I Don't Care About AI and You Can't Make Me
AIwriting will inevitably replace human writers, and there’s nothing you can doto stop it.
I’m sureyou’ve seen comments like this posted on social media over the last few years,and it usually precedes an argument about which is better: AI-createdart/entertainment or that created by humans. After seeing someone post theabove (paraphrased) statement on my Facebook timeline, I realized I have a newresponse to these sorts of comments.
Whofucking cares?
I’m 61.I’ve lived my entire life in a constantly changing world on the verge ofdestruction by one means or another. They say AI is an existential threat.Baby, the entire fucking universe is an existential threat, and it’s never beenotherwise. (And people wonder why I write dark fiction.) If AI does replacehuman writing in all fields – and I’m not convinced it will – that won’t keepme from writing. I write because I have to, because it’s the truest expressionof my Self, because it’s the only thing that uses all of my mind at once(although teaching sometimes comes close), and most of all, because it’s fun. I’vecontinued writing through rejection, depression, illness, divorce, the death ofthe midlist, several death-and-rebirth cycles of Horror, my first agent whogave up on my novel after a year, my first novel contract getting cancelled… Icould go on, but if you’ve been writing for any length of time, you’ve got yourown list of obstacles you’ve overcome. If all of those things couldn’t stop me fromwriting, why should an overhyped technological advancement?
And whileI’ve made it to my sixties, there’s no guarantee I won’t die as I’m typingthese words. (If I was handwriting this, this would be the point where my penwould trail off down the page.) I’ve got too much to do in whatever time I haveleft to worry about AI. But maybe you’re a younger writer with (hopefully) manymore years ahead of you than I have, and AI might seem like a real threat toyour establishing and maintaining a writing career.
Let’s talk.
· Everythingdies. Not a cheerythought, but it’s the truth. The second law of thermodynamics is the closestthing to God we have. I often apply the deathbed test when I’m struggling witha decision. When I’m on my deathbed, will I look back over my life and regretnot having done X? If you’d regret giving up on writing because of the rise ofAI, then fuck AI and write. Yes, it’s possible that AI-produced writing willbecome the norm someday. Who cares? It’s what we do today that matters. Maybepeople in the future (assuming humanity has a future) will live to be200, 300, or maybe even be immortal. Does that mean my 61 to (if I’m reallylucky) 100-year-long life was worthless? Of course not. So all the writing Ihave produced in my life isn’t meaningless just because writing itself may bedifferent in the future.
· Butsometimes things keep living – even if they occupy a different niche in theworld. There arestill blacksmiths, glassblowers, musicians who play medieval instruments, paintersof realism, stage actors… Manufacturing technology, instrument design andconstruction, photography, and film haven’t entirely replaced those oldercrafts. They’re still around, even if there isn’t as much demand for themanymore (then again, there are renn faires). You know that old cliché thatparents say? “If your friends all jumped off a bridge, would you?” Well, turnit around: “If none of your friends write without AI, would you?” Who gives ashit what other people do? It’s what you do that matters.
· It’salways been hard to make a living in the arts. Maybe AI will make it harder for non-AIwriters to make money. I think that’s almost a certainty in business writingand simple nonfiction. I already have students who write web articles andlisticles, and their editors often require them to use AI. But how many of youreading this make all of your money solely from producing your art? (Notcounting any income a partner of yours brings in.) I never have, and I’ve beenwriting and publishing for forty years. The vast majority of my income comesfrom teaching. If I never made another cent from writing, the economic impacton me would be negligible. Yes, some people support themselves solely with theirwriting, even if they’re barely above the poverty level. (Author Tim Powersonce said that it’s easy to live as a freelance writer, “Once you learn to liveshabby.”) Maybe non-AI writers won’t be able to make a living from their art,but most of us don’t now anyway, so what would really change for us? There areplenty of literary writers and poets who know there’s almost no market demandfor their art, and they still produce it anyway. Maybe all non-AI writers willbe in the same situation one day, and that will suck, but the ones who need towrite will still write.
· It’snot inevitable that readers will prefer AI writing to human writing. The AI-vangelists and the AI doomsayersboth assume that AI writing will replace human writing. But that all depends onhumans themselves. Humans make choices for many reasons – psychological,physical, environmental, societal… Humans will have to prefer AI writingand choose it over non-AI writing. Dense, complex literary fiction thatfocuses on character and setting more than plot (if there’s any plot at all)exists, but the vast majority of readers aren’t interested in it. It doesn’tgive them what they want from a story (which is, first and foremost, storyitself). I’m not knocking literary fiction. I like it just fine, so don’t comeat me in the comments or on social media. But there’s a reason why lit ficdoesn’t often show up on the bestseller lists and why it usually doesn’t makeany money. The Horror boom of the 80s became the Horror bust of the 90s whenpublishers started cranking out as many mediocre Horror novels as they could tosate the public’s demand. Readers got tired of reading sub-par novels andstopped buying Horror. The same thing could happen with AI writing. If peopledon’t find AI writing satisfying, and they do find that human writing fulfillstheir needs, that’s what they’ll read. People talk about supply and demand asif it’s all about money, but it’s really about need and desire.
