How we communicate evolves with time and with the medium.
I write my texts (mostly) like I write my emails, resulting in my kids repeatedly telling me that it sounds “aggressive” when I put a period at the end of a text message.
(They also want me to use exclamation points much much more! LOL)
While I’m comfortable with the idea of tone and style evolving over time and in different contexts, I’m uncomfortable with what happens when we no longer need to struggle with a blank page. I’m skeptical that it’s a good thing that Gmail is now offering to “polish” my posts and that LinkedIn suggests “rewrite with AI” every time I string a few words together.
Clear writing and clear thinking co-evolve: I don’t know anyone who writes well who doesn’t think well; and how we express our thoughts in written form is a great way to reveal whether our thinking is as clear as it needs to be. I also know that convenience will win out—why wouldn’t it?—and that the cost of all of this convenience will be mostly invisible.
It’s already established that AI is most useful when you have subject matter expertise, so you can tell the difference between good and bad, and use these tools as leverage for your strengths.
How do we avoid systematically undertraining ourselves as strong writers and strong thinkers, to use the tools without having them replace an activity that sharpens our mind?
