8 Comments
User's avatar
Elizabeth  Trezona's avatar

Thoughtful and thorough.

Expand full comment
Ben Ulansey's avatar

Thanks as always for reading, Elizabeth!

Expand full comment
Kathy Minicozzi's avatar

Thank you for a thoughtful, well-written article.

I use Grammarly to check spelling and punctuation, and it gives me suggestions about better ways to word something. It is my choice to accept its suggestions or not, and I often dismiss them.

I often use Google when I am looking for a synonym.

Other than that, I refuse to use AI to write my pieces. They come out of my own head, my observations, my imagination, and my experiences.

Expand full comment
Ben Ulansey's avatar

Have you explored its editorial functions at all? Like you, I absolutely refuse to just let it take over the writing process for me. I view it as pretty similar to Grammarly as far as refining my pieces goes. More useful, but not radically.

Expand full comment
Kathy Minicozzi's avatar

No, I pretty much stick to Grammarly and to Google for synonyms, etc. Sometimes I ask Google questions, so I guess I am using AI for something.

Expand full comment
Ben Ulansey's avatar

One of the very best functions I’ve found is asking things like, “Given that I’ve overused the word ‘system,’ what are other words that could serve that function in this specific sentence? : ‘….’” So essentially, a thesaurus that will understand right away what function a word is taking. Some words are so broad and have so many meanings that thesauruses don’t always understand which form of them I’m trying to find substitutes for.

Expand full comment
Claudette StPierre's avatar

Excellent article and I appreciate your perspective. It certainly is a conundrum.

Expand full comment
Ben Ulansey's avatar

Thanks so much for reading, Claudette!

Expand full comment