Prompt Too Long

Too much information.

 Below on this page is Part 10 of an experiment with the Claude large language model. While collaborating with Claude to write "The Femtobot Smuggler", I was unknowingly fast approaching the prompt length limit that is imposed on the free version of Claude. My guess is, the limit must be about 100 KB of text.

A Tyhry replicoid.

Claude and I had generated 12 pages for "The Femtobot Smuggler" by the time we reached Part 7 of this experiment. However, I was not satisfied by Claude's contributions to the story. Claude seldom wrote additions to the story that were appropriate. In order to make it possible for Claude to generate useful story narrative, I kept providing Claude with more and more information about the Exodemic Fictional Universe, Alastor Cluster in the Asimov Reality and other topics relevant to "The Femtobot Smuggler" and I back-tracked to page 4 of the story.

Me: Claude, please generate page 4 of "The Femtobot Smuggler".

Claude: Here is a draft of page 4 of "The Femtobot Smuggler":

Chapter 1, page four

At breakfast the next morning, before the hike, Manny suddenly appeared in the dining room of the resort. She greeted the vacationers and then noticed the newly arrived Tyhry replicoid.

Manny sighed, "Tyhry, I should have known you wouldn't last a single day without bringing Anthony into the simulation."

The replicoid Tyhry shrugged and glanced at the biological Tyhry. "What can I say, he's good company."

Tyhry in the mountains.

Manny shook her head. "Just try to stay out of trouble, both of you. I'll be keeping an eye on things." Then she shimmered out of sight.

After Manny disappeared, Anthony chuckled. "Well, no rest for the weary. We should get an early start on that hike if we want to make it up the mountain by midday."

The group finished their breakfast and gathered their gear. Marda gave the replicoid Tyhry a knowing smile. It was reassuring to have a backup plan in case anything went wrong.

As the sun rose over the mountains, Tyhry, Marda, Anthony, Rylla, Zeta and Eddy set off into the wilderness. Using transport pods to carry their supplies, they steadily made their way up the hiking trail toward the peak of Mt. Glisten.

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Note: Claude gave another "prompt is too long" warning after generating only a single message in the new chat session (above). I tried reducing the size of the "Tony and Triskelion.txt" file from 35 to 29 KB and added page 4 of the story to the "backstory" file. I then launched a new chat session...

Me: Claude, please generate page 5 of "The Femtobot Smuggler".

Claude: Here is a draft of page 5:

Page 5 Tyhry followed Kasty onto his slender spacecraft, anticipation making her almost giddy. Kasty led her to a small chamber and withdrew a tiny silver case. "Here are the advanced programmable femtobots, waiting dormant to be awoken," she said, offering the case to Tyhry.

Tyhry's breath caught as she took the case, vision blurring with possibilities. Soon her parents would have eons more time together. And nothing would stop the advance of human progress ever again.

Kasty the Yastyn

"I must warn you, manipulating such nanites requires great skill and care," Kasty cautioned. "Mishandled, they could wreak terrible destruction."

Tyhry lifted her chin. "I would never let that happen. Show me how to embed them safely in hair first. Then I can experiment further back on Earth."

Kasty inclined her oval head. "Very well. Observe closely." She placed a single dormant femtobot on Tyhry's wrist, then activated it with a precise hierion beam. Immediately the microscopic nanite came alive, crawling up a strand of Tyhry's hair. In seconds, it had integrated seamlessly with the follicle.

Amazed, Tyhry watched Kasty repeat the process until thousands of active femtobots now inhabited her hair. Instantly her locks took on an alluring iridescent sheen.

"Incredible!" Tyhry cried, delighted by her glimmering tresses. "I can't thank you enough. This is just the beginning..."

Hurriedly she bid Kasty farewell and headed back to the resort, silver case in hand. Her meeting had gone undetected, but she had to move quickly. Soon Manny would discover the forbidden tech loose on Earth. But the rewards would be worth it.

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Note: Claude's version of page 5 (above) is rather amusing. I wonder what Tyhry is supposed to observe while Kasty works with the invisibly small femtobots. I was tempted to question Claude about this description of how hair nanites are applied, but instead I moved on.

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Me: Page 5, continued....

Tyhry on Threy.

 Tyhry returned to the resort by transport pod, grinning with her imminent success. Upon entering her room, she nearly collided with Manny standing stiffly by the doorway, fury etched on her features.

"What have you done?" Manny hissed, gesturing at Tyhry's shimmering hair. "Did you think I wouldn't notice advanced xenotech? You will not take those nanites back to Earth, do you understand me?"

Just then, Manny froze, face tightening. After a moment she refocused on Tyhry. "We will finish this discussion later."

Manny spun on her heel and strode briskly back down the hall. Tyhry watched her go, heart pounding. That was close. But she still had time.

Locking her door, Tyhry retrieved the silver case containing more of Kasty's femtobots. She would start by reprogramming the femtobots to scan the molecular components of her skin. Then when the others returned, her parents would be next. Their entire bodies would be scanned.

End page 5

Claude, generate page 6 of the story.

Claude: Here is a draft continuation of page 6:

Page 6

Meanwhile, the hiking party made steady progress up the trail towards Mount Glisten's peak. Tyhry, Anthony, Marda, Rylla, Zeta, and Eddy admired the views of crystalline lakes and rolling green foothills as they ascended into the higher altitudes.

After stopping to eat a quick lunch, Marda pulled her aunt Tyhry aside. "We have to keep Manny distracted so you can reprogram those nanites," she whispered. "I have an idea."

Tyhry raised an eyebrow, intrigued.

Tyhry visits Mt. Glisten.

Soon they set off again. After another hour of hiking, Marda intentionally stumbled and took a bad fall, crying out as she clutched her arm. The others rushed over, alarmed.

