It was definitely written with significant LLM assistance. It's very obvious, and the essay is not good.

> The Waymo effect: how AI is *quietly* making research less collaborative

> The Waymo arrived with the serene confidence of a machine that has never once worried about where to find parking, and I climbed into the back seat, glanced instinctively at the driver’s seat to say hello, and found myself nodding politely at an empty chair.

> No obligation to make conversation. No silent negotiation over the radio. A guilt-free space to be alone with one's thoughts, finish an email, or take a call en route without the awkwardness about conducting it in front of a stranger. The car was quiet, smooth and entirely undemanding.

> The collaborator’s inconvenience, in other words, is *not a bug* in the collaboration; it largely is the collaboration. The value of another mind *lies exactly in the ways* it refuses to be an extension of your own.