Graphic Designer here. I use chat GPT to streamline a lot of the emails I send to the customer base of the company I work for. These are, mind you, short informative and/or sales-oriented emails. I am stunned by the idea of people using chat and other language models for serious fiction, and non-fiction. I barely use chat outside of a commercial setting. These tools get repetitive very fast, so much so that I know anybody with decent media training can identify AI-generated text easily.
I recently did a beta test and attempted to generate a short novel outline and see if AI could write a novel. I got about 10 chapters churned out in a day and then tried to edit it. At the end of the day, it was obvious that the content was really bad and almost unreadable at some point. The AI generated was really garbage and took more time to attempt to try to rework it. Def not worth the time when it comes to writing long form content. I can see where sometimes it might be helpful to get past a mental block by giving some ideas, or maybe generating some outline material. Also, you are 100% correct in saying that when you write everything yourself, it is hands down a much more transformative and positive experience.
Never thought of myself as a writer-writer, but after completing a graphic design course, I started working on a screenplay. And I shocked myself in how well I was able to pull ideas together and write characters that felt real. That feeling of experiencing your own writing, seeing the quality of it is exhilarating. Knowing I challenged myself to this degree, especially having put all my eggs into one basket. But when I took a break and came back, it felt like a mystery to which it could become, struggling to bring it all together. Now it’s impossible for me to complete alone. So, I reluctantly turned to AI. I'm now using the foundation of my script and my notes as a blueprint, directing AI to take it where I need it to go. I’m not sure if I physically can't handle the emotional burden anymore after pushing myself so far, or if I’m just willing to let AI finish it to the standard I set for myself. Either way, the fact that I wrote it with my blood pushes me beyond any moral of how it 'should' be written on completion. Had I not written with as much emotional depth and merit, I would not feel the need to use AI to fill in the large emotional gaps I've left. Regardless, my drive to complete it stems from knowing I was able to push myself to that degree and create what I did, something I'm not sure if "most other people don't or cannot do" is one of the greatest universal feelings. To understand "The Joy Of Writing It Yourself", extends to mirror the challenge of completing it, a strange feeling. Leaving AI to complete it in a way that complements my past efforts. What I learned, and can definitely appreciate now, is just how lonely writing becomes, when consumed by a world of your making, completely debilitating to my social skills. For me, it was a constant fight between what I'm losing the in the real world, but what I could gain creatively at home. I pulled a lot of inspiration from Oppenheimer, Attack on Titan, and Nietzsche's and Carl Jung's Philosophy, not sure how it will handle these themes and ideas. ChatGTP is great for ideas and structure, but when it comes to dialogue and flow... its too repetitive and robotic. I’ve resorted to Claude 2.0 to get it done. Any human assistance would be greatly appreciated---preferably 🙂
This is a VERY interesting example. Have you read any books on screenwriting? There's the classic Three-Act Structure book, the Save the Cat books, even Story by McKee. I read those and probably a dozen others to help me try and figure out screenplays. It helps to understand the basics. Also, whenever I would get stuck, I would make an outline of what I had written so far and then try to figure out what it is each of the characters wants in the end, but also for each scene, and then figure out the obstacles that can be used to prevent that. It also helps to figure out the ending first before trying to write anymore.
Not a writer-writer. I write and draw comics. In my experience, the ones who latch onto the "AI" thing are the type of people who in the past would have said they really wanted to learn how to [insert whatever it is] but they just never do. Why? Because they don't want to actually draw, or write, or whatever it is. They just want to produce output. They don't really enjoy the process of doing the thing. When I first started drawing I was crap. I still did it, and eventually I learned how to do it well, but you never start with it. These people are output-focused. They want the good results NOW. And because they never took the time to really learn... they are satisfied with mediocrity. Because they never really see how much attention goes to the individual, minute details.
In personality psychology, the more scientific approach is dimensional, to look at traits and other aspects of personality rather than to label someone as a "type." However, Cattell did allow for personality types as people who clump together with similar levels of the different traits. So, I don't really have an opinion on types, per se. As for the Enneagram itself, I'm not all that familiar as it doesn't come up much in personality research.
I guess a person who uses AI but involves their own judgement in the process could be called a director. Movie directors often don't write the script, play the actors, handle the camera, lighting etc.
