AI PromptsHow to check an AI answer before you use it
An AI assistant writes fluent, confident text whether or not the content is correct. That is the single most important thing to know about using one. This guide explains what goes wrong and gives a simple routine for catching it.
Why confident mistakes happen
An assistant produces text that is likely to follow from your prompt, based on patterns in the enormous amount of writing it was trained on. Often the likely text is also true. Sometimes it is not, and the assistant has no reliable inner sense of the difference. It does not hesitate when it is on weak ground. A wrong answer arrives in the same assured tone as a right one.
The kinds of mistake to expect
- Invented facts. Dates, statistics, prices, phone numbers, rules and procedures that look specific and are simply made up.
- Invented sources. Book titles, court cases, research papers, web addresses and quotations that do not exist. This is common enough to have caused real embarrassment to professionals who did not check.
- Out-of-date information. An assistant's knowledge stops at some point in the past. Fees, limits, deadlines, tax rules, syllabuses and timetables change, and it may give you an old one.
- The wrong place. It may describe the rule of another country or another state as if it were yours.
- Arithmetic slips. Totals, percentages and dates between dates can be wrong, especially in long calculations.
- Misreading your request. It answers a slightly different question from the one you asked.
- Smoothing over gaps. When your notes are incomplete, it may fill the hole with something plausible.
- Agreeing with you. It tends to support the view in your prompt, even a mistaken one.
What to check, by how much it matters
Not everything needs the same care. Sort the answer by what happens if it is wrong.
| What you are using it for | How to treat the answer |
|---|---|
| Wording, tone, structure, ideas | Use freely. Read it for sense. |
| A summary of text you pasted | Compare with the original for missing or altered points. |
| Facts, names, dates, numbers | Check each against a reliable source before using. |
| Rules, fees, deadlines, procedures | Confirm on the official website or with the office. |
| Health, law, money, safety | Treat as questions to ask a qualified person. Do not act on it alone. |
A checking routine
- Read it all, slowly. Most errors are visible to a careful reader who knows the subject. That reader is you.
- Mark every checkable claim. Names, dates, amounts, figures, quotations, references.
- Check each against something that is not the assistant. Your own records, the original document, an official website, a textbook.
- Recalculate the numbers. Use a calculator or a spreadsheet.
- Look for what is missing. A summary can be accurate in every sentence and still leave out the one thing that matters.
- Ask yourself who will rely on it. The more people, the more checking.
Asking the assistant to help you check
Some prompts make checking easier.
List every factual claim in your last answer that I should verify, such as names, dates, numbers and rules. For each, tell me how sure you are and where a person could confirm it. Do not give web addresses unless you are certain they exist.
Replace the parts in [CAPITALS] first, or after pasting.
Which parts of your answer came directly from the text I pasted, and which parts did you add from your own general knowledge? Mark the added parts.
Replace the parts in [CAPITALS] first, or after pasting.
These help, but they are not proof. An assistant asked "are you sure?" may simply repeat its mistake politely, or change a correct answer because you sounded doubtful. Its own statement of confidence is not evidence.
Do not ask it to confirm itself
Opening a second conversation and asking the same question is a slightly better test, since a made-up detail often changes between attempts. But two matching answers can both be wrong. The only real check is a source outside the assistant.
Where to look instead
- Official websites of the government department, board, university, bank or company concerned, for rules, fees, forms and dates.
- The original document, for anything the assistant summarised.
- Your textbook or the official documentation, for facts in a subject or details of a program.
- A qualified person, such as a doctor, a lawyer, a chartered accountant or your teacher, for decisions that carry risk.
The right attitude
Think of the assistant as a fast, well-read helper who never says "I do not know". Such a helper is valuable for drafts, ideas and explanations, and dangerous as a final authority. Use it to do the first eighty per cent quickly, and spend the time you saved on checking the part that matters.
This is an independent site. It is not connected with any company that makes AI assistants. The prompts are plain text and can be used in any AI chat assistant. An AI assistant can give wrong or made-up answers: check anything important before you rely on it, and do not paste private details into a prompt.