From 62dc1d2fea411c39d74778645071246c984f96bb Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: lynxize Date: Wed, 15 Jan 2025 19:57:49 -0700 Subject: [PATCH] aiposting --- content/blog/im-sick-of-ai.md | 129 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 129 insertions(+) create mode 100644 content/blog/im-sick-of-ai.md diff --git a/content/blog/im-sick-of-ai.md b/content/blog/im-sick-of-ai.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..968c0d3 --- /dev/null +++ b/content/blog/im-sick-of-ai.md @@ -0,0 +1,129 @@ ++++ +title = "I'm sick of AI" +date = 2025-01-15 ++++ + +{% warning() %} +This is a bit of an unhinged rant, feel free to completely ignore it. +If you're not in the mood to read somebody's upset rant about AI taking over, just do yourself a favor and skip this. +{% end %} +​ +{% note() %} +It should be obvious, but when talking about to AI, I'm referring to generative AI, and *primarily* ChatGPT. +{% end %} + + +Earlier today, one of my professors gave our class an assignment along the lines of +> Co-create a 1000-1500 word creative piece with ChatGPT by next class. + +Creative writing. +Generative AI. +What???? + +Something about that just didn't make sense to me. It didn't compute. +Is that really what we're doing now? +It's graded *specifically* on the use of AI. + +Oh, and the grading rubric? Yeah, that's AI generated too. + +And I guess that was sort of a wake-up call for me. + +Why is a thousand words of AI slop considered more valuable than a couple hundred of actual, genuine, human-generated words? +There's no chance the professor will actually *read* the forty-odd submissions for this assignment, chances are they'll be summarized by AI and spat right back to us, just like the last assignment was. + +And everyone else was just... okay with this? +Nobody else in the class seemed to care, at all. +And that *genuinely terrifies me*. + +`--- BEGIN ANGRY RANT ---` + +--- + +If we're going to make generative AI so central to everything, it **cannot** be ChatGPT. +We can not be building our education, our society, around OpenAI's inscrutable magic word box, that almost none of us actually understand. + +This is pointless. +Actually, no, this is worse than pointless, it's actively harmful. + +It's like those AI email generation tools, that send emails to people who don't read them, instead just summarize them with AI. +It's just a shitty form of lossy anti-compression. It's introducing a middleman that does not need to be there. +***It doesn't need to be this way.*** This doesn't help *anyone*. + +{% note() %} +Arguably, it helps the companies behind the AI-as-a-service stuff. +Have you read any of their privacy policies lately? They're farming you for both training data and profit. +And *nobody* cares. +{% end %} + +Am I just backwards and stuck in the past? Maybe. I know some people would say so. + +Maybe it's just necessary practice. +Maybe AI crammed into every aspect of life is the inevitable future we're heading toward, and I need to get used to it, adapt, embrace it. +But AAAAAAAAAAAAAA I *REALLY* DON'T WANT TO. + +- AI is being shoved into *everything*, and we're supposed to pretend that's a good thing? +- It's trained on questionably-obtained source material, and we're supposed to pretend that's a good thing? +- The power consumption is astronomical, and we're supposed to pretend that's a good thing? +- It (well, ChatGPT at least) is controlled by giant companies, and we're supposed to pretend that's a good thing? + +We've jumped headfirst into this without stopping to consider the consequences. + +Generative AI has valid uses, but obfuscating human-to-human communication should not be one of them. +Creating slop that nobody wants to read or look at should not be one of them. + +{% note() %} +I want to be very clear that I don't hate the *technology*. The technology itself is super cool. +I think AI generated images and video is an amazing feat of computing. Quick summarization of text is genuinely super useful. +Easy brainstorming of project or gift ideas? Epic! Code line completion that doesn't suck? Yeah, I want that. + +But at least to me, there is a very clear line between using the technology *for a valid purpose*, and just generating slop that nobody actually wants. +It's not the tools themselves that bother me, but rather the overuse and abuse of them. +{% end %} + +I know a lot of people, who when getting stuck on a homework problem go *straight* to ChatGPT. +Not to a friend, not the textbook, not a TA or professor, ChatGPT. +What kind of precedent is that setting for where people get their information? +ChatGPT is *not* a search engine, despite what a concerning number of people seem to think. + +A week or so ago, my dad sent me an article comparing and contrasting different programming languages. +It was obviously AI generated. I don't think he *cared*. + +Generative AI is integral to too much at this point. We **can't** go back. It's too late for that. +Legislature can not and will not fix this. I don't think most people *want* to "fix" this. + +When I was in high school, I watched AI take over writing essays in English classes. +And now in college, I'm watching AI take over teaching too. +It's taken over online search results, it's taken over communication apps. +We are wayyy beyond going back to how it was before. + +I don't want to be second-guessing whether something was written by a machine, and not a human. +Because yes, for some stupid reason, that still matters to me. +I'd rather read an actual person's broken, disorganized, messy pile of words than some perfect Idealized Text™ from a machine. + +I'll be the first to admit that my writing is not the best. +I actively struggle to produce words that are at all close to coherent. (heck, I mean, just look at this post) +At least when I'm done, it's words that *I've* written. +*Me.* +Not some mysterious algorithm trained on stolen data and shoved down my throat when I don't want it. + +I don't *want* to get used to this. +I don't *want* this to be the new normal. +I DON'T *WANT* AI IN MY CHAT APP, I WANT TO TALK TO *PEOPLE*. + +I really, *really* hope I'm not alone in feeling this way. + +{% note() %} +Oh also, go watch [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-opBifFfsMY). +{% end %} + +--- +`--- END ANGRY RANT ---` + +This will (hopefully) be the only time I write anything like this. I don't like being upset. +I plan to go right back to sticking my head in the sand and pretending this isn't a problem, and try my best to just ignore it. + +I really don't know what else I can do at this point. + +Hopefully my next blog post will be about gamedev or something I actually *want* to write/think about. + +Oh, also, the funny part? This is now just as long as that assignment would have been, had I written it by hand. \ No newline at end of file