Why I hate AI

On being (willingly) left behind

Perhaps you weren’t a reader of This Stays Here when I had a shocking encounter in New York City last summer. If you didn’t read or don’t remember that story, I highly recommend you take a moment to check it out: Heart & Soul - You are not replaceable. It’s a quick read, and the first section of the essay recounts my experience in narrative form.

Suffice it to say, I’ve pretty much been writing today’s essay since that moment over a year ago when a stranger told me: “I’m in AI. We’re going to put you out of business.” Understandably, in the wake of such an encounter, I developed a full-blown aversion (allergy, phobia, revulsion) to artificial intelligence. Before then, I had used ChatGPT exactly once when I copied and pasted prompts into the chatbot to help me improve the text on my Instagram homepage. It was complicated, confusing, and I didn’t like the way ChatGPT pretended to be human—it gave me the ick. In the end, I thought the suggestions were off the mark, and did my own thing anyway. My one and only encounter with an LLM (large language model: a type of artificial intelligence trained on massive amounts of stolen text to summarize, translate, and spit-out human-like language such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, etc.) was lackluster to say the least. But I don’t think my experience is representative of most people today. LLMs have become utterly ubiquitous in American life.

I know people who ask ChatGPT what outfit they should wear or which book to read next. Others use Claude to generate lists, brainstorm ideas, and write social media copy that can be tedious and boring to produce. It’s even been reported that AI chatbots and digital companions are reshaping emotional connection, especially in people under the age of 25. We are made to connect, to attach and bond—to love and be loved—and increasingly, that innate, human need for real-world relationships is being outsourced to a digital “friend” who is intrinsically incapable of intimacy in any form. It’s mind boggling.

I’m clearly not at AI guru, and because of this I get told on a regular basis: “You’d better catch up or you’re going to be left behind.”

Cool. I want to be left behind.

Leave me in the dust, friends. I’ll take my notebooks and pencils, as well as my hand-crank sharpener. My special pens, cups of tea, restless wanderings. I’ll forgo Claude and call Tosca instead. Or Kali, Kim, Heather, Julie, or Tracey. Let me scribble it out, crumple up sheets of paper, then start with the first line of a fresh, new legal pad. I’ll get it wrong—not once or twice, but three times, four, or more—and in the agony of gutting it out, I’ll discover a solution that no generative AI (trained by the theft of my own hard won words) could ever conceive because I hadn’t thought of it yet.

ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini (et al.) are nothing but plagiarism machines built from the flesh and blood, embodied creativity of people who have lived and loved and won and lost and laughed and cried.

AI cannot capture the scent of a linden tree in June or taste a sun-warmed peach. It has never held a lover, kissed a child on the crown of her head, run its fingers through dirt to plant seeds in spring. It cannot be human, it can only mimic humanity, and that plastic, mannequin-stiff facade isn’t lovely, it’s chilling. Please, leave me all the way behind.

I know that this is just one gut-level reaction to the creative theft and morally questionable genesis of generative AI, and that there are many more reasons why it should (at the very least) make us pause and contemplate its use. Including, but not limited to: environmental impact, job displacement, ethical concerns, margin of error, security risks, misinformation, radicalization, use by bad actors, bias, deep fakes, lack of accountability and transparency, and overt plagiarism.

I also know that there is nuance to this conversation and that companies are slipping artificial intelligence into nearly everything we use on a daily basis. It’s becoming impossible to avoid. I can’t type a message anymore without predictive text guessing my next move and trying to finish my sentences. I hate it. Often, I’ll intentionally pick a different word just to be difficult, to prove that I can still think for myself, thank you very much. And I know that people will comment or leave messages stating that AI helps with the drudgery, with busywork that allows them to focus instead on their productivity and creativity. I get it, but also:

The journey is the entire point.

Last week, I continued the tedious process of re-writing the first 100 pages of my new novel. It’s not bad, it’s just not quite right, and after a long conversation with my agent and foreign rights agent, we all came to the conclusion that I’m not writing a mystery/thriller—this book is upmarket fiction with a dash of suspense. And that changes everything.

In particular, there was one plot point that I just could not iron out. I’ve been conceptualizing this book for over a year now, and at any point in time I suppose I could have typed my problem into an LLM and asked it to give me some ideas or suggestions. It might have come up with a pretty good solve, and I could’ve adopted it a long time ago and gone on my merry way. Instead, I decided to smoke a pork butt.

I’ve been wanting to master a deliciously juicy pulled pork, but our smoker is finicky and needs to be babysat. So, last week I blocked out a day, bought a 5 lb. slab of meat, seasoned it with a homemade dry rub, and tossed it in the smoker. All day, I worked at my patio table, scribbling away in my notebook, tapping at my computer, and pacing (the best way to get the ideas out). I also added applewood chips to the smoker, spritzed the meat with apple cider vinegar, stared off into space, and weeded my decidedly weed-free gardens. At one point, my dad (who was working across the street) called to tell me that my house was on fire. Nah, it was just the smoker acting up.

At the end of the day, my husband told me it was the best pulled pork he’d ever tasted. But even more delicious was the fact that I had my answer. It only took me a year or so, a half dozen conversations with my agent and several friends, a few long, dark nights of the soul, and a hot day with an uppity smoker. It was so worth the wait. Because I didn’t cut any corners. Because I know my characters on a level that a shortcut would have bypassed entirely. Because the solve came from my heart and my life and my experiences.

And this book… my friends, this book. It’s 100% human and filled with all the hope and angst and beauty and longing my soul can express in words. I hope it makes you feel every ounce of your own complicated, gorgeous, unique, and irreplaceable humanity.

And I hope you choose—in whatever capacity you can—to be left behind, too.

Eyes open. Hearts steady. Hands ready.

Thanks for reading. xoxo - Nicole

Want more? I think you’d enjoy:

• Heart & Soul - You are not replaceable

• Forests & Trees - On zooming out

• Both/And - On nuance and gray space

If a subscription is not your thing, but you’d like to support my work in some way, you can leave a “tip” in any amount at Buy Me a Coffee. It’s a small way to support writers and creatives when their work resonates with you.

I’m a proud member of the Iowa Writers’ Collaborative, a roundup of world-class journalists who call Iowa home. I invite you to check out the group and become a paying member of one or more of our pages.