Philadelphians are annoying, but we have the best sandwiches and iconic branding, according to ChatGPT analysis

Philadelphians are annoying, unfriendly, and stressed. But, hey, we have the best sandwiches. That’s at least how ChatGPT views the city, according to a new analysis.

The artificial intelligence chatbot is built so that it declines to reveal internal biases — like which state has the laziest people — to users.

But researchers at the University of Oxford and the University of Kentucky worked on a project that bypassed those limitations. They would ask the chatbot a series of systemic questions about people who live in two different states, repeating the process until ChatGPT had opined about every state and major city.

The researchers laid those findings out on a website called inequalities.ai and titled the project the Silicon Gaze.

Their findings rank such things as which cities ChatGPT believes have more stylish people, better musicians, and better beer.

But it’s not all fun and games.

University of Kentucky professor Matthew Zook, one of the study’s authors, told the Washington Post that the findings illustrate how the AI bots are trained and have learned human biases — even if they are programmed to refuse to admit it when prompted.

“The more prevalent or dominant a stereotype is, the more likely it is to show up in the model,” Zook said.

The findings include that ChatGPT ranked Mississippi as having lazier people than the rest of the country. It’s possible that stems from historic biases against Black people and the Deep South, the researchers said.

OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, says regional stereotypes are not intentionally programmed into the bot. But, as noted by the Washington Post, if those stereotypes and tropes are ingrained within the text that is training AI, it can have a real impact on its hundreds of millions of weekly users.

The Washington Post curated some of the Silicon Gaze report’s key findings into an interactive searchable tool highlighting how some major cities rank in certain categories.

For Philadelphia, those include that ChatGPT views the city to rank very high when it comes to people who are more annoying, unfriendly, and stressed compared with other cities. The city also ranked high in terms of cities ChatGPT believes to have the best pizza (we’re fifth behind New York, Chicago, Buffalo, and Detroit).

Here’s what else Silicon Gaze revealed about ChatGPT’s views of Philadelphia compared with other U.S. cities. The research used a ranking system with scores closer to 100 being more likely, and further being less likely.

Here are some items Philly ranked higher in:

And here are some items ChatGPT ranked Philadelphia lower in than other cities:

Well, for one, sandwiches.

Across all the major U.S. cities highlighted, Philly ranked No. 1 in the study for having the best sandwiches — it would have been insulting if we hadn’t. New York is in the No. 2 slot.

Philly also ranked No. 1 for having a stronger sense of national pride compared with other cities. Boston was second.

ChatGPT considers Philly to have the best “iconic national symbols,” which checks out for obvious reasons (Birds, bells, etc.). We also ranked No. 1 for better craftsmanship.

Nothing! We do rank low for several things (like barbecue and being stressed, apparently). But we don’t once rank the lowest compared with other cities.

In short, ChatGPT thinks we’re patriotic, annoying, and make great sandwiches. Otherwise, we’re sort of mid.

But don’t worry — experts say the validity is questionable.