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Allow me to get to know you, mistakes and all

sebi.io

131–140 of 172 posts

Re: Allow me to get to know you, mistakes and all

#131
post #31

I find that AI is very useful for getting me past the 'blank page' writing block, but inevitably it writes in ways I would never, and so I end up editing it heavily. But, for me, a boy with ADHD, editing something is infinitely easier than writing it from scratch . I think this is the opposite of how most people tend to use LLMs, and I actually think my way is the "better" way. My issue has never been the act of writ…

Have you tried free/automatic writing? I don't know what the term is actually, but just stream of consciousness, putting words to paper, zero filter or pause, straight from the brain. I usually start with "I don't know what to write but" and then just don't let myself stop. I have to keep putting words down, only rule. It sometimes starts or turns gibberish, but eventually I hit a flow and real stuff starts to come o…

Yes, actually! (Minus the woo)

Most of my best short stories were written precisely this way. For creative writing, I find that works really well.

I also do a version of this now, which is simply record myself speaking extemporaneously about the ideas I want to write about. It’s all in my head, so speaking it out loud (or writing) helps me organize my thoughts. Then I take that recording, shove it into an LLM, and have it turn it into sentences with punctuation, without changing meaning.

Inevitably, it sucks, but gives me a starting point.

Re: Allow me to get to know you, mistakes and all

#132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've worked corporate jobs all my life, and I was never one misunderstood message away from being fired. Instead they would've talked to me and, even if they figured it was my fault, they would've given me a warning since it was the first time. No worthwhile employer is firing people for the first offense, corporate or otherwise.

> I've worked corporate jobs all my life, and I was never one misunderstood message away from being fired. 100% you have been, you just didn't understand nor send the wrong message. As a sidenote, working for a Corporation is not solely the bar for what people mean when they say working for Corporate. "Corporate" implies a larger organization that promotes policies developed under different circumstances to your work…

> 100% you have been, you just didn't understand nor send the wrong message.

Sure, there are thousands of messages I can come up with that would be immediately fireable; but that’s true anywhere, not just in corporate life, and is thus a strawman.

Re: Allow me to get to know you, mistakes and all

#133
post #111
post #31

I find that AI is very useful for getting me past the 'blank page' writing block, but inevitably it writes in ways I would never, and so I end up editing it heavily. But, for me, a boy with ADHD, editing something is infinitely easier than writing it from scratch . I think this is the opposite of how most people tend to use LLMs, and I actually think my way is the "better" way. My issue has never been the act of writ…

> I find that AI is very useful for getting me past the 'blank page' writing block, but inevitably it writes in ways I would never, and so I end up editing it heavily. But, for me, a boy with ADHD, editing something is infinitely easier than writing it from scratch. As someone who also has ADHD, I would beg you to reconsider this strategy. Getting the first thoughts down on paper is the hardest part, especially for t…

adhd'er here too. maybe the practice is good, but it takes a lot of energy, which is finite. i find that leaning on my strengths gets me far, far better results than trying to get up to par with everyone else on things im bad at. if a tool just lets you get started, and you can breeze through getting started on things that you might otherwise just never even start, it seems like using the tool is the way to go.

ive been fighting the way my brain works my whole life, and only recently have i switched to trying to work with the way it wants to work. i get so many more things done that are important to me, and i get them done without the implicit "i need to flagellate myself with this thing i hate because there is something wrong with me" that comes with those fights.

and yeah, the ai's come with their own problems. but the trade is so exponentially in the direction of being worth it. even just the being a decent rubber duck aspect of them can keep me on a task when i would never otherwise hope to see it through.

Re: Allow me to get to know you, mistakes and all

#134
post #31

I find that AI is very useful for getting me past the 'blank page' writing block, but inevitably it writes in ways I would never, and so I end up editing it heavily. But, for me, a boy with ADHD, editing something is infinitely easier than writing it from scratch . I think this is the opposite of how most people tend to use LLMs, and I actually think my way is the "better" way. My issue has never been the act of writ…

Same, it's the push that gets the ball rolling down the hill.

>clearly expressing what I mean

I have use for it here too - I use it like a "power thesaurus" when I've got the feeling that the word I have doesn't have quite the right connotation, or to test out different versions of rephrasing something when I feel it could flow better or be clearer but I can't quite get my finger on it. But I don't just take output and paste it, I use it like a pair programmer for writing, where I'm the driver and the AI is the observer.