· AIwill inevitably surpass human writers. People tend to believe that technology advances at aconstantly accelerating rate, but this isn’t always true. All you need to do istake a look at old predictions of what people in the past thought (or hoped) thefuture would be like. But we don’t have flying cars, bases on the moon and Mars,intelligent robot companions, faster-than-light drive, etc. Technology canplateau and remain at that level for a long time. While there have beenadvancements in Windows, Word, PowerPoint, etc., they are essentially the sameprograms they were decades ago. AI-vangelists (and people who predict theSingularity occurring within a few years) are likely overly – if not wildly – optimisticin their predictions. AI might plateau at a certain point and remain there fora long time, perhaps a very long time. But even if AI continues to advanceand does so rapidly, the writing it produces won’t be better than what a humancreates. It will produce writing faster, and much of it might be as good aswhat an average writer produces, but I doubt it will be able to truly simulatethe perspective of individual humans. It might be able to write for its ownexperiences and perspective, though, and that would be very cool. But as I saidearlier about making a living from writing, more advanced AI might change themarket for writers (both traditionally published and indie writers). A friendonce told me that “There’s no difference between the average literary novel andthe average genre novel, except the average literary novel doesn’t getpublished.” (He told me this before the advent of current self-publishing tech.)A future of this quote might be “There is no difference between the averageAI-written piece and the average human-written piece, but the averageAI-written piece is produced faster and more cheaply.” (More cheaply in termsof not paying writers, not in terms of AI’s energy and water usage.) Readers inthe future might still read human-written writing, but they might read onlyhigh-quality work written from unique perspectives and/or interesting,innovative techniques rather than run-of-the-mill prose.
· There’sno stopping AI. Isee people post on social media that “AI MUST BE STOPPED!” I never say anythingwhen I see such comments, but I always wonder how anyone can truly believe thisis possible. It’s like they’re standing on a beach, palms outstretched as agigantic wave rushes toward them, and shout, “THIS TSUNAMI MUST BE STOPPED!”Good fucking luck with that. You can choose not to use AI or consume anythingit produces (although this will become more difficult as AI becomes moreembedded in society), but humans are tool-users, and if an effective new toolis created, humans will rush to use it. It’s not “AI MUST BE STOPPED!” but “WEMUST STOP EVERYONE IN THE HUMAN RACE FROM USING AI!” Ain’t gonna happen. Thecollege where I teach is going to incorporate AI into all its classes startingthis Fall. How and how much we’ll use it is unclear right now, but it’shappening. And not just at my school. It’s happening everywhere.Children will grow up using AI in all kinds of ways, and the tool will beperfectly normal to them by the time they’re adults. I only use AI to theextent I need to in my classes, and I try to inform students about the best choicesthey can make when using AI. First, I tell them there is no ethical way to useAI, and I explain how AI was trained on stolen material and how it consumes aton of energy and water (making it hugely wasteful). But then I tell them thatthere’s no ethical way to use much of our technology, such as combustion engines.People need to weigh the pluses and minuses of using technology for themselvesas individuals and for the world at large, and then make their own choices. I tellthem that their classes and jobs may require them to use AI one day soon, andthey’ll have to make choices about that, too. I show them an AI program, showthem how to write prompts, etc. Then I ask the AI program to tell the studentswhat it can do for them without writing their essays. Then I ask the program totell students what its limitations are in helping them with their writing. Ipost both of these responses on our course page. This way, the AI program istelling them how and how not to use it, not me. I think it’s worth everyonetrying out AI programs a bit just to familiarize yourself with the tech sinceit’s rapidly becoming a common tool in society. And if you are rabidly anti-AI,keep fighting the good fight, and if you lose in the end, you hopefully madepeople consider their attitudes toward AI and how (or if) to use it, and that’sno small thing.
· NoAI was used in the production of this work. Some people are starting to use statements like this toassure readers that their work is 100 percent human-written, like the labelsyou see on various products in the grocery proclaiming them to be gluten-free,no sugar added, 100 percent organic, no artificial sweeteners, etc. Not only isa non-AI statement a promise to customers, it’s also an effective statement of yourvalues. And likely, more effective than posting FUCK AI! on social media. It’sa positive statement that makes no criticism of AI or of others who may use AI.People tend to respond better to positive sales messages than negative ones(especially ones that don’t explicitly or implicitly criticize them).
· Keepliving your best writing life. Ifthe world keeps changing around me until I’m the last writer on Earth not usingAI, so be it. I’m going to keep writing my stories my way and be thankful Ilived at a time when I could do so. That will be enough for me. But if nothingelse, don’t let your feelings about the advent of AI-assisted writing take upso much of your mental and emotional energy that you find it hard (and maybeimpossible) to write. Don’t let the existence of AI impede your creativity becausethen it really will win. Keep writing, you brilliant, beautiful humans.
DEPARTMENTOF SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION
Conan:Spawn of the Serpent God
I have aConan the Barbarian novel coming from Titan Books in October! It was a hell ofa lot of fun to write, and I hope fans of sword-and-sorcery action will enjoyit.
