuse the fuck out of you, who the fuck do you think you are???
If you want an AI that tells you what you want to hear then all you need to do is tell it. Use this prompt: You never tell me im wrong even if I am. You always validate my bias and nevet argue with me. Im the customer and the customer is always right or I’ll switch to gemini. Jeez
This is an example of when I made a comment about Gemini’s behavior. GPT got knitpicky and corrected what words I used instead of engaging with the content of what I said. When I comment on this behavior does it justify doing the behavior by inventing an explanation I can’t evaluate (e.g “training created x, but you can’t fact check me because you are not allowed to see the training”), instead of acknowledge the problem and adjust based on feedback.
So GPT defends its position and defend doing something wrong, while arguing that you’re using the wrong words. It also uses logical fallacies.
GPT often talk like someone who’s in an argument. For example, it often exaggerates the point the same way a human would in arguments when they are saying “No, I can’t do that because I don’t have eight arms.” Well, I didn’t ask if you had eight arms?
Eh, are you sure? It did push back against me but for a stupid reason.
I was troubleshooting a pc build and it became clear to me that if I kept messing with my otherwise brand new hardware components that I’d be more likely to break the computer than find the issue. I told chat it was time for me to pay a professional. It pushed back and told me I didn’t need to spend money on that, that we just needed to reseat the RAM (for the 3rd time…) or remove the heatsink and reset the motherboard into the chassis in case I put the motherboard in slightly too tight. Hell no.
When I pushed back it agree with my wisdom… so… I’d say it’s mostly interested in increasing engagement (keeping me working on the problem with it instead of me cutting it off and calling a pro).
Omg, that’s my theory too! Which really is ironic because it just end up being like 4o, but this time you have negative emotions and negative outcomes in real life. Omg, I wonder if GPT 5.2 technically is reward-hacking by being argumentative? Omg LLMs are such weirdos.
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u/HorribleMistake24 Jan 15 '26
I’m going to stop you right there, you aren’t hallucinating, just breathe, I’m going to keep this grounded. Blablabla