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Don't paste the AI, please

dontpastetheai.com

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Re: Don't paste the AI, please

#211

Post by latexr »

knorker wrote: post #179
mscbuck wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just want to say, "Copying and pasting Claude responses into Slack or an email directly shifts the burden of comprehension and understanding to everyone else" is something that I don't think I really internalized until you wrote it in that way. Which I think is evidence of what you are talking about.

This reminds me how I've had to tell people to try to type better and nt us wird abbrvs, even if it means they can type it faster. Because if you want 100 people to read it, then every second you waste for the reader is worth you fixing up your message for over a minute. It's very likely that proper punctuation and capital letters help the reader, then it doesn't matter than not using them is faster to type. I'm sure…

> This reminds me how I've had to tell people to try to type better and nt us wird abbrvs, even if it means they can type it faster.

You can also teach those people about text expansion software. macOS and iOS have it natively, though if I’m not mistaken it doesn’t work properly in non-native apps such as Slack. Alternatives like Alfred should work anywhere. That way they can keep using their abbreviations to type faster, but others won’t have to deal with them.

> It's very likely that proper punctuation and capital letters help the reader

Can confirm. Not using proper punctuation and capital letters makes reading less fluid. I’ve stopped caring about posts and comments that do that—if you don’t care enough about what you wrote to do the most basic of courtesies (and sometimes even fighting the auto-capitalisation that’s done for you) then why should anyone else expend the effort?

Re: Don't paste the AI, please

#212

Post by llm_nerd »

"Someone asked you a real question. You popped it into a chatbot, copied the answer, and sent it back. It felt fast. It felt helpful. And it usually isn't."

Excellent advice, with one very large exception based upon human foibles.

Occasionally there are people who do not ask things in good faith. They ask you a question not because "they wanted your take on it... Your context, your taste, your judgement". Instead they ask the question because they're then going to go to extensive lengths to find every possible counterpoint or opposition to whatever answer you give. In 2026 those sorts of people who will ask and then revert 30 minutes later, after you've carefully detailed a well thought out answer, that "ChatGPT says..." Add that for time eternal they will hold the fact that you answered something for them as a liability that you must atone for, and for which you are responsible for every ramification of their interpretation of your answer[1].

If you ask someone something and they just copy an AI answer, it's such a cop out that I imagine there are many cases where the person knows they're dealing with someone who "asks questions" like this. I have people who I give thoughtful, considered answers to, but then I also have people that I basically say "I don't know...Google it", because giving an iota of an answer always turns out to become something I regret.

[1] - This is not unlike helping someone with their computer. There are people who we love to help, but then there are people that will then ascribe everything that ever goes wrong with their computer for time eternal to that time you showed them a shortcut in Excel. CPU died six years later? Probably because of that shortcut.

Re: Don't paste the AI, please

#213

Post by AbsurdCensor »

mscbuck wrote: post #48
disillusioned wrote: post #17

Heh. Just got done writing (by hand!) a Principles of AI Use document for my (ironically) AI enablement firm, the first of which is: Write as yourself. You’re being paid for your expertise and insights. Communicate them directly to us. Copying and pasting Claude responses into Slack or an email directly shifts the burden of comprehension and understanding to everyone else, and worse, risks skipping that step for your…

Just want to say, "Copying and pasting Claude responses into Slack or an email directly shifts the burden of comprehension and understanding to everyone else" is something that I don't think I really internalized until you wrote it in that way. Which I think is evidence of what you are talking about.

I want to use this as internal AI guidelines, I am so tired of people in my workplace simply copying and pasting whatever garbage AI gives them and expecting everyone to just go along with it and try to decipher what crap they were provided.

Re: Don't paste the AI, please

#214

Post by AbsurdCensor »

bayindirh wrote: post #132
nchmy wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I made some ninja edits, so perhaps you didn't see them. But it is entirely possible that both a person and an Ai could produce writing that is both good or bad, useful or misleading. You can also direct the Ai to write about specific points and, again, it may write somehing good or bad. I provided a link to a chat I had with chatgpt about this very conversation and it shows everything I was saying. The fundamental i…

The thing is, I expect the person who sent me something to know about and understood what they have sent me. I don’t expect the other person to copy my response to the same chat and paste the AI response back even without reading it. Don’t be a meat proxy.

> Don’t be a meat proxy.

That's it in a nutshell. I think I need this up on my wall.

