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I miss using em dashes

bassi.li

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Re: I miss using em dashes

#111

Post by buu700 »

the_af wrote: post #101
buu700 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Putting aside the claim that "LLM output [...] is almost always not worth reading"[1], the whole issue here is that this supposed ability of determining whether or not content is AI-generated doesn't exist. Is it really a valuable life skill to decide whether or not you want to read something based solely on its density of em dashes? Of course there are cases where you can tell that some text is almost certainly LLM…

> 1: You're assuming a specific type of output in a specific type of context. If LLM output were never worth reading, ChatGPT would have no users. I think nobody is upset about reading an LLM's output when they are directly interacting with a tool that produces such output, such as ChatGPT or Copilot. The problem is when they are reading/watching stuff in the wild and it suddenly becomes clear it was generated by AI…

Right, that's part of what I'm getting at. There are two primary cases when LLM output tends to be bad:

1. In the context of research/querying, when unverified information from its output is falsely passed off as verified information curated by a human author. There's a big difference between "ChatGPT or some blog claims X" and "the answer is X".

2. In the context of writing/communication, when it's used to stretch a small amount of information into a relatively large amount of text. There's a big difference between using an LLM to help revise or trim down your writing, or to have it put together a first draft based on a list of detailed bullet points, and expecting it to stretch one sentence into a whole essay of greater value than the original sentence.

Those are basic misuses of the tool. It's like watching an old person try to use Google 20 years ago and concluding that search engines are slop and the only reliable way to find information is through the index of Encyclopedia Britannica.

Re: I miss using em dashes

#112

Post by llamavore »

fsckboy wrote: post #110
llamavore wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I 100% agree. I hear a lot of pushback from em dash lovers on the semicolon; if you can learn to love an em dash, you can learn to use and love a semicolon. Remember, meaning is based on common usage, so now em dash is slop-nonymous, semicolons can take on a more casual vibe. For example: I love pizza — it's my comfort food. Can just become: I love pizza; it's my comfort food. For asides: I love pizza — especially pe…

I also love pizza, it's my comfort food. You see a problem here?

Not at all! Pizza for everyone.

Re: I miss using em dashes

#114

Post by mwcz »

throw0101c wrote: post #55
wpollock wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm not sure why people let others change them. I keep punctuating like it's the 20th Century. In the 20th century, there were two spaces after an end of sentence period. (I still do that.)

> In the 20th century, there were two spaces after an end of sentence period. (I still do that.) Only if you used a typewriter. I was using (La)TeX in the twentieth (1990s), and it defaulted to a rough equivalent of 1.5 spaces (see \spacefactor). Two ('full') space characters were added because of (tele)typewriters and their fixed width fonts, and this was generally not used in 'properly' published works with proport…

Thanks for sharing. I'm a double spacer, but have to agree it does look to wide most of the time, while single-spacing looks too narrow. 1.5 sounds like a greatGoldilocks spacing. I only wish it were easier to use.

Re: I miss using em dashes

#116

Post by the_af »

llamavore wrote: post #80
Cadwhisker wrote: post #63

I'd switch to semicolons, but I need to re-read this book to be sure I'm using them correctly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eats,_Shoots_%26_Leaves

I 100% agree. I hear a lot of pushback from em dash lovers on the semicolon; if you can learn to love an em dash, you can learn to use and love a semicolon. Remember, meaning is based on common usage, so now em dash is slop-nonymous, semicolons can take on a more casual vibe. For example: I love pizza — it's my comfort food. Can just become: I love pizza; it's my comfort food. For asides: I love pizza — especially pe…

Wow. Am I the only one who reads all those sentences differently? Either the length of the pause or the intonation is different to me. But I wouldn't be able to explain it...

Re: I miss using em dashes

#117

Post by buu700 »

the_af wrote: post #105
buu700 wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having good heuristics is a valuable life skill. Presence of standard punctuation is not a good heuristic.

This seems like begging the question to me. Why do you think it's not a good heuristic to be able to quickly spot the tell-tale signs of LLM involvement, before you've wasted time reading slop? Yes, there will be false positives. It's a heuristic after all.

Because the false positive rate is unacceptably high — we're talking about a standard, widely used character — and because if the heuristic becomes widespread enough to matter, then it will be trivially circumvented by bad actors anyway. Who is it helping if we collectively bully ourselves into excising a perfectly good punctuation mark from human language?

If anything, I'd rather that renderers like Markdown just all agree to change " - " to an en dash and " -- " to an em dash. Then we could put the matter to bed once and for all.

Re: I miss using em dashes

#118

Post by marcus_holmes »

bee_rider wrote: post #93
campbel wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100%. I use em-dashes a decent amount and plan to continue. If someone wants to incorrectly assume it was AI writing so be it.

I use them occasionally and have never been falsely accused of being an LLM. The stakes are a bit different for students unfortunately, who who’ll have their writing passed through some snake oil AI detector arbitrarily. This is unfortunate because “learning how not to trigger an AI detector” is a totally useless skill. Generally, I don’t think we need AI detection. We need dumb bullshit detection. Humans and LLMs ca…

I think this is a passing phase - academia and the education system will have to adapt to the fact that LLMs exist and will be used, and that therefore the essay is no longer a useful artifact as evidence of learning. This is probably a good thing in the long run.

Re: I miss using em dashes

#119

Post by the_af »

shmerl wrote: post #98
anon84873628 wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article wasn't really about that...

Suggestion that humans don't use symbols like em dash is based on the possible difficulty to use them. The reason is probably because many never used / heard of the Compose key. It's not hard to do it once you learn about it.

I don't think it's because they are mechanically difficult to use as you imply, but rather that they are subtler or more nuanced symbols than most people know how to use.

A lot of people are comfortable using the dot, the comma, and maybe exclamation marks.

AI-speech seems to strive for more formal writing by default.

Re: I miss using em dashes

#120

Post by lmm »

buu700 wrote: post #117
the_af wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems like begging the question to me. Why do you think it's not a good heuristic to be able to quickly spot the tell-tale signs of LLM involvement, before you've wasted time reading slop? Yes, there will be false positives. It's a heuristic after all.

Because the false positive rate is unacceptably high — we're talking about a standard, widely used character — and because if the heuristic becomes widespread enough to matter, then it will be trivially circumvented by bad actors anyway. Who is it helping if we collectively bully ourselves into excising a perfectly good punctuation mark from human language? If anything, I'd rather that renderers like Markdown just al…

> the false positive rate is unacceptably high — we're talking about a standard, widely used character

Citation needed.

> Who is it helping if we collectively bully ourselves into excising a perfectly good punctuation mark from human language?

Humans can adapt faster than LLM companies, at least for the moment. We need to be willing to play to our strengths.

Who is it helping if we bully ourselves into ignoring a simple, easy "tell"?

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