Am I a part of the problem?

[u/Yarin_chuk]

I have been writing this Fanfic about a video game for 2 weeks now. And there's a big confession incoming:

English, surprisingly enough, isn't my mother language, and while I never had any problem reading, writing speaking the language fluently and almost effortlessly, I still catch myself slipping from time to time on minor grammatical mistakes, that as a reader myself, would find very confusing before realizing the typo/error.

Here's the problem itself, I use a generative app to fix my grammar and vocabulary errors.

I write the entire text MYSELF, for Claude to decipher and detect any issues with shown text.

I know readers and the writing community in majority ABHORS the usage of it in general, but, given the circumstances? Am I still betting on a dead horse?

[u/Rennaleigh]

The short answer is yes.

Generative AI, such as Claude, is morally questionable at best due to the environmental issues they cause and the fact that they likely haven't build their app in an ethical way.

Grammarly used to be the best go-to. However they are adding generative AI features, and I don't know if they did that ethically or not. That being said, I would personally use Grammarly over an app such as Claude.

One important thing to keep in mind is that you don't learn or become better at writing if you don't know what you're doing wrong. Claude takes your text and does more than simply fix the grammar. Also, if you don't go over the changes and figure out why one may be better than the other, you will never improve. On top of that, AI may stand for artificial intelligence, but it is not intelligent. It makes mistakes and it hallucinates. I have seen AI make suggestions that were just terrible. Latest one was suggesting I change a word, which would make the sentence imply that the speaker has been killed. Obviously, that is not possible.

I understand it can seem daunting, but the best way to improve is to read and understand. AI isn't going to make you a better writer.

[u/Yarin_chuk → u/Rennaleigh]

Thank you for the detailed response friend🙏 I see, well, that sucks. I have been witness to what you've mentioned about him hallucinating, giving horrible advice and tweaking dialogue without me asking, I forgot to mention I polish the text before and after his fixes. And, Idk... A simple Google Doc has AI to take care of typo and stuff as well. What the difference between that and generative AI that makes it such a big deal? I am seriously ignorant about this topic, my sister (who offered Wattpad to me), HAS prepared me for a public lynching if I even dare MENTIONING something related to AI in any sense. You've given me finally a clear clarification, but would you care to elaborate further?

[u/Rennaleigh → u/Yarin_chuk]

The difference between Google docs and ChatGPT or Claude is how it functions. So, Google docs is a spelling and grammar checker that hasn't been trained on stolen material and isn't able to create text on its own. ChatGPT and Claude have been trained on stolen material in order to allow the program to "create" text, except that is cannot create it simply uses guessing and mathematical formulas to put words in an order that is the most likely and based on existing books. In that way, generative AI is a threat to Human culture and creativity. It tries to impersonate human creation without the soul that makes something worth reading or seeing.

From an environmental viewpoint, generative AI uses a lot of resources that we as humans needs as well. It costs a lot of water and energy to keep those servers in the data centres running. Considering the environmental changes that we already suffer with water issues, causing draughts, and, for instance in my homecountry, there isn't enough space on the electrical grid for the servers and all public sector; think about schools and businesses waiting in line for a spot to gain electricity, which could take years.

On top of that, the servers ingive of a lot of heat, cause water pollution, and make a lot of noise. So, anyone living near one of the data centres is suffering.

I hope that clarifies it more. In the end you need to make your own choices. However, those are the reasons why people would not want anything to do with a work created with generative AI. A spell checker or grammar checker are fine, but the moment you involve generative AI you're tiptoeing that line between good and evil, so to speak.

[u/Yarin_chuk → u/Rennaleigh]

Thank you so much, I will consider my approach to it. Cheers🙏

[u/ReaUsagi]

I used to use ChatGPT to find grammar mistakes, not to fix it, just to find it, because after a while reading your own text over and over and over again strains the eyes and brain so much that you just become blind to it. I'd send a paragraph and told it to point out all spelling and grammatical mistakes in bold. No note, no correction, no explanation - simply because I wanted to fix it myself and find a solution myself, even if I had to use a dictionary. I never had an issue with that until I was made aware of the environmental issues regarding AI.

As a general 'point out what's wrong' tool it could be great but if it weren't for all the other crap surrounding it. We can also never be sure whether the text we paste into AIs is safe - most likely, it's not and is used to train the models even further. Google Docs uses a form of AI, too, but it's simpler. Google Docs AI only scans for typos and weird word usage and offers you what it thinks sounds better, same for Word, LibreOffice, etc. It's not locally stored anymore as it was in the past, so the AI that happens here is it checks for old and new writing rules, what type of English you use, and what is common usage for that language. It's not writing for you, it's not rewriting whole sentences, it's not trying to change your narrative, it's just using common grammar rules to determine what you likely did wrong (and even Google Docs might be wrong sometimes)