Analogy: it’s fine to write stories for yourself mad libs style with AI

It’s not ok to write stories with AI and post them for others to read claiming “I did that”

Get the difference?

I think the idea is if you are going to share LLM writing then why not just share the prompt which is shorter and has the message you want to convey anyway.

That is not to say that I don't think there is a place for LLM assisted writing. Writing is an exercise for the author and translates to oral argumentation so I don't think that fades away. But LLMs could do some "audience normalization". What if I could make a blogpost that is dynamic based on experience of the reader? There are lots of opportunities, but versus other fields where optimizing for laziness can be beneficial I don't think lazy writing currently has much value add.

This analogy looks quite good. Heavily processed food is not heathy for your body and heavy use of AI and other dopamine shortcuts like social media are not healthy for your brain. You have to approach both with causion.

Sure, let's do food analogy..

It's your turn to host supper club this week and you serve frozen diners on your nice tableware.

Largely speaking eating is an activity that only involves yourself. Whereas, writing and thinking are largely activities to communicate ideas between yourself and others. Basically it matters more how this is done.

To stick with that analogy, you also wouldn't serve a tv dinner to a guest unless you were somehow incapacitated. You certainly wouldn't do it if you were running a restaurant.

Add to that the fact that AI is significantly worse for you than TV dinners, and has an outsized harm to humanity, and the conclusion is plain:

AI should not be imposed on others.

But isn't one problem here that it's not just personal consumption? People bemoan the proliferation of food-service (Sysco et al) "slop" at restaurants. It seems like LLM writing for others is serving that $3 burrito for $15 without even trying to doctor it up. If you're not willing to put in the effort to think about and produce your writing it's probably best to keep it for personal consumption.

I’m fine with my neighbour eating TV dinners, but if they invite me for a meal I expect to not be served a TV dinner, or to at a minimum be informed beforehand that that’s what going to be served.

Same thing with LLM-assisted writing. It’s one thing to do it for yourself, quite another to share it with other folks without warning.

I agree. I honestly think convenient food is perfectly fine for people most of the time. Recently I have been playing with "eternal stews" which I guess are logically the opposite of fast foods, but at the same time are focused on availability and convenience over intentionality and mastery (at least the way I make them).

Most food is literally just fuel. I think that is fine. And at some level, eating 3$ burritos for a quick lunch on the daily really makes you appreciate the depths of a home made risotto even more. :]

> to some people, food is art, creativity, life to others, food is fuel

right. he is talking about the first group. where did you get the 'shame' part?

I like your analogy. Microwaved empty calories perfectly describes llm output. You are going to pay the price sooner or later.

Probably he should have actually said "what's the point of writing then?", because there isn't one. Just like food is fuel, writing is thinking.

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Even more importantly: it's not an either/or situation.

You can love to cook and enjoy every second of it, but sometimes you just need fuel and that $3 microwave burrito is sufficient. Just the same, 99% of your means could be frozen TV dinners, but that doesn't mean cooking a romantic meal for Valentine's Day is off the table.

There's a weird level of fear mongering occurring around AI that it will make you incapable of independent thought if you use it. People will throw around very light research that kind of points in that direction, but they'll never highlight any of the nuances in such an argument. You can use AI and still "think" if you choose to, just like how you can avoid AI and still opt out of "thinking" if you choose to. It has less to do with AI and more to do with the context of the individual using AI.