Using loaded phrases like "doing the writing for you" tells me that you've already started from a conclusion before considering what LLM-heavy workflows actually involve. You mentioned a specific video you were basing some of these opinions on, can you link to it in the description? Because "having the AI write the story for you" isn't at all the experience with what I or anyone else I've talked to who actually uses AI has in terms of how it is used, and the scenario you seem to be describing seems to be a straw-man that doesn't relate to how these tools fit into what people are doing. I'd love to see the video you're reacting to, to clarify where you got this from. Yeah, there are scammers who are trying to flood the market with AI-generated crap they don't care about at all. I hope we can find ways of barring these people without impacting those who aren't doing that. But ignoring literal scammers, I'm not going to attack anyone who finds a tool to be useful. If the human involved considers the end result to be a true expression of their intent, then I don't care what tools they're using to do it, and *that* is what matters. Which is effectively the same thing that you're saying, but without the bias of unilaterally declaring that feeling to be impossible when AI is used as part of the process. I suppose I could summarise my position in a way which fits your terms as: we all need to suffer to create what we're trying to, but not all forms of suffering are necessary, and non-maximal joy is still valid. AI can be useful and helpful in many ways which can allow people to write and express themselves. I find your video to be extremely refreshing in a topic which is usually flooded with mere moral arguments or tenuous claims of theft. Thank you for sharing this perspective. I appreciated hearing it. I do however think that it is attacking an imagined enemy - or if such an enemy does exist outside of the circles I am aware of, it would still benefit from the mention of other uses for which I don't think your arguments hold.
First, thanks for the thoughtful comment. I intended to post the link to the video I mention but forgot to. It is below. However, "doing the writing for you" may be a loaded phrase but it is EXACTLY what the "author" in the video says he did (used AI to write his novel). He then edited it, rewrote parts, but left other parts the way the AI wrote them. And then he told himself, proudly, "I wrote a novel." No, he did not. He used AI to write it for him. Nothing wrong with that, but the claim that he wrote it. So, no, I did not come to the conclusion before careful consideration, and in fact I also experimented with AI. But, having actually written my fiction myself I found it to be NOT writing but prompting an AI to do the work for me. I guess one would actually have to have written a novel in order to understand the difference. The video mentioned wasn't the only encounter I've had with this topic, as you can see from my previous video here: ua-cam.com/video/tAttuh8BZ_8/v-deo.html. This "author" " says she "wrote" two books in one summer using AI, after having not been able to write one on her own. I fail to see how she is a "straw man." And again, no one can know the feeling of having written a novel unless they actually write a novel. If they use AI, they will know the feeling of what it was like to use AI to write a novel for them, or part of it, or some of it...but unless they write the whole thing they simply cannot know what it is like to have written a whole novel oneself. For me, it is an impoverished experience, but maybe the better word is that it is simply what it is, DIFFERENT. Here's an example: I once wrote a screenplay called KISS OF THE SUN that was set in Miami. Having grown up in South Florida and frequently gone to Miami I didn't really need to do any research. But then there was an opportunity to have a movie made based on my screenplay, except it would be set in South Africa, so I was asked to change the setting to Cape Town. I could not afford to travel to South Africa, so I researched Cape Town via travel books and history books. I then made the necessary changes. Later, when my producing partner met with our potential South African partners they asked if I had lived in Cape Town and were amazed that I had not because the portrayal of Cape Town was so realistic to them. It was extremely gratifying to hear that, and my producing partner said something along the lines of, "I knew you were talented, but wow, not THAT talented!" (For the record, he wasn't trying to insult me; he was as amazed as I was by the reception the script got.) AI wasn't around back then (this was 20 or so years ago) like it is now. Had I simply been able to give AI the prompt "Please rewrite this screenplay to change the setting from Miami to Cape Town, without changing anything else," perhaps it would have done just as good a job, or even better. And I would still be proud of the plot, overall story, etc. But I would NOT have been the person who wrote the script that blew the South African producers away. So, my point is, until you've written a novel yourself, you simply cannot know what it is like to write a novel. There's nothing wrong with using AI to write all, most, or some of a novel for you, but that means you know what it is like to use AI to write all, most, or some of your novel for you NOT what it is like to do it yourself. It doesn't matter if you take all the credit and really believe you wrote it. You didn't. Belief and reality aren't