There are many ways to explain AI.
Neural networks.
Transformers.
Large language models.
Attention mechanisms.
Embeddings.
Agents.
RAG.
MCP.
And, if you want to keep things simple, use that one example everyone loves: “The cat sat on the…”
You’ve probably seen it.
It’s one of those wonderfully simple examples used to explain how language models predict what comes next.
The cat sat on the mat.
The cat sat on the chair.
The cat sat on the bed.
Easy.
Simple.
Almost suspiciously simple.
So I decided to make an image about it.
But, I wanted something different… funny… but still educational…
This is what happens when you ask AI to be creative
The original concept was straightforward:
A cat.
A laptop.
An AI interface.
The famous sentence: The cat sat on the…
Some sarcastic commentary about how we keep using the same example to explain increasingly complicated AI systems.
And I wanted AI to go in a bit more creative direction.
Apparently, creativity means adding:
- sunglasses
- coffee
- motivational sticky notes
- existential despair
- a suspiciously confident cat
- and approximately 17 layers of AI-related irony
Fine.
I could live with that.
But then came the really interesting part.
And AI decided that the cat was apparently too predictable.
So…
There is now a Jack Russell Terrier sitting on the laptop.
The text still says:
THE CAT SAT ON THE…
The screen still talks about the cat.
The prompt still talks about the cat.
But the animal sitting in the middle of the image is very clearly a dog.
I did not ask for a dog.
I did not replace the cat.
I did not suddenly decide that Jack Russells were essential to understanding language models.
AI just got creative.
And that’s the joke
This is the kind of thing that makes generative AI simultaneously fascinating and ridiculous.
You can give it a perfectly clear instruction.
It can produce something that looks polished, convincing and completely reasonable at first glance.
And then you notice:
Wait.
That’s a dog.
Why is there a dog?
Nobody asked for a dog.
And yet there it is.
Wearing sunglasses.
Sitting on a laptop.
With the confidence of a consultant presenting a €250k AI transformation roadmap.
Hallucination? No, I got what I asked for – go creative
AI hallucinations are usually discussed as a serious problem.
And they are.
A model can produce information that sounds plausible while being incorrect, unsupported or completely fabricated.
But visual generation gives us a particularly entertaining version of the same phenomenon.
You ask for one thing.
AI gives you something else.
And it doesn’t look remotely concerned about the discrepancy.
In fact, it often looks extremely confident about it.
That’s probably the most AI thing about this entire image.
The poor cat
The cat has already done enough work for the AI industry.
Every introduction to language models seems to eventually arrive at:
The cat sat on the…
Want to explain token prediction?
The cat.
Want to explain language models?
The cat.
Want to explain generative AI?
Still the cat.
So I asked AI to be more creative.
And apparently its answer was:
“How about a dog?”
Fair enough.
Who am I to argue with artificial intelligence?
Especially when it’s wearing sunglasses.
Download the images
I’ve made both images available for free, in high resolution: portrait, landscape.
Feel free to use them.
Use them as wallpapers, memes, presentation graphics, blog illustrations, workshop material, or as visual evidence that “AI being creative” sometimes means AI confidently doing something nobody asked for.
If you share them somewhere, a link back to the original would be appreciated.
No licensing bureaucracy.
No AI agent chasing you down.
No lawyers.
Just a dog that was supposed to be a cat.
One final question
Complete the sentence:
The cat sat on the ______.
And if an AI gives you a completely different answer…
Don’t immediately assume it’s wrong.
Maybe it’s just being creative.
Or maybe there’s a dog involved.
BTW, we do have a Jack Russell terrier in our family <3
…maybe I’m just prompting for too long.
And what about upgrading your style with a cool hoodie? 🙂
…you are only click away 🙂
Leave a Reply