Tag: ai

I’m not a fan of AI.

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There. I said it.

This time I know what I’m talking about, too.

In September, I completed a course called Introductory AI for Editors, which was taught by a seriously brilliant instructor named Erin Servais. In this online course, we students learned how to use AI to perform copyediting, developmental editing (AI is better at editing fiction here), research, and fact-checking. We also explored many of the ethical considerations of using AI in editing.

I am very glad that I took the course, because now I am much more versed in what AI can do, and I know how to use AI to do it. Also, Erin is a phenomenal instructor and her assistant, Katie, gives wonderful feedback on the homework assignments.

That having been said, I am turned off by the use of AI in editing and writing.

For one thing, many people are using AI to write cover letters for job applications now. I think this practice is dishonest. The point of a cover letter is to show the potential employer how well you can write. AI can write a wonderful cover letter (for one of our homework assignments, I had ChatGPT do this), but all it really shows is how well you know how to prompt AI. It’s like asking your brother to write a cover letter for you.

It’s the same thing with blog posts. I want you all to know, dear readers, that each one of the posts on this blog are 100 percent written and edited by me. Many people have AI write their blog posts for them now. Of course, it saves a lot of time, since AI can write a blog post in seconds. But are you really getting to know an editor and how well they work when you read a post that they didn’t even write?

As for the developmental editing of fiction, I have less to say, since I do not edit fiction. However, I really don’t think I would want to read a novel that had been developmentally edited by AI. I want the author to think for himself or herself about character and plot development and such. Or at least I want a human editor to have read the book and make such suggestions.

What do you think of using AI in editing?

Becoming intelligent about artificial intelligence

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This past week I began a seven-week introductory course on artificial intelligence (AI) for editors.

The course is taught by the naturally intelligent Erin Servais, who is also a dynamic speaker.

The week before the course began, I downloaded ChatGPT and played with it a little. I had never used it before, nor Copilot, Gemini, Claude, or any other popular AI platform. ChatGPT astounded me. I told it to write a poem about Garfield the cat, and in about two seconds it brought forth a rhyming anthem about the fat cat that read like a Shel Silverstein verse.

We have only had one session so far, but I have already completed our first assignment, and the results were hilarious. (I do not feel comfortable sharing my assignment here, since it is part of the course.) I got to read the results of some of the other students as well, and they were equally humorous and outrageous. Sometimes I wonder if ChatGPT ever laughs at itself.

It frightens me that some people use AI to write research papers for them or even to write novels. Would I read a novel that was generated by AI? Only if I were fooled into believing that it was written by a human. Of course, any human who uses AI to write a novel obviously does not like to write and is doing so only to make ill-gotten money. Shame on them.

I am definitely looking forward to learning how to use AI tools to copyedit more efficiently, fact-check, and write my own macros. However, I am also anticipating the class session in which the ethical implications of AI are discussed. I have heard from numerous editors on LinkedIn that there are AI detectors that can supposedly tell whether a work was written by a human or by AI. Unfortunately, many of these editors have run works that they wrote themselves through an AI detector and seen the detector tell them that 80 percent of the work was AI-generated.

Sigh! Can we win?

With the proper skills, yes.

AI: Artificial intelligence

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These days, there is a lot of talk about artificial intelligence (AI).

To me, the term sounds like an oxymoron. Many decades ago, my father took a training class in the use of the personal computer. According to him, the instructor said, “The first thing to remember is that the computer is a dumb machine.” If that is true, then how can a computer show intelligence?

Just about everyone in this modern world uses AI, whether they know it or not (and whether they like it or not). For example, I have Siri on my iPhone. Siri, for those who aren’t familiar with it, is a virtual assistant which is artificially intelligent. I can ask it, “When is Bruce Springsteen’s birthday?” and it will reply in a female voice, “Bruce Springsteen was born on September twenty-third, nineteen forty-nine, and is seventy-four years old.” Or if I ask Siri a more complex question, it will show me links that potentially have the information for which I am looking. I have to admit that I love Siri.

Texting on my iPhone also exposes me to AI. As I am typing a sentence, three suggested words will appear below the text, and I can tap a word to insert it rather than typing out all of the letters. This saves me a lot of time, although sometimes it concerns me, such as when I type, “Suzelle was…” and one of the next words the app suggests is “murdered.”

For the most part, however, I don’t want much part in AI. I do not want to see a movie or TV show whose script was “created” by AI. Not necessarily because I don’t think the quality will be up to par, but because I believe humans are the only truly creative beings around. Not only that, but the human screenwriters need to eat. It is because of this that we had the writers’ strike in Hollywood last year. AI will never replace human writers. It is the same thing with music. I would not want to listen to music “composed” by AI. What would that sound like? And how would AI give a concert?

A few of my friends have Amazon Alexa in their homes. I have seen instances where Alexa will not do what you ask it to do, such as lower the volume of the music its speaker is playing. I also once heard on a TV news broadcast that there have been times when Alexa will flatly say, “No,” in response to a command. I wonder if the machines are revolting.

What is your opinion of AI?