the same thing. You can only experience what you have actually done, even if it feels a lot like you did experience something else. I've read lots of books and seen lots of movies about combat in war, but I (hopefully) will never know what it is actually like to be in war. There's a great scene in GOOD WILL HUNTING between Matt Damon and Robin Williams that gets this across better than I can. Here's the link to the video I mentioned: ua-cam.com/video/s7CxlB0wMfA/v-deo.htmlsi=J5D4_rQtog5heHGH Please note that he is not a straw man. He explicitly states that he used AI to do most of the writing for him. Also, the proliferation of AI-written fiction has actually affected me and other writers in that markets now limit their submission windows drastically due to the burden put on them by AI "writers." This also makes it NOT a straw man argument, unfortunately. Aside from coming up with a different term than "writer" or "author" for people who use AI to do all, most, or some of the writing for them, I also believe it is unethical not to make it publicly known that a work was created using AI, and for that to be noted somewhere on or in the work itself. Perhaps if that becomes the norm then some of the markets for fiction will make room for works created that way. Until then, though, I think they are justified in rejecting all works they discover have been written by AI (without attribution) in any capacity and banning the writers who submit those works from ever submitting anything else forever more (again, unless that writer clearly states that's what they did). Well, I have more I could say about this, but I think that's enough for now!
Also, to clarify, I do not think the woman mentioned in my other video is a scammer, nor the guy I referenced. I don't know if he intends to alert readers who don't watch his channel that he used AI to do most of the initial writing for him, but when I checked the woman's books she did not. I don't think they are trying to deceive anyone. I just think they really believe they wrote the books themselves (based on their own statements, either in her article or in his video). The reason why that matters isn't to satisfy my own sense of "what a writer should be" but to alert publishers, editors and readers of the reality of the situation so they can make informed decisions.
Graphic Designer here. I use chat GPT to streamline a lot of the emails I send to the customer base of the company I work for. These are, mind you, short informative and/or sales-oriented emails. I am stunned by the idea of people using chat and other language models for serious fiction, and non-fiction. I barely use chat outside of a commercial setting. These tools get repetitive very fast, so much so that I know anybody with decent media training can identify AI-generated text easily.
That seems like a good use of AI, I think.
I recently did a beta test and attempted to generate a short novel outline and see if AI could write a novel. I got about 10 chapters churned out in a day and then tried to edit it. At the end of the day, it was obvious that the content was really bad and almost unreadable at some point. The AI generated was really garbage and took more time to attempt to try to rework it. Def not worth the time when it comes to writing long form content. I can see where sometimes it might be helpful to get past a mental block by giving some ideas, or maybe generating some outline material. Also, you are 100% correct in saying that when you write everything yourself, it is hands down a much more transformative and positive experience.
I could see someone using it for that. Or go for a long walk instead! :)
Never thought of myself as a writer-writer, but after completing a graphic design course, I started working on a screenplay. And I shocked myself in how well I was able to pull ideas together and write characters that felt real. That feeling of experiencing your own writing, seeing the quality of it is exhilarating. Knowing I challenged myself to this degree, especially having put all my eggs into one basket.
But when I took a break and came back, it felt like a mystery to which it could become, struggling to bring it all together. Now it’s impossible for me to complete alone. So, I reluctantly turned to AI. I'm now using the foundation of my script and my notes as a blueprint, directing AI to take it where I need it to go.
I’m not sure if I physically can't handle the emotional burden anymore after pushing myself so far, or if I’m just willing to let AI finish it to the standard I set for myself. Either way, the fact that I wrote it with my blood pushes me beyond any moral of how it 'should' be written on completion. Had I not written with as much emotional depth and merit, I would not feel the need to use AI to fill in the large emotional gaps I've left.
Regardless, my drive to complete it stems from knowing I was able to push myself to that degree and create what I did, something I'm not sure if "most other people don't or cannot do" is one of the greatest universal feelings. To understand "The Joy Of Writing It Yourself", extends to mirror the challenge of completing it, a strange feeling. Leaving AI to complete it in a way that complements my past efforts. What I learned, and can definitely appreciate now, is just how lonely writing becomes, when consumed by a world of your making, completely debilitating to my social skills. For me, it was a constant fight between what I'm losing the in the real world, but what I could gain creatively at home.
