So far, I’ve tried to just listen to the conversations about AI. It hasn’t yet affected me directly (as least not that I’m aware of) in my teaching or personal life. But as I write that, it doesn’t feel true. If I use social media, I guess I am affected by AI through every algorithm used to get me to buy whatever AI thinks I might be interested in.
At the beginning of this month’s SOL challenge, I noticed that the sidebar of my WordPress page had a new button. Where I choose tags and categories there is now a button called “AI Assistant.” Day 1 of the challenge, I wrote my piece and thought, “What the heck? Let’s see what it says.” When I read the generated feedback, I got some nice compliments and some suggestions to draw more readers.
Then I had a decision to make. Did I want to follow its advice? Should I go back and add those subheadings it suggested? Should I add more specific examples? AI was telling me things that I’ve taught my students in the past, so why was I feeling resistance. I guess that bit of human nature that says, “You can’t tell ME what to do” was alive and well.
That said, every time I’ve written this month, I haven’t been able to resist tapping that button to see if AI still likes me and my writing. Will it become another dopamine hit of potential addiction?
a place of safety, support, and beauty.
pelicansandprose 
I think of AI as a tool, like using an online thesaurus to find a better word. If a sentence feels clunky to me, I’ll put it in CHATGPT and ask for ways to improve it. Writers use all kind of tools, and using AI doesn’t mean it isn’t your work anymore.
With all that said, I haven’t even tried that button yet. Off to check it out now!
Molly, I see these AI prompts also – haven’t tried them yet, though. I have tinkered a time or two to see what it will do with poetry and have been astonished. It doesn’t feel like “mine,” though, and so I don’t claim it. I will say that earlier in this SOLSC I shared feedback from Perplexity, after someone ran one of my poems through it for an interpretation. What it gave back blew my mind… so poignant that I can hardly reconcile it coming from something nonhuman. Or alive!
I’ll have to check out Perplexity–that is new to me. I know there are a lot of “M” names–I’m Marilyn (but I have a granddaughter Molly!)
I wonder how I got that? Thank you, Marilyn!
-Nor EVEN alive, rather!
You are so perceptive in this reflection, how you cant resist the button, and how you then CAN resist being told what to do, even though it might sound like advice you’d give students! And your observation about if AI still loves you and getting that dopamine hit- oh, my, what’s to become of us I wonder? (I’m still afraid to even look, but you might have made me bolder…)
Hmmm I have not noticed that button where I post. I will need to check it out. Just now my friend Chat GPD did help me with some dialogue formatting. Another slicer showed how they got feedback and I tried that too. I also wonder about the dopamine hit. Thanks for sharing these thoughts. It has me thinking.