Do you have the AI flu?
Postcards from the Uncanny Valley
“A writer, I think, is someone who pays attention to the world.”
—Susan Sontag
Hi Writer!
I’ve noticed a new sensation in myself this year. It comes up on the days when I’ve been spending a lot of time looking at AI slop – not just my computer, but also the tv screensaver, billboard ads, news headlines, and emails.
I’m calling it the AI flu.
It’s similar to the sluggishness I feel after blowing a weekend binging a TV show, or forgoing veggies too long, but the AI flu has an underlying discombobulation that’s new.
In the old days we used the term “uncanny valley” for computer generated images that were almost but not quite good enough. Uncanny valley people were unnerving because looking at them pinged the places in your brain that looking at a real person did – did they look attractive? Did they seem nice? Your mind instinctively stretched to empathy … before it hit on the dead eyes and weirdly reflective skin. It was a bait and switch that undermined your certainty about the world, just a little.
Now we all live in the uncanny valley and it’s impossible to tell what role AI has played in any writing or images you see. It’s not just the ads, it’s in the text messages from your friends and even the feedback from your college professor.
So far I’ve only found one prescription for the AI flu. It’s writing. Preferably in a paper notebook, where the chatbots can’t butt in every 2 words to make a suggestion.
The act of creating – writing own thoughts, sentence by sentence, word by word is – is like putting your hand on a guard rail cemented to the earth. It stops the spinning, even if temporarily.
When we write, we don’t just create content. Our words aren’t imitations of some other words that appeared somewhere else. We’re choosing them, and each is tied to a real thought inside a real person’s skull. Even “bad” writing, even boring writing, even lies, are worth more because they were chosen with intention, and intention keeps us tied to the real world.
Today’s Reason to Write is…
To fight the AI flu. My prescription is 10 minutes of writing about absolutely anything that comes into your head. Titrate that amount up until the symptoms subside.
This Week I’m:
Reading: Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton. Greg won an ARC of this on Indie Bookstore Day and I immediately set my sights on it. It was a quick read, but very enjoyable. H is for Hawk vibes.
Watching: Mission Impossible: the Final Reckoning. Not as good as MI:7, but still a fun time at the movies. Definitely see it on the biggest screen you can.
Listening to: Boy Genius
Snacking on: I already knew these Wrap City people made my favorite potato chips, but this week I discovered they also make my favorite tortilla chips! If you see them at the grocery store you know what to do.
https://www.wrapcitysandwiches.com/
Take a Class with Me:
My June Jumpstart your Writing class at Grub Street is already full (join the waitlist here ), but there’s still space in my Jumpstart your Novel class starting June 18, and Jumpstart your Writing beginning July 22.
Until next week, Happy Writing!
Kayleigh
PS. It’s the screensaver on my tv that really gets me because 1. I don’t need a screensaver -- modern TVs don’t burn in the way the old ones did, and it could just as easily go to a blank screen anyway. But more than that, 2. photos of landscapes, dew drops on a leaf, castles on mountains are the most anodyne, plentiful images in the world. Why is google using the energy (and water, but that’s a whole other rabbit hole…) to render an AI version? The point of a screensaver is that it can just be any image. You’re telling me you didn’t have access to ANY IMAGES that would be cheaper or better than AI slop?