Those sentence constructions that are "tells" were also learned from good writers though. But here, I'll let you be the judge. This was a comment I wrote 100% myself on reddit, which was both downvoted and I got multiple DMs referencing it and telling me to "stop posting this AI slop":

https://www.reddit.com/r/ExperiencedDevs/comments/1pyjkuf/i_...

Granted, it was in a thread about AI and maybe people were on edge, but I was still accused, which to be honest hurt a bit after the effort I put into writing it.

▲ svachalek 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Interesting, that's one of the most AI-like comments I've read but it still feels human in a way that's hard to define. The headings, the punctuation, the word choices, the paragraph sizes all look GPT-approved. But there's just some catch in the flow, like inclusions in a diamond, that reads "natural" vs "synthetic".

I've been talking to Opus a lot lately though, and this could almost be something it wrote; it also has the tendency to write AI-ish looking blurbs that are missing the information-free pitter-patter that bloats older and lesser LLMs. People are going to hate me for saying it but sometimes it words things in a way that are actually a joy to read, which is not an experience I've had with other models. Which is to say, maybe what we hate about AI has less to do with the visual patterns and more to do with what we expect them to mean about the content.

But I think there will always be that feeling of: a human being took the effort to write this. No matter how informative or well written an AI article or comment is, it isn't something we instinctively want to respond to, the way we do when we know there is a person behind the words.

	▲	nobody9999 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		>But I think there will always be that feeling of: a human being took the effort to write this. No matter how informative or well written an AI article or comment is, it isn't something we instinctively want to respond to, the way we do when we know there is a person behind the words. Over and over again, when reading comments from some folks who lionize the usage of LLM outputs, as well as other folks who demonize such usage, I'm reminded of this bit from Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle[0], specifically from the "Books of Bokonon"[1]: `Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than before. He is full of murderous resentment of people who are ignorant without having come by their ignorance the hard way.` And I wonder if, (myself included) those who demonize LLM usage are those who "came by their ignorance the hard way." I'll admit that the analogy isn't great, but there is something to it IMNSHO. Mostly that many who distrust (and often rightly so) LLM outputs have a strong negative impression (perhaps not "murderous resentment," but similar) of those who use LLMs to spout off. I suppose this is a bit tangential to the topic at hand, but if it gets anyone to read Cat's Cradle who hasn't already, I'll take the win. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat's_Cradle [1] https://www.cs.uni.edu/~wallingf/personal/bokonon.html

▲ strken 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This is a really interesting example because, to me, it reads as AI- or corpospeak-influenced human. I can't imagine anyone writing the text in the year 2000, but I believe you when you say you wrote it, and the actual information seems worth communicating.

▲ dddgghhbbfblk 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I think the comment you linked doesn't sound like AI at all, though. I do empathize with people worried about getting falsely accused of using AI in their writing, either hypothetically or in your case in actuality, but at the same time I kinda just think that's a skill issue on the part of the accusers.

This is very much a general "English reading skills" kind of test. A lot of people don't speak English as a first language, in which case I think it's entirely forgiveable. It's hard being attuned to things like writing style in a foreign language (I know from experience!). It's a pretty high level language skill, all things considered. And even among those who do speak English as a first language, there are many in this industry who don't have strong reading skills.

I do believe that personally my hit rate for calling out AI content is likely very high. Like many of us I've had the misfortune of reading more LLM output than is probably healthy for my brain.

One quick point:

>Those sentence constructions that are "tells" were also learned from good writers though.

I don't agree at all, I think the LLM style of writing is cribbed from like, LinkedIn and marketing slop. It's definitely not good writing.

▲ linkregister 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It's the paragraph headings that look AI-ish. It seems to be rare for human commenters.

▲ quietsegfault 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Nothing about that article screams AI slop to me. What a weird world.

▲ nonameiguess 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I get that it's possibly contrary to the point if people are looking to truly have conversations here, but at least 99% of the time, I post a comment and never come back. I said what I had to say and don't particularly feel like getting sucked into an argument if someone disagrees, and frankly, if I'm wrong I think I'll realize it eventually anyway. I'm more likely to dig in my heels and ossify in a wrong position if someone shits on me and I immediately feel the need to defend myself. It can mesmerize you into believing things you might not have if it didn't hit your ego. I could be deluded but think I'm good at making arguments, but that at least means I'm good at making arguments that convince myself, which can be dangerous because you can convince yourself of things that are wrong. The upside is if anyone is out there accusing me of being an LLM, I don't even know so it can't insult me.

It is amusing to witness this happening to others when it's someone like you who is a semi-public figure who should probably be well known on Reddit of all places.

	▲	jedberg 7 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> It is amusing to witness this happening to others when it's someone like you who is a semi-public figure who should probably be well known on Reddit of all places. One of our key tenants on reddit for a long time was "upvote the content, not the author". Which is why we made the usernames so small. It actually makes me happy when people judge the merit of what I write for what I said, not who I am. But yes, it is sometimes tempting to say "do you know who I am??". :)