I have developed a phobia

And I feel I need to share it with you. Or perhaps embrace it. Or maybe foster it. Ride the wave? Idk.

Says it all: this is Midjourney’s response to a simple command ‘ChatGPT writing a blog post.’ I kid you not.

First, read this:

🌐 Embracing the future of education with decentralization! 📚🚀 Imagine a world where learning isn't confined to traditional classrooms. 🏫💡 Decentralized education empowers learners worldwide by breaking geographical barriers, fostering collaboration, and personalizing learning journeys. 🌍🤝 Whether it's exploring niche subjects, adapting to individual paces, or tapping into a diverse pool of expertise, decentralization opens doors to boundless opportunities. 🌈🔓 Let's ride the wave of innovation, revolutionizing education for all! 🌟🎓 #DecentralizedLearning #EducationRevolution #EmpowerLearners

OK, I feel better now that’s out of the way.

How do you feel when you read it? I mean, really feel? Does it connect with you? Does it speak to you? Can you get a sense of the writer’s intention (that old GCSE English chestnut)? Do you take something from it that can move your thinking on in some way, or that helps you in your job or personal life?

If yes, then great! The future belongs to you.

If not then you have the same phobia as me. And that’s such a relief. I am not alone!

Because the prompt I put into ChatGPT-3.5 to get the above was this:

Write me a LinkedIn post on the benefits of decentralised education. I want the post to be about 100 words long. Write it in your most ChatGPT-like language.

The emojis were entirely ChatGPT’s doing. A little extra, unasked-for flourish.

As some of you know, I’m big into this movement towards decentralisation in education (likely in most institutions). I’ve written on it a few times on this Substack. (Here and here, in fact). But I’m not an expert. No one is as most of it is guesswork.

But it interests me, this idea that, if we lose trust in our centralised institutions and see them as no longer being fit for purpose (for numerous reasons I won’t go into here), we’ll naturally look more towards our local communities and find ways to govern in a smaller, more human scale way. At least that’s my hope.

But. I read text like the above ChatGPT output and I have a physical reaction to it. And it’s close to revulsion. Ok, maybe revulsion is too strong a word. It’s more the sort of reaction I get to elevator muzak or inane ‘algowritten’ Netflix sitcoms. It’s that sort of dead-eyed, my-brain-has-just-lost-some-of-its-cells-and-I’ll-never-get-them-back feeling.

Because. It says nothing. It means NOTHING. Look at it. Analyse it if you must. There is not one tiny shred of meaning or use in that paragraph. Zero.

I don’t know about you, but as a writer I think that’s important. That what we share with others should mean something. About the subject, but also about us.

I think it’s one of the only things we have that separates us from the machines.

As AI does not think as we think. It does not know what it’s saying. So if we give our writing over to AI, what does this say about us? That we cannot think for ourselves either?

But also this: our writing is like our fingerprint. Or the colour of our eyes. Or our tone of voice when we speak. It’s unique to us, and the more we use it, and the more people read it, the more they learn about who we are.

Me for example. My style. I veer between formal, trying to be super clear with everything I say, and more ad hoc and random (like this post I guess). Sometimes a bit poetic when I’m in the mood. My writing is me. In 21st-Century Speak, it is part of my brand.

Look, I know some people find it hard to write. They’ve ideas but they can’t phrase things so they say what they need to say. It’s just practice mainly. It does get easier and eventually you find your voice. And once you have it your authenticity grows. And people start to listen when you speak.

And then you have a duty to make sure what you say actually counts.

Below are the words and phrases that probably make me feel most cold. I never had a problem with them before ChatGPT. Now whenever I see them I think that the writing has been done by AI (even if it hasn’t).

In no particular order: ‘imagine’, ‘fostering’, ‘embracing’ (also ‘Let’s embrace…’), ‘exploring’, ‘delving’, ‘boundless’, ‘the age of AI’, ‘empowering’, ‘personalizing’ and ‘revolutionizing’. There are more, but these are the most egregiously ChatGPT-ish.

I even asked ChatGPT what words it uses most often when writing about topics of this nature. Top 5?

1. Embracing

2. Future

3. Education

4. Imagine

5. World

Confirms my fears. It has them on the tip of its machine tongue.

‘Imagine a world where we embrace the future of education…’ I just can’t. Really.

You know how I feel about AI. About its massive potential to change pretty much every part of our lives and education system. And that’s largely a good thing as I’m not a doomer. It’s totally changed my life and the lives of others and we haven’t even started.

I therefore want to say we probably need to ‘embrace’ all this and stop fretting. But ChatGPT has stolen that word from me, and I don’t think I’ll ever get it back. And that bothers me.

Perhaps that’s my phobia after all. Not about the bland nothingness of so much ChatGPT-speak. Or its truly terrible overuse of meaningless emojis when you allow it free rein. But rather the fact that it has stolen some of our words, robbed them of meaning, and made some of us really bloody lazy as a result.

OK, confession over. Who’s next?