You canfind various preorder links at the Titan Books site: https://titanbooks.com/72365-conan-spawn-of-the-serpent-god/
Synopsis:
InZamora, the city of thieves, Conan meets Valja, a thrill-seeking thief. Sheentices him to join
her on aheist, where they steal a golden statuette of Ishtar, said to contain thegoddess herself.
Afterkilling a dozen guards and failing to escape, the pair are saved by priestessesof Mitra. But
Conanknows that nothing is free.
Thepriestesses have need of their skills. They have waged war against Set, god ofchaos and
serpents,who demands constant sacrifice from his subjects and massacred thousands of his
followers.Yet they are no match for Uzzeran, a powerful sorcerer, who has been performing
unspeakableexperiments on humans in the name of Set. To defeat Uzzeran, they will need a
legendarywarrior on their side. They need Conan the Barbarian.
TheWorld Turns Red
My newhorror novella, The World Turns Red, is unleashed upon the world, and sofar the reviews have been great! Here’s a sampling:
“A dark,disturbing masterpiece worth binge-reading in one sitting.” – S.E. Howard
“This isa very dark, intense read with a surreal quality that pulled me in from pageone and held me spellbound to the bitter end.” – Well Worth a Read
“TheWorld Turns Red is another in a long line of brilliant horror work by TimWaggoner. There was never anyone who could blend the real with the surreal soseamlessly that, as wild as the story gets, it makes perfect sense somehow. NowTHAT takes one hell of a writer. The book is a flawless masterpiece…6 out of 5stars.” – Carson Buckingham
Welcometo the meat room.
At first,it’s a whisper on the edge of your consciousness.
As itgets louder, you begin to make out words—dark, sharp, dangerous words… You clapyour hands over your ears to shut them out, but you can’t escape what comesfrom inside you.
The voicetells you to do things to yourself. Bad things. Awful things…
Thelonger you listen, the more they seem reasonable. Desirable.
Inevitable.
And asyou reach for the nearest knife, gun, or rope, the voice speaks the last fourwords you’ll ever hear:
Allhail the Unhigh.
Amazon: https://tinyurl.com/5cabrjn2
Barnes& Noble: https://tinyurl.com/kzphuep7
DarkTides 21: 24 Frames Per Second
I’mthrilled to have another new novella in the latest volume of Crystal LakePublishing’s Dark Tide Series – 24 Frames Per Second – alongside AndrewNaldony and Gary A. Braunbeck.
Step intothe terrifying world of Hollywood horror, where the line between fiction andreality blurs, and the consequences of cinematic creation become all too real.In 24 Frames Per Second, three chilling novellas bring to life thedarkest corners of the movie industry—where horror isn’t just confined to thescreen.
“The LastCannibal Movie” by Tim Waggoner: A group of student filmmakers embark on aproject to create a cannibal holocaust film—but soon, their fictional nightmarebegins to unfold in real life. As their imagined horrors come to life, theymust face the terrifying reality of their own creation.
“I Am theRainbringer” by Andrew Nadolny: A woman is transformed into a serial killer byher father’s dying wish, and her husband turns her deadly past into a movie.But the ghosts of his parents—and her brutal history—soon rise to haunt themboth, blurring the line between the living and the dead in a nightmare thatcan’t be escaped.
“This IsNot My Movie” by Gary A. Braunbeck: After a movie theater is consumed by fire,the charred ruins become a nexus for ghosts and alternate realities. A hauntingtale of how a beloved movie theater's destruction births a dark, sentientforce, trapping the souls of those killed in the blaze.
In 24Frames Per Second, horror reaches beyond the screen and becomes part of thefabric of reality, where the true cost of creation is more horrifying than anyfictional tale. Each novella is a unique exploration of terror, art, and theboundaries of reality, set against the backdrop of Hollywood’s darkest secrets.
Amazon: https://tinyurl.com/8u7jh8f
Barnes& Noble: https://tinyurl.com/873tj3vj
“AndYou Will Live in Horror Forever”
I have anew short story in the latest issue of Cthonic Matter. If you’reunfamiliar with the journal, here’s a description from their submission page: “ChthonicMatter is a quarterly offering of tales from the darkside. Its contentsrange in tone from the quiet horror of Shirley Jackson to the bleak stylings ofThomas Ligotti — and everything in between.” I’m proud to be part of such acool publication!
https://chthonicmatter.wordpress.com/chthonicmatter/
Amazon: https://tinyurl.com/45sb5b73
AllRoads Lead to Hell
PIC
My story“No One Sings in the City of the Dead” appears in this anthology. (Fulldisclosure: the tale is a reprint.) From the publisher:
Thisanthology, composed of 11 tales of terror by the authors of Winding RoadStories, will remind you that it's not where you begin but where you end. Andin the world of horror, all roads lead to hell.
Amazon: https://tinyurl.com/5hap3wyy
SCHEDULEDAPPEARANCES
San DiegoComic Con. July 24-27. San Diego, California.
GenconWriters’ Symposium. July 31st to August 3rd. Indianapolis, Indiana.
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