I pulled a lot of inspiration from Oppenheimer, Attack on Titan, and Nietzsche's and Carl Jung's Philosophy, not sure how it will handle these themes and ideas.
ChatGTP is great for ideas and structure, but when it comes to dialogue and flow... its too repetitive and robotic.
I’ve resorted to Claude 2.0 to get it done.
Any human assistance would be greatly appreciated---preferably 🙂
This is a VERY interesting example. Have you read any books on screenwriting? There's the classic Three-Act Structure book, the Save the Cat books, even Story by McKee. I read those and probably a dozen others to help me try and figure out screenplays. It helps to understand the basics. Also, whenever I would get stuck, I would make an outline of what I had written so far and then try to figure out what it is each of the characters wants in the end, but also for each scene, and then figure out the obstacles that can be used to prevent that. It also helps to figure out the ending first before trying to write anymore.
Not a writer-writer. I write and draw comics.
In my experience, the ones who latch onto the "AI" thing are the type of people who in the past would have said they really wanted to learn how to [insert whatever it is] but they just never do. Why? Because they don't want to actually draw, or write, or whatever it is. They just want to produce output. They don't really enjoy the process of doing the thing.
When I first started drawing I was crap. I still did it, and eventually I learned how to do it well, but you never start with it. These people are output-focused. They want the good results NOW. And because they never took the time to really learn... they are satisfied with mediocrity. Because they never really see how much attention goes to the individual, minute details.
Do you have an opinion on the Enneagram?
In personality psychology, the more scientific approach is dimensional, to look at traits and other aspects of personality rather than to label someone as a "type." However, Cattell did allow for personality types as people who clump together with similar levels of the different traits. So, I don't really have an opinion on types, per se. As for the Enneagram itself, I'm not all that familiar as it doesn't come up much in personality research.
I guess a person who uses AI but involves their own judgement in the process could be called a director.
Movie directors often don't write the script, play the actors, handle the camera, lighting etc.
I like that! They're obviously doing more than simply being a coordinator. MY FIRST AI NOVEL Written by ChatGPT, Directed by Ursula C. Heinbury.
Using loaded phrases like "doing the writing for you" tells me that you've already started from a conclusion before considering what LLM-heavy workflows actually involve. You mentioned a specific video you were basing some of these opinions on, can you link to it in the description? Because "having the AI write the story for you" isn't at all the experience with what I or anyone else I've talked to who actually uses AI has in terms of how it is used, and the scenario you seem to be describing seems to be a straw-man that doesn't relate to how these tools fit into what people are doing. I'd love to see the video you're reacting to, to clarify where you got this from.
Yeah, there are scammers who are trying to flood the market with AI-generated crap they don't care about at all. I hope we can find ways of barring these people without impacting those who aren't doing that.
But ignoring literal scammers, I'm not going to attack anyone who finds a tool to be useful. If the human involved considers the end result to be a true expression of their intent, then I don't care what tools they're using to do it, and *that* is what matters. Which is effectively the same thing that you're saying, but without the bias of unilaterally declaring that feeling to be impossible when AI is used as part of the process.
I suppose I could summarise my position in a way which fits your terms as: we all need to suffer to create what we're trying to, but not all forms of suffering are necessary, and non-maximal joy is still valid. AI can be useful and helpful in many ways which can allow people to write and express themselves.
I find your video to be extremely refreshing in a topic which is usually flooded with mere moral arguments or tenuous claims of theft. Thank you for sharing this perspective. I appreciated hearing it. I do however think that it is attacking an imagined enemy - or if such an enemy does exist outside of the circles I am aware of, it would still benefit from the mention of other uses for which I don't think your arguments hold.
First, thanks for the thoughtful comment. I intended to post the link to the video I mention but forgot to. It is below. However, "doing the writing for you" may be a loaded phrase but it is EXACTLY what the "author" in the video says he did (used AI to write his novel). He then edited it, rewrote parts, but left other parts the way the AI wrote them. And then he told himself, proudly, "I wrote a novel." No, he did not. He used AI to write it for him. Nothing wrong with that, but the claim that he wrote it. So, no, I did not come to the conclusion before careful consideration, and in fact I also experimented with AI. But, having actually written my fiction myself I found it to be NOT writing but prompting an AI to do the work for me. I guess one would actually have to have written a novel in order to understand the difference.
