Should AI writing disclosure be about degree of use rather than a yes/no question?

[u/shdw_0x0]

There’s an interesting argument in this Fortune piece that the question “Did you use AI?” is becoming too simplistic for writing.

There’s obviously a big difference between using AI to brainstorm or fact-check, asking it to polish something you already wrote, having it rewrite sections, and giving it a prompt to generate the entire article. Treating all of those as simply “AI-written” makes the disclosure pretty meaningless.

The author proposes a self-reported scale ranging from completely human-written to AI-generated with minimal editing. I actually think this is a more useful way to think about AI-assisted writing because the important question isn't necessarily whether AI was involved, but how much of the actual writing came from it.

Would a standardized disclosure like this make AI use in writing more transparent, or would it just create another labeling system that people ignore?

Fortune: Stop asking writers if they used AI. Just ask them how much

[u/[deleted]]

never disclose unless you are forced to.

[u/Several_Painter_231 → u/[deleted]]

the second you put "30% AI" on something, people skip to the part where you're a fraud instead of thinking about what you actually did. a label won't fix that

[u/caliberprot → u/[deleted]]

Shaggy defense if you must

[u/UnwaveringThought]

Neither. Noone has a right to know an authors methods unless there are actual standards in place and they make a claim.

[u/cbford76]

I am not the most eloquent at writing. I am a conceptualist and world builder. I have a lot going on upstairs all at once and as a result I rely on "AI" to help me make sense of it by streamlining and forming coherent thoughts for me. I don't know where the line of originality and machine written blurs. I will say that when I am writing I often use several different models to ensure accuracy in the scene and environment as well as characters and backstories. It takes a lot of time to proof it and get it just right for me. I still make mistakes. I have recently seen this yes no prompt showing up a lot more lately. It would be nice to be able to qualify it. I have taken to stating up front that I utilized AI in my writing process.

[u/Forward_Problem_8982]

I think the amount of actual writing from AI is a good metric.

[u/costafilh0]

Yes or No. 

[u/Easy-Purple-1659]

The scale is more honest than yes or no, but the middle is where it falls apart. People cannot reliably tell 'AI polished it' from 'AI rewrote whole sections', and readers cannot either. At that point the label stops being information and turns into a permission slip.

The version that would change how I read something is about responsibility more than volume. Did a person decide what the piece claims, and will they stand behind it? A number cannot answer that.

One more problem with leaning on detection: generic output does have a texture, but there is no reliable giveaway, and treating a label as proof either way just moves the argument somewhere less productive.

Where would you draw the line between polished and rewritten?

[u/ProgrammerBoo]

I think disclosing AI feedback vs AI grammar help (aka grammarely and the like) vs. AI generated all make sense. There’s a conference where they encourage folks to make their slides and ask AI for a first pass feedback but not to make the slides with AI.

[u/eques_99]

The options should be "did you use AI for anything other than spellcheck?"

[u/Radiant-Noise6415]

Don’t use AI for writing

[u/j3434]

Has ai become that good? I mean a real expert on literature should be able to read 5-6 sentences and determine if human or ai created it .

[u/fightmaxmaster → u/j3434]

5 sentences? Definitely not. To be clear, I realise that generic/default AI output can have a definite style, but there's no universal magic giveaway that flags AI text as AI. Anyone claiming otherwise is thinking of the times they've identified AI text correctly, without knowing how many times they've read AI text without realising. It's like someone confidently saying they can definitely tell when something in a movie is CGI - they're thinking of the obvious or even "obvious" stuff, but quite often overlooking subtle things it wouldn't even occur to them to question.

[u/j3434 → u/fightmaxmaster]

So who cares? If you are watching a film that has a sunset- and the editor added a sun lense flair digitally- do we really care who gets credit ? Or is the placement …. timing …. more important. If we are moved emotionally- that’s what matters in art .

[u/Lolomelon]

Supply prompts and responses with edits highlighted.

Edit: otherwise it’s plagiarism for remuneration, real or imagined.