Manny’s review of The Machine Consumes Itself: Artificial Intelligence and the End of Publish‑or‑Perish > Likes and Comments
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Equal parts fascinating and terrifying. I took a graduate class on performing and writing research papers years ago and even in that brief period caught scent of much of what you're talking about here. I'm even more concerned with the arts, as there's something primal inside that feels AI creating or replacing human art is some sort of original sin.
There have already been a couple of high-profile scandals where works that have been awarded literary prizes were then accused of having been written by AIs.
Here as well, I think we're in denial. If the AIs' work is that good, the only reasonable solution is to allow them to take part under their own names. We just have to accept, as quickly as possible, that they are now part of our society. The longer we postpone that step, the longer we carry on rewarding people who lie and punishing people who tell the truth.
Yeah I've been following those cases. I suppose I'm one of the people in denial. I don't believe that an AI can create art the way human can, I always think there's something missing even though it's clear it's becoming very difficult to identify. You're probably right though, the technology will only get better, the landscape is changing. I feel like Tommy Lee Jones at the end of No Country for Old Men.
Adam wrote: "Yeah I've been following those cases. I suppose I'm one of the people in denial. I don't believe that an AI can create art the way human can, I always think there's something missing even though it..."
Part of me wants to agree with you, another part says that many pieces now generally recognised as great works of art were dismissed as vacuous nonsense when they first appeared.
My favourite Tommy Lee Jones line from that movie is "If this ain't a mess, it'll do til the mess gets here".
This is the bleakest literary criticism. Not so many years ago Christian Bok wrote poetry onto bacteria with DNA - I’m sure there must be an example of a Victorian automaton somehow “writing” original work, an now this! Surely as you suggest there will be a brave university creating the first lit prize given out to AI. You just know a few years in a human will sneak their work in.
I didn't know about Christian Bok and the bacteria, that is a fantastic story!
I'm not suggesting there should be any lit prizes reserved exclusively for AIs. Just that they should be allowed to compete on equal terms, with the judges not told in advance who the pieces are written by. Right now, my prediction is that most of the prizes would in fact be won by the humans, but the AIs would still pick one up every now and then. Though the practical problem would be dealing with the hugely increased number of submissions.
PS Note also that Manabu is talking about academic writing, not literary writing. The sociology of the two communities is very different, even though there is some overlap.
Manny wrote: "PS Note also that Manabu is talking about academic writing, not literary writing. The sociology of the two communities is very different, even though there is some overlap." I gathered that, but it raises the question of when will this come to the literary world - and at which point will all the things in the article apply - literary journals getting snowed in with content derived by AI, and publishers likewise being overwhelmed. Literary authors having AI write their books and the writers becoming glorified editors and word cloud creators.
Andrew wrote: "I gathered that, but it raises the question of when will this come to the literary world - and at which point will all the things in the article apply - literary journals getting snowed in with content derived by AI, and publishers likewise being overwhelmed."
It is clearly happening already, but perhaps less since literary text is not as formulaic as academic text. Though I must admit I'm not sure about that argument.
As far as I can see, the only solution is to let AIs be editors as well, going through the vast slush-piles to find things that are worth showing the human experts. If the AIs get to the point where they can write good novels on their own that people appreciate, well, why not publish them? Right now, I think we're some way from achieving that, though they can put together quite nice short stories.
I am less concerned by the idea that AIs might start writing than by the dismal fact that most people have stopped reading.
Manny wrote: "Andrew wrote: "I gathered that, but it raises the question of when will this come to the literary world - and at which point will all the things in the article apply - literary journals getting sno..." Government inner circles are already identifying research projects and initiatives to pursue using AI to the point where to keep up you need to use AI to match the scope and and volume of expectations. To what you're saying - maybe AI can be the editor (in the sense that it selects or chooses what is successful) and grades the work, But at some point we have to assume that the reader or purchaser is human. There still needs to be a market. My AI work still needs significant person-in loop perspective - hence I can see the author as first (but heavy) editor - with the AI being a team of researchers and ghost writers. Sometimes I feel like Tony Stark talking to his computer to do the work for him. (I have a background in actually doing the work. What happens when a next generation has never done the work and just relies on AI? - what will their editorial and critical thinking abilities be?)
Andrew wrote: "What happens when a next generation has never done the work and just relies on AI? - what will their editorial and critical thinking abilities be?"
Yes, we are at a very strange transition point. Right now, we can do projects where the AI is responsible for almost everything and work advances with incredible speed. I'm involved in one right now, where in a couple of weeks a state of the art AI (GPT-6 Astra Ultra High) and I have built a language learning app which would have taken at least a year with human-only methods. Astra has written all the code and fixed some obscure and tricky software bugs that I didn't even understand.
I am still the human in the loop, making suggestions about what we actually want the app to do, but it's clear that Astra understands all of my advice very well. I say, we don't want it like this, it's clunky and unintuitive, we want it like that instead. Astra says, of course, you're right, and it picks up my initial idea and improves it. I just get the feeling that soon I won't need to give it that little push any more. It'll go out and talk to the users directly and then act on their comments.
I don't think it could do that now, but it seems pretty clear that at some point it will be able to, so the question is when. If I had to guess, I would say in at most a year from now.
