Computers can't tell jokes

“If you could master any language in the world, what would it be?” “C++.”

It’s a classic programming joke. The humor is ironic: language skills are less important than technological ones. Humor, I’m told, doesn’t flourish in tech. Computers can’t understand it.

And, some would argue, neither can engineers.

But the computer bit isn’t quite accurate. Chatbots based on large language models, like ChatGPT, don’t understand things the way we do.

But with enough data, they can communicate like us. They can even repeat jokes when prompted, just like some seniors I know.

So maybe they can tell jokes,...