I just recently realized that what I truly hate about LLMs is that it devalues language. I love language, I love using it very intentionally, I love how different people wield and work language differently. A well forged phrase can cut right to the soul. Language is literally magic. It can do things where man and machine all fail.

But now with the press of a button you can get sugary pink language goo in any shape you like. And this is sold as an equal replacement to real human language. The insult! The depravity!

I think it might say something about how far language is already devalued. We live in a morass of content marketing and business process documentation and terms and conditions and propaganda and spam. All soulless language that nobody asks for but that people are compelled to create. We can't imagine not creating such language goo. And so we're grateful for the pink goo machine.

You know those stories about how there was once magic in the world but it was lost? This is it. This is how it happens.

When my regional public university is closed-- a likely scenario these days, even after 153 years serving New Hampshire, due to a disgraceful lack of public funding for higher ed-- its gravestone will read:

"Acquiesced To Its Own Defunding"

(Quote from https://tonemadison.com/articles/online-education-is-a-key-part-of-the-uw-systems-austerity-agenda/)

Delighted that we have our first cohort of faculty Open Educational Resources grant recipients at Brock! This important affordability initiative is funded by our Brock University Student Union (BUSU) and has been shaped in close collaboration with faculty, students, librarians, and staff colleagues. #OER

https://brocku.ca/brock-news/2023/05/brock-grants-aim-to-enhance-teaching-cut-student-costs/