This is half-formed argument I’ve had percolating in my mind for a while. But i’ve been struck by the tendency to evaluate conversational agents vis-a-vis an imagined ideal contributor e.g. horror at the idea of AI peer reviewing in comparison to the imagined ideal of the engaged intellectual who sets aside a day to immerse themselves in an article, as opposed to the frequently reality of someone working through it in a distracted state on a train journey. The copy produced by generative AI is often mediocre but people often write mediocre copy, the analysis is superficial but we’re drowning in superficial analysis, its ‘creativity’ is variations upon a theme but so too is most creation which takes place under contemporary capitalism. The problem is not the sociological cynicism about generative AI but rather the failure to apply that cynicism in a symmetrical way, recognising the marketised and depleted reality of our existing educational systems.
It’s not clear to me that taking what should be as our reference point in these debates actually does anything to help realise what could be given the conditions we currently confront. Though perhaps this is a sign that the 2019 election then Covid-19 rather dramatically knocked any social hope out of me.
Mark Carrigan 