Naomi Baron Is Worried About Bots Doing the Thinking for Us
A linguist who's long researched the impact of technology on reading and literacy takes on generative AI
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“Creativity does something for us as humans,” Naomi Baron said in a lively Zoom discussion with TW’s Martha Nichols this May, nodding to what’s at stake with the increasing use of ChatGPT and other generative AI systems for writing. Her tenth book—Who Wrote This? How AI and the Lure of Efficiency Threaten Human Writing (Stanford University Press, 2023)—was the focus of their wide-ranging conversation.
Naomi Baron is a linguist and professor emerita at American University. Her longtime research interests include language and technology, reading, first language acquisition, the relationship between speech and writing, the history and structure of English, and higher education. In addition to Who Wrote This?, she’s the author of numerous articles and books, such as How We Read Now (2021) and Words Onscreen (2015). Baron is currently exploring the future of reading in an AI world.
Who Wrote This? came out not long after ChatGPT’s public release in November 2022. Baron laughed ruefully about turning in her manuscript that same November when “all hell broke loose” and she had to make last-minute revisions.
Fortunately, she was already well-versed in the large language models that power these AI systems. Her book brings together deep research into the history of AI and the advent of transformers (the “T” of GPT) with her own surveys of students and insights about when the use of generative AI for writing makes sense—and when it undercuts human thinking. She nudges readers into asking tough questions about what the intent of a piece of writing is supposed to be.
In talking with Martha, she pointed out that many writing assignments in college have no audience beyond a TA or instructor checking them off, and the intent is simply to get a grade. So, if you’re a novice writer and busy student, why not generate a paper with a bot? And more generally, what’s wrong with thinking of ourselves as prompt engineers or creative directors rather than writers?
A lot is wrong, Baron made clear, but there’s increasing pressure on students and workers to produce efficiently. When asked about her top three suggestions for writers in an AI world, she highlighted these:
Become familiar with the technology.
Check all information encountered online (“trust but verify”).
Respect yourself and your own ideas rather than what an AI generates for you (“be a person”).
Martha also emphasized knowing the AI devil. In the opening, she told Baron she’d prompted ChatGPT 4 to generate ten questions for an “interview with Naomi Baron” and would include one during their conversation. At the end, Martha asked her if she’d guessed which question it was. Baron said she couldn’t tell, although with hindsight she noted the ChatGPT question seemed more formal than the others.1
Later, Martha emailed her all ten ChatGPT questions. Baron’s reply:
I just read through ChatGPT’s suggested questions. In terms of content, they are none too shabby. But bureaucratic? You bet.
It was so much more fun having you ask the questions!
Episode Information
American University faculty profile: Naomi Baron.
Stanford University Press book: Who Wrote This? How AI and the Lure of Efficiency Threaten Human Writing.
The “godmother of artificial intelligence” at Stanford University: Fei-Fei Li.
AI-generated content in peer reviews: “Monitoring AI-Modified Content at Scale: A Case Study on the Impact of ChatGPT on AI Conference Peer Reviews.”
Norway’s AI strategy (including concerns for democracy): “The National Strategy for Artificial Intelligence.”
Jennifer Lepp quote: “The Great Fiction of AI” (Verge).
AI writing tool for fiction: Sudowrite.
The ChatGPT-generated question: “How has researching and writing this book changed your own views on writing and authorship?”
Until bots get a personality I'm not worried. Of course, a lot of novels lack personality. Those are the writers who should worry : )