A Note about Story Grammars in ChatGPT

Abstract

Think of an artificial neural net as a platform on which to implement higher level structures, like one might implement a word processor or a database in C++. In investigate of the neural net underlying ChatGPT implements a simple grammar, stories with five components, in order: 1) Donné, 2) Disturb, 3) Plan, 4) Enact, 5) Celebrate. I present the results of four experiments in which ChatGPT transforms one story into another based on a single change in the nature of the protagonist or antagonist.

Keywords: story grammar, narratology, ChatGPT, large language models, deep learning, Lévi-Strauss