Apparently, Hunter Biden is obsessed with Twitter. This is a pretty weird time to get into Twitter, but, to be fair, Hunter’s not known for the best decision making.
This week, curiosity got the best of me, I straight up asked…
I got a response…
This is the thread that got my attention….
Is it actually Hunter Biden? I don’t know. What I do know, though, is that this post is AI. Maybe it was him using it, maybe it was an assistant, but, yep, AI. Just for the record, I agree with the ideas expressed here, and I’m thrilled about the recent election results in New York. I’m just saying, this writing, AI. Here’s how I know…
When expressing a point of view, AI often starts with a god-term. That is, a term that the contemporary society generally views in the positive. In this case, authenticity. Then, it will pick out some kind of subject that it deems to be the opposite based upon its topic. What is the opposite of authenticity if we’re talking about the political world? A focus group.
AI will tap into common metaphors and figures of speech, but then take them in a different direction that kinda makes sense but not really. In this case, they pick a sword, something sharp, then they go to a question mark. The known metaphor typically compares the sword to something dull, like when the Sheriff of Nottingham told Robin Hood he’ll rip his heart out with a spoon because it will hurt more. AI is programmed to nod to metaphors, but not completely copy them. So, it goes for something related to the topic, but not to the sword: the question mark. A human brain wouldn’t be likely to make this association because it’s not really a strong one. We would think “question mark? I can do better than that.” But AI can’t rationalize. Mathematically it makes sense, so there it is.
AI loves, loves, loves alliteration. It’s obtusely obsessed! Also, when discussing contemporary issues, it will just kind of list topics without any emotion or cohesiveness, it just arranges the data in a way that makes sense algorithmically. “Who pays for what,” what does that mean? It means the machine missed the mark on that one, that’s what.
See point number two. They’re trying to have an original spin on “window dressing.” But instead it just says something stupid.
This one’s actually not half-bad. However, it still follows a known pattern. Start with an insightful, slogan-esque claim, “the middle is not a strategy”, and then unpack it with a web of analogies. It goes from literal strategy, to the imagery of an empty room, to the imagery of voters physically reaching. Literal to cerebral to cerebral. Could a human write this way? Absolutely. Are they likely to, especially on a Twitter thread? Absolutely not. It’s intellectually exhausting, and nobody likes writing in an intellectually exhausting manner, not even academics. They just have to pretend that they do.
Running towards a voter isn’t a common turn of phrase to describe politicians courting voters. But, the word ‘running’ comes up in an area that’s quite obvious: Running for office. Hence, the AI would have that word, in all its tenses, nearby for the topic. With running, it’s easy to juxtapose opposites. You’re running towards something or away from it. Those are opposites. What are the opposites as it pertains to the topic? Winning or losing. Run away = lose. Run toward = win. Then, Mr. Robot puts it in a sentence.
Sometimes AI will just string some ideas together to try to sound profound, while actually just stating the painfully obvious. Of course you have to be in a party if you want to lead it. Then it follows with a cliche, and then he “took the field,” which is an awkward phrasing that doesn’t really make sense, but how often were the words “field” and “Mandani” near each other in news articles that the AI was scraping? Probably a ton. It was an intense race that the entire world was watching.
Finally, getting back to point one, the thread calls back to a god-term. In this case, leadership, or being led. What’s inferior to leading? In this case, managing. Which, isn’t always a bad thing, but certainly is in the context of inept politicians.
You might be thinking, “a human could totally write like this, though, right? I mean, everything you described could just be a human choosing to do that.” Yep. Definitely. But, when there’s tell after tell that can be explained mathematically throughout the entire thread, you’re likely reading AI.
You also might be thinking, “gee, I feel like this uninspired slop isn’t worth destroying the planet for.” Agreed.
An anti-capitalist indie comedy film we made called Left At Wall.
I'm saving this one. When I first read the entire XTwitter excretion, I felt like I was reading a very bad imitation of Ernest Hemingway. All of the sentences are short. Jarringly short.
You demonstrated that they are in fact algebraically short, full of one opposite deleting another until a simple equation is presented as the best solution given the inputted data. Algebra in, algebra out. Garbage in, garbage out. Of course it's AI. Does it produce a better product than anything Hunter Biden could? Maybe. I wouldn't be surprised.
And I'm supposed to give up central air to support this slop? Fuck that shit.
I feel like either people are using AI to write or everyone took the same writing workshop that stresses a familiar tempo and cadence, metaphorical intensity, brevity of sentence structure with an overall aseptic quality.
I’ve been reading all my life and now all of a sudden all sorts of people write like one another?
Thanks Ron, I was afraid I was inadvertently taking crazy pills.