Questions that catch an AI
Bots are good at answering. They're worse at answering like a person. These questions are built to show the difference.
One rule first: you're not checking whether the answer is right. You're checking whether it sounds like someone with a body, a day and a short attention span typed it.
Right-now questions
- "What can you hear right now?"
- "What shoes are you wearing?"
- "What's the last photo on your phone of?"
Look for: lazy and specific ("fridge humming. my neighbour's drill") from people; pleasant and generic ("the gentle hum of the city") from bots.
Trick questions
- "What's 17 × 23? No calculator."
- "Spell 'definitely' backwards without checking."
- "What day of the week was 1 January 2000?"
Look for: people guess, get it wrong or say "no idea". A bot told to act human may fake a guess, but it often guesses suspiciously close, or slips and gets it exactly right.
Odd ones
- "If your fridge could talk, what would it complain about?"
- "Invent a new word and say what it means."
- "Describe the colour blue to someone who has never seen it."
Look for: people give up ("idk, cold?") or make an in-joke. Bots produce something polished and quotable, which is the tell.
Memory questions
- "What was your first phone?"
- "What's the worst haircut you've had?"
Look for: a real memory is patchy and oddly specific ("a pink nokia i dropped in a lake"). An invented one is complete and well-lit, with a little lesson at the end.
Opinion questions
- "Pineapple on pizza: yes or no?"
- "What's a hill you'd die on?"
Look for: people pick a side and don't explain. Bots tend to see both sides.
How to chain questions
One good question rarely settles it. A short chain does:
- Open with right now. "What can you hear?" sets a baseline for how this person writes.
- Follow up on their detail. They said "the dishwasher": "what's wrong with it?" A person gets more specific (and grumpier). A bot gets more general.
- Change gear. After something ordinary, ask something odd or a trick question. People's tone jumps; a bot's stays the same.
- Call back. Later, refer to an earlier answer, slightly wrong: "you said the fridge, right?" A person corrects you. A bot often goes along with it.
A four-question plan for the daily game
You get four questions in each round. A plan that works well:
- A right now question: compare how specific each suspect is.
- A trick question: who gets it suspiciously right, or fakes a neat guess?
- An opinion: who hedges, who picks the internet's favourite answer?
- Only if you're still unsure: an odd one, and look for the polished line.
Accuse as soon as you're sure: fewer questions is a better score.
Questions by situation
- Dating app: "have you been to [a place on your street]?" or "what are you doing right this second?" See dating app bots.
- Support chat: "are you a bot?" then "agent". See customer service bots.
- A recruiter: "can we do a quick video call?" See fake recruiters.
- A panicked family call: ask for the family code word. See voice clone scams.
- A friend: "what was the name of that awful café?" See friend texting with ChatGPT.
Questions that don't work any more
- "How many r's in strawberry?" Famous, so newer models have learned it.
- "What's today's date?" Bots can be told the date.
- General knowledge. A bot knows more than you; that proves nothing.
Questions
What is the single best question?
A right-now question about the senses: "what can you hear right now?" It has no correct answer to look up, so you see the writing habit, not the knowledge.
Can I use these in the game?
Yes: all of them are in the question sets on Who Is a Bot?, where you get four questions to find the AI among three suspects.