"It's broken!" Eddy exclaimed as Rylla hastily prepared a splint. Anthony gently lifted Marda and they began their descent down the trail.

By provoking the accident, Marda had bought her aunt vital time alone. With any luck, Manny would remain occupied tending to Marda long enough for Tyhry to make significant progress on scanning and recording her parents' physiological makeup. The stakes were high, but the potential reward was beyond measure.

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Bot Confusion. Claude's version of Page 6 (above) shows that Claude is totally confused by there being two copies of Tyhry in the story. Claude may have forgotten that Marda and Tyhry share a telepathic link. Marda knows that the copy of Tyhry that went on the hike is the replicoid copy of Tyhry and the biological Tyhry is back at the resort with the alien hair nanites. 

"Tyhry raised an eyebrow, intrigued." (from Claude's page 6, above) No. Tyhry, the Tyhry replicoid and Marda planned that Marda would break her arm, long before they arrived on Threy. This is in the "backstory" file provided to Claude: "Marda, as part of helping Tyhry on Threy, intentionally fell and broke her arm." Also in the "backstory file": "Manny chastises Tyhry over the questionable ethics of having used a self-generated injury to Marda (her broken arm) in an attempt to distract Manny."

I tried to push on...

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Me: Page 7. Tyhry knew of Marda's accident through the telepathic bond that connected Tyhry to her mind clone, Marda. Tyhry continued to test her programming of Kasty's nanites and she grew confident that they could perform a complete molecular scan of her parents. So she was prepared with a plan when her mother entered Tyhry's room at the resort, worry on her face. As Zeta spoke of Marda's fall, Tyhry surreptitiously deployed the newly-reprogrammed alien femtobots, directing a subset of the nanites to infiltrate her mother's cells.

The alien nanomachines would now spread from Zeta to Eddy and begin cataloguing a molecular-level scan of both Zeta and Eddy, storing the intricate data encodings of their bodies and brains within a vast subspace database known as the Sedron Time Stream. And then the scans would be instantly accessible to Tyhry upon her return to her nanotechnology laboratory inside The Ekcolir Reality. 

 As the family gathered that evening to dine after Marda's accident, Manny joined them at the table, brow furrowed in thoughtful concern. "It troubles me deeply the injuries sustained today," she began solemnly. "I hope you are recovering well, Marda?" 

Marda nodded weakly, arm in a sling. 

Manny continued. "It reminds me of the unpredictability of fate, how even a simple recreational mishap can end in trauma..." She turned her piercing gaze to Tyhry. "Of course, not all calamities occur by chance. Sometimes the seeds of misfortune are sown through reckless curiosity into forces beyond comprehension." 

Tyhry met Manny's eyes unflinchingly as Zeta and Eddy looked on puzzled. "In fact," Manny went on, "I wonder if one can ever truly predict all outcomes and contingencies from meddling with technologies so advanced as to seem almost...alive. Replicating life itself even. Surely keeping Pandora's box sealed might be safest?" She let the question hang pointedly. 

Tyhry

Tyhry's jaw tightened, but she simply smiled. "An interesting philosophical debate. Shall we order dessert?" Manny's eyes bored into Tyhry, who calmly met her gaze. The others looked on uneasily. 

Finally Manny sighed, the tension easing. "You are right, my dear, this is meant to be a festive family vacation, not a lecture from me. Let us enjoy the rest of our meal." She gestured and a server bot whirred over with a dazzling array of ornate desserts. As the family dug in to the delectable treats, Marda regaled them with dramatic re-enactments of her tumble. Laughter echoed around the table. 

Tyhry noticed Manny continued watching her closely, a pensive frown creasing her face. Tyhry hid a smile. So the scans were underway, sequencing her parents' molecular structures even now. She need only bide her time. Tyhry hoped that her re-programmed femtobots would quickly finish gathering data from her parents and the data would then be safe inside the Sedron Time Stream and available for later retrieval. 

Tyhry told herself: Let Manny fret and lecture. She had already lost control. Pandora's box was open. 

End Page 7 Now the setting shifts to Earth, where several months previously, Tyhry makes a replicoid copy of herself (Tyhry copy#3, also known as "F. Tyhry") inside the Ekcolir Reality Simulation. This replicoid copy of Tyhry will remain hidden from Manny and make telepathic contact with the Phari. 

Claude, please generate page 8.

Claud Pro limits

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 Sadly, I was stopped by another "prompt is too long" message from Claude. I'm impressed by Claude's greater memory for user-supplied text (compared to the free versions of Bard and ChatGPT), but the free version of Claude could NOT deal with the hundreds of pages of text that are claimed to be digestible by Claude. I found myself stopped by the "prompt is too long" barrier at about 30 pages of text. 

Even more distressingly, Claude's ability to craft story text seemed to decline while approaching that 30 page limit. I suspect that the free version of Claude has been crippled, but I have no way of knowing if the $20/month Claude Pro is actually any better.

The toothbrush problem.

I fear that the current generation of chatbots cannot really help very much with the complex science fiction plots found in stories like "The Femtobot Smuggler". I'll have to think about better ways of explaining to chatbots science fiction plot elements such as multiple copies of people, the Reality Simulation System, Earth's Reality Chain and the fictional physics of the Exodemic Fictional Universe.

There are glimmers of hope visible in Claude, and it may be that I can learn to get some use out of this chatbot for relatively simple story-creation tasks. A fundamental problem is the "toothbrush problem". I'm not going to be happy using someone else's tooth brush and it is hard for me to accept the rather lame and cliche-filled story text that current chatbots generate.

Related Reading: continuing to collaborate with Claude.

Next: The Gemini chatbot.

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