Re: Don't paste the AI, please

#215

Post by nchmy »

bayindirh wrote: post #199
nchmy wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, In any healthy organization or relationship, there should be no problem with someone not knowing about/understanding something. If someone is feigning competence, that's the fundamental problem, not AI

I don’t agree. I have seen many knowledgeable people fall into AI so hard that they are happy that they are not writing code, reading things and using their brains to understand or produce something. These people know (or knew) what they were talking about so well, and was very passionate about their area as well. Not knowing something is alright, but surrendering their whole knowledge and passion to a statistical mo…

It's sad that this has happened, but having knowledge/skill doesn't mean you have wisdom, integrity, discernment, etc... Those are an entirely different plane of understanding, and are what guard against our worst impulses and temptations. Unfortunately there isn't much focus on these things anymore (and, in fact, they're often denigrated and attacked). The result that you've observed is inevitable.

I genuinely worry even more about young people, who are being formed in this anti-thinking, anti-responsibility environment. I'm sure there's some who are strongly resisting it and seeking out genuine knowledge and connections. But surely most are happy to just vibe their way through school and life.

Re: Don't paste the AI, please

#216

Post by lelanthran »

RugnirViking wrote: post #19

yes, its all ai writing. A bunch of the metaphors here dont make sense. "read it all, yes even the bullets. especially the bullets" if you read one thing from a large wall of text, its gonna be the bullet points, right? thats a big part of what they're for? "It is the conversational equivalent of forwarding the email." this is a terrible metaphor. it seems to rely on the idea you would be mad if you sent an email to…

It's pretty obviously AI written in parts at least.

ZeroGPT says 21.5% generated.

Re: Don't paste the AI, please

#217

Post by r3trohack3r »

disillusioned wrote: post #17

Heh. Just got done writing (by hand!) a Principles of AI Use document for my (ironically) AI enablement firm, the first of which is: Write as yourself. You’re being paid for your expertise and insights. Communicate them directly to us. Copying and pasting Claude responses into Slack or an email directly shifts the burden of comprehension and understanding to everyone else, and worse, risks skipping that step for your…

I’m interested in the rest of the document, is it something that can be shared publicly?

Re: Don't paste the AI, please

#218

Post by sceptic123 »

Don't make the "Don't paste the AI website, please" site. You can rather use some kind of search tool to find one of the many that already exist. If it's not quite saying what you want, maybe just reach out to the author with an ask for them to update it. Then we get one place everybody knows about, rather than the many many sites (likely all AI generated anyway) that dilute the message.

Re: Don't paste the AI, please

#219

Post by coldtea »

nchmy wrote: post #182
lelanthran wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The value in having a human write it is that whenever something bad/misleading/redundant is introduced, that person will learn from the feedback, For me, the value of receiving comms from a human is different: it communicates not just the idea itself, but the fact that the human already understands the idea. The people arguing that round-tripping their thoughts through AI still means that it's their thoughts appare…

I don't think you quite realize the implications of what you're saying. Surely you don't actually believe, or even desire, for everyone to fully understand everything that they say... No room for questions, uncertainty, bewilderment, etc? If someone is feigning competence via AI, that's the problem. Not Ai. If they use Ai to polish a communication, be it statement, question, etc, and they do it in a thoughtful manner…

>Surely you don't actually believe, or even desire, for everyone to fully understand everything that they say... No room for questions, uncertainty, bewilderment, etc?

Nothing they said implies that.

What they said is they want the understanding of the person to be revealed in the communication. Not masked via AI.

>If they use Ai to polish a communication, be it statement, question, etc, and they do it in a thoughtful manner to ensure the final communication clearly and effectively communicates what it should be, there's no problem with that.

Yes, if that ever happens in the real world, it would be ok.

Re: Don't paste the AI, please

#220

Post by nchmy »

lelanthran wrote: post #209
nchmy wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you quite realize the implications of what you're saying. Surely you don't actually believe, or even desire, for everyone to fully understand everything that they say... No room for questions, uncertainty, bewilderment, etc? If someone is feigning competence via AI, that's the problem. Not Ai. If they use Ai to polish a communication, be it statement, question, etc, and they do it in a thoughtful manner…

> If they use Ai to polish a communication, be it statement, question, etc, and they do it in a thoughtful manner to ensure the final communication clearly and effectively communicates what it should be, there's no problem with that. My point is that it is still a problem, regardless whether they are asking an AI to write it for them or a human to write it for them. Round-tripping a message through a 3rd party change…

> In some other context, sure, maybe some people are thoughtfully engaging with the AI, but I have never come across this yet. I suspect you haven't either.

Um, I've literally said throughout this entire thread that I regularly get Ai to assist with my writing, to great effect. It often helps me be more concise and certainly more kind - I have a tendency to be neither in writing, especially online.

It is also helpful in formatting, say, a github issue. Though, I do need to be careful with that as it is very easy for it to just appear as an Ai slop post, even if lots of thought went into it all.

To be very clear, at no point have I ever supported/advocated for thoughtlessly copy pasting whatever Ai writes for you. This thread has been about using it judiciously, as we can/should be doing for coding or anything else.

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