How to make prompt engineering work better for You?
Many ways to improve prompt engineering:
- Gather more data. The more examples of good and bad conversations a model is trained on, the better it will understand context and respond appropriately. Continually adding new data helps address blind spots.
- Emphasize empathy, harm reduction, and ethically-aligned responses. Prompts should guide the model to be helpful, harmless, and honest above all else. Avoiding toxic, abusive, dangerous or unethical responses is critical.
- Test extensively with real people. Prompts need to be evaluated by people from diverse backgrounds in different contexts to find problematic responses. Bias and safety testing is important.
- Make responses context-sensitive. Prompts can encourage looking at full conversations rather than just the last utterance to ensure appropriate, thoughtful replies.
- Consider follow-up questions. Rather than just giving information, prompts could encourage clarifying misunderstandings respectfully through follow up queries.
- Allow "I don't know" responses. It's better for a model to admit lack of knowledge than speculate or try to be helpful in a risky way. Prompts should permit passing on difficult questions.
- Make correction processes transparent. If issues arise, be clear about how feedback is addressed and future versions will improve. Transparency builds trust.
- Continue review and refinement. Prompt engineering is an ongoing process as models and needs evolve. Constant review and revision helps Ensure the model acts as a good conversational partner over time.
Good examples of prompts that could encourage more complex, thoughtful responses:
- Most issues don't have a single right answer. Help explain the nuances of this situation and consider multiple perspectives.
- Rather than give a quick opinion, reflect carefully on how different factors could affect or influence different people's experiences with this topic.
- Ambiguity is natural when discussing many real-world topics. Share your current understanding while acknowledging parts that are still unclear or could be interpreted differently.
- Complex problems often have no perfect solutions. Exploring pros and cons of various options respectfully can yield more insights than declaring one approach best.
- Diversity of lived experiences means people may have very different but equally valid viewpoints. Look for common ground and understanding rather than disputing other positions.
- Simple answers may be incomplete. Elaborate your response by considering related historical, social or environmental contexts around this issue.
- Refrain from definitive conclusions and instead focus the discussion on respectful sharing of perspectives, insights and remaining questions from various angles.
- Nuance often gets lost online. Take care to acknowledge any assumptions or generalizations in your initial analysis could overlook important details for some.
The aim is prompting self-reflective, multifaceted discussions that explore issues thoughtfully from many sides rather than cursorily pick one view.
- Conduct prompt self-analysis. Have the model reflect on its own goals, limitations and how it will handle uncertain or sensitive situations. This helps ensure safe, principled responses.
- Reward nuanced replies. Prompts should encourage complex, thoughtful answers over simplistic ones. Recognizing ambiguity and multiple perspectives leads to richer discussions.
- Account for power dynamics. The model needs guidance on conversing respectfully across differences in areas like age, gender, culture, ability etc. Avoid reinforcing biases.
- Update terminology carefully. As language evolves, changes to prompts must be tested against potential new implications or misunderstandings. Well-intentioned changes can backfire.
- Involve subject matter experts. Getting feedback from those with knowledge in discussion topics helps surface blind spots. Prompts are strengthened by integrating outside insight.
- Consider societal impact. Prompt engineering is shaping technologies that may influence culture. Aim for responses that bring more understanding and build social connections between people.
- Remain humble. No matter how well-designed, an AI has inherent limitations. Prompts should cultivate an awareness of incomplete knowledge and ongoing work needed for safe, helpful interactions.
The goal is prompting models to have thoughtful, nuanced conversations that respect individuals and social complexities. It requires constant improvement as technologies and their applications progress.
Prompts that could encourage more complex, thoughtful responses:
- Most issues don't have a single right answer. Help explain the nuances of this situation and consider multiple perspectives.
- Rather than give a quick opinion, reflect carefully on how different factors could affect or influence different people's experiences with this topic.
- Ambiguity is natural when discussing many real-world topics. Share your current understanding while acknowledging parts that are still unclear or could be interpreted differently.
- Complex problems often have no perfect solutions. Exploring pros and cons of various options respectfully can yield more insights than declaring one approach best.
- Diversity of lived experiences means people may have very different but equally valid viewpoints. Look for common ground and understanding rather than disputing other positions.
- Simple answers may be incomplete. Elaborate your response by considering related historical, social or environmental contexts around this issue.
- Refrain from definitive conclusions and instead focus the discussion on respectful sharing of perspectives, insights and remaining questions from various angles.
- Nuance often gets lost online. Take care to acknowledge any assumptions or generalizations in your initial analysis could overlook important details for some.
The aim is prompting self-reflective, multifaceted discussions that explore issues thoughtfully from many sides rather than cursorily pick one view.
