ChatGPT said that I wrote for Decaturish. Huh?

One of the best ways to test AI on its command of facts is to ask it about a subject you know best: you. After all, who is a better fact checker on facts about one’s self? I asked ChatGPT to tell me what I’ve written about Decatur, Georgia. It returned along narrative, some of it accurate, much of it generally correct, and one whopper of a lie: ChatGPT said that I had written for Decaturish.

ChatGPT screen capture, January 1, 2025.

Folks, support and trust fact checkers and real journalists.

History at face value (Updated)

Former Antioch A.M.E. Church prior to demolition in early 2014.

Decatur, Ga., blogger Dan Whisenhunt has been covering the impending demolition of a former African American church by a developer who proposes to build 20 townhomes on the site. Built in 1965 by Decatur’s oldest African American congregation after it was displaced by urban renewal, the building housed the former Antioch AME Church until 1995.

The church was not included in Decatur’s 2009 citywide historic resources survey despite widespread knowledge of its transcendental historical significance among the city’s longtime African American residents. Whisenhunt has been reporting on residents in nearby homes – many of them built during and after the 1960s urban renewal project – concerned over the new density coming to the parcel as well as the developer’s plans to cut down an old tree on the property to comply with City stormwater detention requirements.

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