Sherlock You're Kidding?
A lost Sherlock Holmes story
Several years ago I wrote 90% of a Sherlock Holmes pastiche, dithered a bit, and then filed it away. I fully intended to finish it later. Years passed and, early this year, I felt an itch to complete it. To my great disappointment I haven’t been able to find it: such backups as I have do not seem to include it. I am expecting to find it any day now.[1]
ChatGPT and the artificially intelligent silicon-based lifeform
After reading about ChatGPT—an ancestor of humanity’s soon-to-be overlords—I created an account at OpenAI.com to try it myself. Soon I was facing a sort of sandbox where I could ask a question, request a description of quantum mechanics, solicit a recipe for Top Ramen and peanut butter, or write up a thumbnail sketch of a sequel to Lord of the Flies. I suppose I had other options as well, but I really couldn’t think of anything interesting. Quantum mechanics is interesting, but I had no interest in an AI’s summary of a Wikipedia page. A better ramen dish? I’m not a cook. The sequel idea intrigued me, but “meh?” I thought. However…
That same morning I’d executed another search for my Holmes pastiche, and I’d wondered if it would be worth trying to recreate my 90% finished story. Clearly no, I thought. Now facing a sand trap, or rather a sandbox, I decided to test ChatGPT’s mettle. Everyone it seems has a Sherlock Holmes story in the attic (belfry?), so I fed the digital mind this:[2]
Below is the story it produced.
The Adventure of the Swiss Patent Clerk
It was a cold, foggy night in London when I arrived at 221B Baker Street. My old friend Sherlock Holmes had invited me to visit and I could almost smell the mystery already. As I stepped through the door of his flat, much to my surprise, seated across from him was none other than Albert Einstein!
The two men were deep in conversation about physics, so naturally they welcomed me warmly as soon as they noticed my presence. After exchanging pleasantries we all settled down together and began discussing various topics of interest; however it wasn’t long before our conversation turned back to science.
Einstein declared that he had just recently finished work on his theory of general relativity which explained how gravity works due to the curvature of space-time caused by mass or energy being present in certain areas. He went into further detail about how this affected light waves travelling near large objects such as stars and planets but unfortunately for us both, Holmes’ eyes glazed over shortly after this explanation began!
I attempted to bring some life back into his expression with an outburst of laughter derisively claiming that no matter what new theories Einstein may come up with he would never be able to match Isaac Newton’s genius—a joke which didn’t quite go down well with either man! In fact things got rather heated between them until finally Einstein challenged Holmes (and myself) to a duel involving violins instead of guns! We quickly agreed although none of us knew exactly what kind of duel this would involve yet…but none the less we eagerly awaited its commencement.
Suddenly there came a knock at the door and upon opening it we found ourselves face-to-face with a young street urchin accompanied by her trusty canine companion who seemed more than happy for some company; thus providing us all with something else entirely unexpected—entertainment! The dog ran around joyfully while Einstein played beautiful music on his violin whilst simultaneously telling us stories about relativity; meanwhile Holmes used deduction techniques taught him during our many cases together too[sic] figure out where exactly she had come from and why she was here tonight—an eventful evening indeed!
A critical assessment
I am not impressed, though my “ask” wasn’t good; for one thing it didn’t specify a mystery to be solved. The mystery of the street urchin—where did she came from and why?—isn’t much of one, and moreover, the story doesn’t include a solution. I may have overestimated ChatGPT’s ability to understand that a mystery and its solution is the sine qua non of a Holmes story. Duh, Machinehead!
I have copy-and-pasted the story exactly as ChatGPT wrote it, with only the addition of “[sic]” where it used an incorrect word. The story uses a very un-Doctor Watson-ish six exclamation marks in its five brief paragraphs. Also, I believe commas are needed in a few of its longer sentences (I overuse commas though).
That Watson fails to use “singular” to describe the evening is extremely disappointing.
I asked the bot to include cocaine in the story—Holmes was a big fan of it—but it declined; probably for the best in the presence of the young child and her dog.
If I ever find and complete my Holmes story, I hope it’s better than this one. I may try to find a way to work the detective’s “seven-percent solution” into mine.[3]
—
Notes
- I did not try to reproduce my story with ChatGPT. My story was to be titled “The Adventure of Chekhov’s Gun,” and featured neither Albert Einstein, a joyful dog, nor a duel. [^]
- This was my second attempt. My first was not much more than “write a new Sherlock Holmes story.” The second attempt included my increasing the target word count. [^]
- My dad asked me yesterday if I had heard of ChatGPT. This is my—perhaps overlong—answer. [^]
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