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Oct 06, 2026 08:05AM
Equal parts fascinating and terrifying. I took a graduate class on performing and writing research papers years ago and even in that brief period caught scent of much of what you're talking about here. I'm even more concerned with the arts, as there's something primal inside that feels AI creating or replacing human art is some sort of original sin.
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There have already been a couple of high-profile scandals where works that have been awarded literary prizes were then accused of having been written by AIs.Here as well, I think we're in denial. If the AIs' work is that good, the only reasonable solution is to allow them to take part under their own names. We just have to accept, as quickly as possible, that they are now part of our society. The longer we postpone that step, the longer we carry on rewarding people who lie and punishing people who tell the truth.
Yeah I've been following those cases. I suppose I'm one of the people in denial. I don't believe that an AI can create art the way human can, I always think there's something missing even though it's clear it's becoming very difficult to identify. You're probably right though, the technology will only get better, the landscape is changing. I feel like Tommy Lee Jones at the end of No Country for Old Men.
Adam wrote: "Yeah I've been following those cases. I suppose I'm one of the people in denial. I don't believe that an AI can create art the way human can, I always think there's something missing even though it..."Part of me wants to agree with you, another part says that many pieces now generally recognised as great works of art were dismissed as vacuous nonsense when they first appeared.
My favourite Tommy Lee Jones line from that movie is "If this ain't a mess, it'll do til the mess gets here".
This is the bleakest literary criticism. Not so many years ago Christian Bok wrote poetry onto bacteria with DNA - I’m sure there must be an example of a Victorian automaton somehow “writing” original work, an now this! Surely as you suggest there will be a brave university creating the first lit prize given out to AI. You just know a few years in a human will sneak their work in.
I didn't know about Christian Bok and the bacteria, that is a fantastic story!I'm not suggesting there should be any lit prizes reserved exclusively for AIs. Just that they should be allowed to compete on equal terms, with the judges not told in advance who the pieces are written by. Right now, my prediction is that most of the prizes would in fact be won by the humans, but the AIs would still pick one up every now and then. Though the practical problem would be dealing with the hugely increased number of submissions.
PS Note also that Manabu is talking about academic writing, not literary writing. The sociology of the two communities is very different, even though there is some overlap.
Manny wrote: "PS Note also that Manabu is talking about academic writing, not literary writing. The sociology of the two communities is very different, even though there is some overlap." I gathered that, but it raises the question of when will this come to the literary world - and at which point will all the things in the article apply - literary journals getting snowed in with content derived by AI, and publishers likewise being overwhelmed. Literary authors having AI write their books and the writers becoming glorified editors and word cloud creators.
Andrew wrote: "I gathered that, but it raises the question of when will this come to the literary world - and at which point will all the things in the article apply - literary journals getting snowed in with content derived by AI, and publishers likewise being overwhelmed."It is clearly happening already, but perhaps less since literary text is not as formulaic as academic text. Though I must admit I'm not sure about that argument.
As far as I can see, the only solution is to let AIs be editors as well, going through the vast slush-piles to find things that are worth showing the human experts. If the AIs get to the point where they can write good novels on their own that people appreciate, well, why not publish them? Right now, I think we're some way from achieving that, though they can put together quite nice short stories.
I am less concerned by the idea that AIs might start writing than by the dismal fact that most people have stopped reading.
Manny wrote: "Andrew wrote: "I gathered that, but it raises the question of when will this come to the literary world - and at which point will all the things in the article apply - literary journals getting sno..." Government inner circles are already identifying research projects and initiatives to pursue using AI to the point where to keep up you need to use AI to match the scope and and volume of expectations. To what you're saying - maybe AI can be the editor (in the sense that it selects or chooses what is successful) and grades the work, But at some point we have to assume that the reader or purchaser is human. There still needs to be a market. My AI work still needs significant person-in loop perspective - hence I can see the author as first (but heavy) editor - with the AI being a team of researchers and ghost writers. Sometimes I feel like Tony Stark talking to his computer to do the work for him. (I have a background in actually doing the work. What happens when a next generation has never done the work and just relies on AI? - what will their editorial and critical thinking abilities be?)
Andrew wrote: "What happens when a next generation has never done the work and just relies on AI? - what will their editorial and critical thinking abilities be?"Yes, we are at a very strange transition point. Right now, we can do projects where the AI is responsible for almost everything and work advances with incredible speed. I'm involved in one right now, where in a couple of weeks a state of the art AI (GPT-6 Astra Ultra High) and I have built a language learning app which would have taken at least a year with human-only methods. Astra has written all the code and fixed some obscure and tricky software bugs that I didn't even understand.
I am still the human in the loop, making suggestions about what we actually want the app to do, but it's clear that Astra understands all of my advice very well. I say, we don't want it like this, it's clunky and unintuitive, we want it like that instead. Astra says, of course, you're right, and it picks up my initial idea and improves it. I just get the feeling that soon I won't need to give it that little push any more. It'll go out and talk to the users directly and then act on their comments.
I don't think it could do that now, but it seems pretty clear that at some point it will be able to, so the question is when. If I had to guess, I would say in at most a year from now.