The video mentioned wasn't the only encounter I've had with this topic, as you can see from my previous video here: ua-cam.com/video/tAttuh8BZ_8/v-deo.html. This "author" " says she "wrote" two books in one summer using AI, after having not been able to write one on her own. I fail to see how she is a "straw man." And again, no one can know the feeling of having written a novel unless they actually write a novel. If they use AI, they will know the feeling of what it was like to use AI to write a novel for them, or part of it, or some of it...but unless they write the whole thing they simply cannot know what it is like to have written a whole novel oneself. For me, it is an impoverished experience, but maybe the better word is that it is simply what it is, DIFFERENT.
Here's an example: I once wrote a screenplay called KISS OF THE SUN that was set in Miami. Having grown up in South Florida and frequently gone to Miami I didn't really need to do any research. But then there was an opportunity to have a movie made based on my screenplay, except it would be set in South Africa, so I was asked to change the setting to Cape Town. I could not afford to travel to South Africa, so I researched Cape Town via travel books and history books. I then made the necessary changes. Later, when my producing partner met with our potential South African partners they asked if I had lived in Cape Town and were amazed that I had not because the portrayal of Cape Town was so realistic to them. It was extremely gratifying to hear that, and my producing partner said something along the lines of, "I knew you were talented, but wow, not THAT talented!" (For the record, he wasn't trying to insult me; he was as amazed as I was by the reception the script got.) AI wasn't around back then (this was 20 or so years ago) like it is now. Had I simply been able to give AI the prompt "Please rewrite this screenplay to change the setting from Miami to Cape Town, without changing anything else," perhaps it would have done just as good a job, or even better. And I would still be proud of the plot, overall story, etc. But I would NOT have been the person who wrote the script that blew the South African producers away.
So, my point is, until you've written a novel yourself, you simply cannot know what it is like to write a novel. There's nothing wrong with using AI to write all, most, or some of a novel for you, but that means you know what it is like to use AI to write all, most, or some of your novel for you NOT what it is like to do it yourself. It doesn't matter if you take all the credit and really believe you wrote it. You didn't. Belief and reality aren't the same thing. You can only experience what you have actually done, even if it feels a lot like you did experience something else. I've read lots of books and seen lots of movies about combat in war, but I (hopefully) will never know what it is actually like to be in war. There's a great scene in GOOD WILL HUNTING between Matt Damon and Robin Williams that gets this across better than I can.
Here's the link to the video I mentioned: ua-cam.com/video/s7CxlB0wMfA/v-deo.htmlsi=J5D4_rQtog5heHGH
Please note that he is not a straw man. He explicitly states that he used AI to do most of the writing for him. Also, the proliferation of AI-written fiction has actually affected me and other writers in that markets now limit their submission windows drastically due to the burden put on them by AI "writers." This also makes it NOT a straw man argument, unfortunately. Aside from coming up with a different term than "writer" or "author" for people who use AI to do all, most, or some of the writing for them, I also believe it is unethical not to make it publicly known that a work was created using AI, and for that to be noted somewhere on or in the work itself. Perhaps if that becomes the norm then some of the markets for fiction will make room for works created that way. Until then, though, I think they are justified in rejecting all works they discover have been written by AI (without attribution) in any capacity and banning the writers who submit those works from ever submitting anything else forever more (again, unless that writer clearly states that's what they did).
Well, I have more I could say about this, but I think that's enough for now!
Also, to clarify, I do not think the woman mentioned in my other video is a scammer, nor the guy I referenced. I don't know if he intends to alert readers who don't watch his channel that he used AI to do most of the initial writing for him, but when I checked the woman's books she did not. I don't think they are trying to deceive anyone. I just think they really believe they wrote the books themselves (based on their own statements, either in her article or in his video). The reason why that matters isn't to satisfy my own sense of "what a writer should be" but to alert publishers, editors and readers of the reality of the situation so they can make informed decisions.