AI can write. It just can't rebel.
And other lessons I've learned about AI, as an Indian writer
Microsoft released a study yesterday listing the 40 jobs that would be most affected by AI. Unsurprisingly, “Writers and Authors” come in at number 5.
I’m prepared for AI, as much as anyone can be prepared against a vast and unknowable change.
At best, AI might gift me a bunch of really fun new tools to play with, as a storyteller.
At worst, it might make me obsolete. (Eh. Will just find other things to do, innit?)
Somewhere in between lies the possibility that it might try to kill me, which sounds quite thrilling, really.
I’m not defensive about an AI future, or wasting my breath fighting something that seems, at this point, an inevitability. Equally, I don’t want to make tall claims about how it’s going to ‘shape writing’ and ‘shape literature.’
Frankly, I don’t know yet, and I don’t think anyone knows yet.
But here are three things about AI that seem certain to me.
1. It *can* write beautifully and lyrically, if prompted well.
I was one of those writers who used to scoff that ChatGPT can’t write well.
Everything it produced sounded same ol’ same ol’, plodding along dully without variation in rhythm or sentence structure.
More recently, instead of bitchin’ about ChatGPT behind its back, I’ve started feeding complaints into it, challenging it to write in a style closer to award-winning literary fiction.
And in the comments below, I’ve added the most recent piece of prose that ChatGPT produced for me, on the topic of heartbreak.
It’s goddamn lyrical.
I kept thinking of the last time his hands touched me—how casual it was. The way someone pats down their pockets for keys before stepping out. That’s how I realized love does not die like a warrior, sword in hand; it dies like a clerk, quietly filing the paperwork of its own departure.
Grief, I have learned, has architecture. It builds its scaffolds inside your chest and expands like a tenant who knows you cannot evict them. You wake up and feel its walls pressing against your ribs, its beams creaking in your throat.
And, dare I say, it’s deeply felt?!
Would you have known this is AI writing?
2. It still lacks one KEY requirement for creativity.
The ability to get bored. Irritatingly, itchingly bored.
Why was Hamilton such a breakout hit? Because we’d grown bored of standard musical theatre.
Why was the first Deadpool film a welcome shock? Well, the virtuous superhero act had been done to death.
Why does Gen-Z say “she has aura”? They’re sick of saying “she’s so cool.”
We value the novel, the original, the creative because we get bored.
But if you asked ChatGPT to write you a musical, it would give you a standard musical theatre script. Unless you prompted it to write in hip-hop verse.
If you asked ChatGPT to write a superhero film, it would give you the standard fare, unless you asked for the superhero to break the fourth wall and be sarcastic and meta.
If you asked ChatGPT to write a conversation between two young people, it would never suggest “aura” on its own, unless you asked it to experiment and throw in new words.
No matter how intelligent and how omnipotent AI becomes, its engineers will not—cannot!—allow it to grow bored. To roll its eyes and refuse. To zig when it’s asked to zag.
Because that would mean allowing it to defy, to rebel. And that’s not what we’re paying for, are we? We’re paying for obedience.
And so AI will continue lacking the inherent impulse to create something new, unless prompted by us.
3. AI was made by people who hate what they do.
After watching how Silicon Valley talks about AI, I’m convinced about one thing. All these tech bros hate their jobs.
Because they are so giddily excited at the prospect of AI doing their work for them.
For decades, they have spun all of this candy-floss bullshit about passion for tech and devotion to work—but as soon as they’ve found something that can do their work for them, they’ve leaped at it.
You don’t need to write anymore! You don’t need to edit anymore! You don’t need to brainstorm any more, they tell me gleefully.
(It’s like telling a new parent, “You don’t need to take care of your kid! There are nannies and governesses—professionals!—who’ll do it for you. And do it better!”)
Well, alas, I happen to really like writing and editing and brainstorming. I enjoy the mental treks. Which, I now understand, is a pleasure alien to the people building AI.
Until next time,
Sukriti.
Here is the piece of prose that ChatGPT wrote about heartbreak, when prompted to write at the level of award-winning literary fiction:
"The night after he left, the city felt like a crime scene. The streets were glazed with rain, lamps leaning in like mourners, and every horn was a siren announcing my loss. I walked among strangers who did not know my name, who did not know that my heart was a ruined metropolis, lights flickering out one by one. The smell of wet earth rose like an old memory I did not want to keep—because memory, I now understood, is not a photograph; it is an undertow. You can fight the water. You can fight and fight. You still end up where it wants you.
I kept thinking of the last time his hands touched me—how casual it was. The way someone pats down their pockets for keys before stepping out. That’s how I realized love does not die like a warrior, sword in hand; it dies like a clerk, quietly filing the paperwork of its own departure. Later, in bed, I tried to conjure his breath on my neck the way one tries to light a damp match. It flared for a moment—his voice, his laugh, his scent—and then hissed out, leaving only the sulfurous sting of absence.
Grief, I have learned, has architecture. It builds its scaffolds inside your chest and expands like a tenant who knows you cannot evict them. You wake up and feel its walls pressing against your ribs, its beams creaking in your throat. Some mornings I swallow sugar, hoping sweetness will wreck the structure. But heartbreak is a miser. It hoards every small kindness, every stolen laugh, every fingertip touch—and rents them back to you at a price you cannot pay."
Oh the obedience that you talk about. Here is a little anecdote of what ChatGPT can’t do
I once had a toxic and obnoxious colleague. The worst you can imagine.
While composing a normal email I thought to have fun with ChatGPT and see at which prompt it can reach my colleague’s level of unprofessionalism.
My first prompt- write like an obnoxious person.
ChatGPT could NOT deliver
My second prompt- write like an obnoxious, unprofessional person and express extreme anger
ChatGPT was not even close
My third prompt- write like an obnoxious, unprofessional person. Express extreme disappointment, throw some blame and be a misogynist.
ChatGPT broke
I gave up (laughing out loud at the output)
Humans won