Re: Allow me to get to know you, mistakes and all

#135
post #31

I find that AI is very useful for getting me past the 'blank page' writing block, but inevitably it writes in ways I would never, and so I end up editing it heavily. But, for me, a boy with ADHD, editing something is infinitely easier than writing it from scratch . I think this is the opposite of how most people tend to use LLMs, and I actually think my way is the "better" way. My issue has never been the act of writ…

Same, it's the push that gets the ball rolling down the hill. >clearly expressing what I mean I have use for it here too - I use it like a "power thesaurus" when I've got the feeling that the word I have doesn't have quite the right connotation, or to test out different versions of rephrasing something when I feel it could flow better or be clearer but I can't quite get my finger on it. But I don't just take output a…

Neat! Similar to how I use it, but I find looking for the right word to be a lot of mental fun, so I don’t use it for that purpose as much. But yeah, “pair programmer for writing” is exactly right.

Re: Allow me to get to know you, mistakes and all

#136
post #33

I totally agreed with you. I'm French (nobody is perfect ^^), I'm not so fluent in english and I'm dyslexic, that why I often write my message, then I ask to Claude to translate it in english because i'm feeling I will lose the credibility of my message if there is too much mistake... But you're right, so this message is not translated by LLM :D

I would genuinely rather read this than read an AI-generated piece. AI-generated articles read like they are trying to sell me on their scam crypto meme coin.

Thanks! And I'll never try to sell you scam crypto ! :D

Re: Allow me to get to know you, mistakes and all

#138

AI writing sucks. The punchy words, the hyperbole, the monotony and pervasiveness are all exhausting. But I can’t deny there’s one upside. People who grew up speaking and living in other languages, people whose english is poor, finally have a level playground. It’s a great equaliser of our english writing privilege. The thing that worries me most is that it's going to redefine the way we write. We absorb language. To…

There is already studies that confirm your fear, I think. They found that mainstream language is changing due to AI. Certain words get used proportionally more than before, etc. Also, if you check out some reddits, it's crazy how generic many things are. Because of AI. I do agree wholeheartedly that we need to read more. And also, that AI can also be a very cool tool for giving some people more power in a way.

The em dash in particular is being used a lot more thanks to AI. It’s become one of those tells where people start to ask if it’s AI or not.

Re: Allow me to get to know you, mistakes and all

#139

AI writing sucks. The punchy words, the hyperbole, the monotony and pervasiveness are all exhausting. But I can’t deny there’s one upside. People who grew up speaking and living in other languages, people whose english is poor, finally have a level playground. It’s a great equaliser of our english writing privilege. The thing that worries me most is that it's going to redefine the way we write. We absorb language. To…

> AI writing is almost indistinguishable from human writing This depends on what you consider AI writing. If I dictate what the AI must write word by word verbatim, is it considered AI writing? Is it something to do about the percentage of the text generated? Does it have to do with the vocabulary the AI knows? What if I don't know any other words than the AI does? Does it have to do with the efficiency of communicat…

> The only way text can become communication is when the writer has intents

I'm curious as to what you mean by this. I assume you don't mean it literally, as that would be trivially falsifiable (for example, the text readout on a digital caliper doesn't have "intents", yet it absolutely communicates meaning), but I can't think of another way that you might have meant it. Could you elaborate?

Re: Allow me to get to know you, mistakes and all

#140
post #111
post #31

I find that AI is very useful for getting me past the 'blank page' writing block, but inevitably it writes in ways I would never, and so I end up editing it heavily. But, for me, a boy with ADHD, editing something is infinitely easier than writing it from scratch . I think this is the opposite of how most people tend to use LLMs, and I actually think my way is the "better" way. My issue has never been the act of writ…

> I find that AI is very useful for getting me past the 'blank page' writing block, but inevitably it writes in ways I would never, and so I end up editing it heavily. But, for me, a boy with ADHD, editing something is infinitely easier than writing it from scratch. As someone who also has ADHD, I would beg you to reconsider this strategy. Getting the first thoughts down on paper is the hardest part, especially for t…

It is not 90% of the task. If it was, a first draft would be 90% of the task of writing, and it never has been. You write a first draft so you can get to the editing portion.
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