When AI Changes How You Roll

A few years ago, when the term AI was just casually seeping out of its place in sci-fi and into real life, I thought that having artificial intelligence around would not bother my work as a writer (and my husband’s work, as an architect), because it’s a profession that required a human touch. But it seems I was wrong, because everywhere I look nowadays, there is AI ready to “help” me with writing.

For example, Microsoft Word now comes with Co-Pilot, which offers to compose things for me before I even begin anything. Whenever I see Co-Pilot’s text box inviting me to write something there, I feel a sense of curiosity (I mean, what would the AI churn out, and would it be better than anything I can muster to write?) combined with a sense of dread (heaven forbid I might stop writing if I ever end up depending on this thing to write for me!). It’s no wonder that there has been a rise in AI-written books: just get the AI to write what you want, then self-publish it on Amazon.

Human writing

Which brings me to the question of “What is the difference between something written by a person, and something mish-mashed together by an ‘intelligent’ summarizer?” In a written panel discussion on “Humanity in Stories—A Written Panel (Part 1)” posted in Philippine Genre Stories, the panelists (composed of fantasy and science fiction writer Vida Cruz-Borja, educator Gabi Francisco, and media consultant and AI ethicist Carljoe Javier; their discussion was moderated by Kenneth Yu) talked about how AI is changing the landscape of thought. AI, or rather a “lower version” of it (available to anyone with a device) called Large Language Models (LLMs), is being used by more people to write not just books but also papers, essays for school, and even to generate answers for a job to interview.

The effect is that, slowly but surely, many of the writing that we come across, be they online, in print, or at work, are starting to sound the same. Case in point: this article in The Conversation talks about how college students in Canada are realizing that AI-assisted writing “does not sound like me.” Weighing the reasons behind AI use, author Nurul Hassan Mohammad of the University of Toronto, writes, “AI can intensify [standardized forms of writing] by making a fluent, generic style instantly available. For some students, this lowers barriers and supports access. For others, it feels like self-erasure.”

The danger is that if more LLMs are used to “help” standardize writing, many students (or young writers) will learn that competence is in the tool rather than within themselves. And that’s a pity, because, this way, the tool turns into a crutch.

Focusing on the human-generated

It is with a kind of exasperation that I’m being firm about writing everything myself, even if it takes a long time. Currently, I am working on a story that I can only continue every few days (sometimes weeks) because other things need my attention more. I got frustrated when I realized that AI is changing how I write as well. Recently, I found out from my colleague that AI “likes” to write with the emdash, and so, after groaning about it—having written so many things with the emdash (like right now)—and wondering if any of my past writing looks AI-written, I consciously try to avoid it for fear of that.

And while I know that AI generation is also encroaching on the artist landscape (hello images with weird fingers), I picked up a brush to practice gouache painting to escape. It’s a manual activity, so no AI text box will pop up on the side of my paper asking me to put in a prompt before I work. If any of the fingers I paint looks weird, at least I’m sure it’s obvious I generated it myself.

Our focus on manual workmanship (Richard, as you know, has been posting about his fineliner art) is more of a reaction to AI generation rather than what seems to be an analog era for Gen Z that is all over social media these days. (Aside: Have you heard of the analog bag?) I am miffed that writers and architects and artists and teachers and doctors and a host of other professionals are slowly being treated like workers AI can replace. Excuse me, AI just summarizes data using what is out there (and paid AI uses some kind of "premium data set" also from somewhere out there) whereas human-generated design, writing, art, and diagnoses are the product of an individual mind affected by the learning, experiencing, honing, living in community (i.e., serving and helping others), and critical thinking that the person does. AI does not understand anything. AI does not think. AI does not care.

A Shift for Space and Care

You might notice in the next few posts that we will change Space and Care a bit. We shall shift to creating and promoting art with our affinity for architecture, manual workmanship, family life, health, and wellness in the background tying it all together. Space and Care will be a platform from which to share the work and thoughts that we sincerely believe in: honest to goodness, made from scratch, human-made, hand-crafted, artisanal… you get the drift.

That said, stay tuned for more!

"The danger is that if more LLMs are used to 'help' standardize writing, many students (or young writers) will learn that competence is in the tool rather than within themselves. And that’s a pity, because, this way, the tool turns into a crutch."