Thanks for a great and thoughtful episode.
I’ve wondered why it is that some writers seem to be comfortable using AI at all levels of the writing process, especially giving AI some ideas and asking it to write their first draft. They feel like it’s their creation because the main ideas came from them, although the words and perhaps the organization did not. Others have an issue with using AI to write for them and would never consider allowing AI to write their first draft.
I think the difference in viewpoints is based mainly on how writers view themselves and their work.
If you envision yourself as a writer of documents, and your job is primarily to write down ideas in a way people can understand and potentially help them, the focus is on function. Anything that can make this process more efficient for the writer or improve their writing style is seen as a positive. Hence, using AI to write a first draft makes sense. After some editing, a finished document is published in a fraction of the time it took without AI.
On the other hand, if we see ourselves as artists of a craft, and our job is to reveal ourselves, our unique thinking, feelings, and viewpoints to readers through the prism that is uniquely us, the focus is on personal crafting. We don’t want AI to write a first draft because we know it won’t contain our unique organization and way of expressing our thoughts. We feel editing won’t be effective in revealing ourselves since we’re likely to be overly influenced, channeled, and constrained by the existence of an AI-generated first draft. We want to communicate our thoughts to our readers in a way that benefits them, but we want them to be our thoughts, our unique expressions. So it doesn’t matter how efficient AI is or how much time we save writing a first draft and producing a publishable document.
That’s a good articulation of two viewpoints, Jim. They’re not mutually exclusive, though. It’s possible to surf between both, and to get the best out of both worlds.
I respect that you have a different viewpoint, but to me, they are mutually exclusive. Letting AI write my first draft means I’m letting it set the agenda instead of me setting the agenda. It’s important to me that my writing not only be my thoughts but also my unique expression and organization.
Once there is a written first draft in front of me, I find it impossible to be completely objective and edit it to the point where it’s what I would have said if I’d drafted my own first draft. And if I edited to the extent where it really did become uniquely mine, what would be the point of having AI do it in the first place. All of the time savings and efficiency would be gone; in fact, it would probably take more time to create a heavily edited first draft. For me, it’s not about “efficiency” and saving time; it’s about the process necessary to share myself (not AI edited to sound more like me) with my readers.
It’s not enough for me to say, “I gave AI my original thoughts; therefore, what it generates is mine.” My wife plays the Celtic harp. If she were to give AI some of her thoughts about the type of music she’d like to create and let AI compose the music, could it really be said that she composed the music? I think not. I think that would be true even if she did some editing of the AI-generated composition.
Fair enough. Just for clarity, what I meant by mutually exclusive is that someone can do both, but doesn’t have to.
Just so you know, I’m not a total Luddite. I do use AI in producing my blog posts. 
After I write my own first draft, I will ask ChatGPT to give me several suggestions for a headline and section headings. I am pathetic at coming up with headlines that sound interesting and succinctly capture what I’m talking about in the section. I’ll look at what AI gives me, and often modify a bit to make it what I think is accurate and sounds good.
I’ll also ask ChatGPT to be an expert blog editor and make suggestions to improve my blog text. If I agree with a suggestion, I’ll rewrite a section to make it communicate better (but still in my words).
I agree that one person can do both the type of creative writing I’m talking about and a more functional type of writing. I wouldn’t have an issue using AI’s help to draft a summary of something, a business-type letter, or some technical writing.
But I won’t use it to generate a first draft of something that I want to be personal from me to the reader, like a blog post or personal letter. For that kind of writing, I want to be the source of the thoughts, organization, and verbiage so it accurately reveals my unique person to the reader.
BTW, I very much enjoyed your appearance on Focused. Thanks for a good listen! 