What Do Waterproof Umbrellas Have to Do with Generative AI?

My son craved for a football outfit for his last birthday. My husband ordered one and we waited for it to be delivered. And waited, and waited. And the outfit still wasn't in our mailbox a month after the order date. When I politely enquired what happened, I was informed that we had cancelled the order, and that the amount was refunded to us. Which wasn't true. So I politely wrote back to ask for either a proof of refund, or the outfit be sent. And we waited again. Two months went by, during which I made three additional polite attempts without any success. Not so long ago, I would have surrendered. BUT, a new tool is available today, that helps us out in domains where we are ignorant: generative AI (GenAI).

Introduction

I then used GenAI to write a formal letter referring to the Swiss law of obligations, commanding the vendor to either refund the amount, or send the outfit, with a deadline of 10 days, or else... The process took me five minutes. And tada, the next day, the amount was on our bank account. Sadly or wonderfully, GenAI clearly won against ignorance and politeness.

The Waterproof Umbrella was one of many wonderful inventions and dates back to the 1st century

A Brief History of Human Tools

The first human tool industry dates back approximately 1.7 million years, when our ancestors developed bifacial hand axes.

Since then, our genus and species certainly evolved, but most of all, so did our tool industry:

• the wheel approx. 3,500 BC
  

• the waterproof umbrella in the 1st century
  

• electronic computers in the 1940s

These are just a few of human's wonderful inventions. Each of these new tools represented a revolution (bigger or smaller) that changed our life for the better and the worse.

Enter Generative AI

Today, THE tool that is revolutionizing society and transforming how we work is without doubt GenAI. The first GenAI is considered to be the ELIZA chatbot developed in 1966 at MIT.

It simulated a conversation with a psychotherapist.

It created the illusion of meaningful interaction by rearranging user input into pre-programmed responses (e.g., turning "I feel sad" into "Why do you feel sad?").

Modern GenAI differs from ELIZA in that it uses and trains on massive datasets, i.e. the whole internet, to create contextually coherent texts or graphics.

But is it really that different from all other inventions? And how does it impact the job of scientific writing? The purpose of this blog post is to discuss some of these aspects, without being exhaustive.

What Makes GenAI Different

Most features of GenAI that come to my mind are actually not totally different from features of pre-existing inventions:

• GenAI is reshaping the work landscape, both by replacing and creating jobs, just like the tractor and internet.
  

• GenAI generates fears, mainly in people who misunderstand the techniques at play on the background. Just like the railway steam engine.
  

• GenAI is replacing brain power rather than muscle power, just like computers.
  

• GenAI comes with a dramatic ecological impact. Just like nuclear power plants: data centers, just like radioactive waste, remain largely out of sight, yet their environmental toll is staggering. Every GenAI search consumes about 5 to 10 times more electricity than a standard web search, which can amount to running several LED light bulbs for up to an hour.
  

• GenAI is very quickly taken up by people around the world and across societal classes. Just like the waterproof umbrella.

The most striking difference, in my opinion, is our interaction with it. GenAI mimics human connections in unprecedented ways: it answers questions, converses, makes decisions, and even claims to "think", sometimes under human names and figures.

The semantic field around GenAI is that of human interactions. You certainly don't use such vocabulary when you interact with your waterproof umbrella on a rainy day! Overbonding with machines can have dramatic consequences, isolating people and turning them away from rich and real human interactions.

GenAI in Scientific Writing

I recently used a GenAI tool specifically designed for scientific writers (paid option) to help me draft an introduction. The tool can extract summaries of uploaded pdf reference papers, suggest contextualized text, etc. I was disappointed: the output was badly constructed, it was not capable of providing context nor correctly interpret data; in fine, I had to do it almost all by myself. Before that experience, I was afraid of loosing my job. But after, I realized I wouldn't be so easily replaced.

GenAI is a good tool to help drafting documents, rephrasing sentences, finding information, summarizing notes, etc. BUT:

• GenAI should not be fully trusted for providing information: always double-check the sources and run some additional searches in conventional search engines. GenAI searches often provide missing, outdated or wrong results (experience made!)
  

• Have some control on the inputs used by GenAI. Along with the shit-in shit-out concept, you won't get good results if the tool feeds on low quality information. You can simply do that by including the website(s) you want the tool to get information from, in your prompts.
  

• Original content creation is essential. Without fresh and reliable input, the output quality will degrade over time. Scientists and writers remain vital to provide the new, trustworthy content it depends on.
  

• GenAI language style is poor. Language style is paramount in scientific writing, in that it contributes to the paper's general quality and to engage the reader. Badly written manuscripts can be rejected by scientific peer reviewers simply based on poor level of English. Also, nurture your own style, and add this little personal anecdote in a presentation for example, that GenAI will never be able to do for you.
  

• Don't forget that as an author, you have full responsibility of the content you write.
  

• Lastly, GenAI will never provide you the pride and satisfaction of having done the job yourself.
  

Of course, numerous additional factors must be considered when integrating GenAI into scientific writing and publishing. Should you find yourself overwhelmed by data or caught in unproductive GenAI interactions, do not hesitate to contact the WordifyScience team. We are here to assist—whether with or without the use of GenAI.

Science without conscience is but the ruin of the soul (Rabelais, 1532)

Conclusion

Just like all other inventions, GenAI transforms our society, provides new opportunities and helps us in daily or professional tasks. But also just like all other inventions, we'll adapt to it, and learn how to frame it and use it consciously. In 1532, when Rabelais wrote this famous sentence "Science without conscience is but the ruin of the soul", he probably didn't have umbrellas in mind, but perhaps did he foresee the tremendous impact that emerging technologies would have on human ethics.

Never has Rabelais' statement been so true than for GenAI. If used unconsciously, it can tragically replace human connections. If used consciously, the tool is powerful and wonderful: saving time, saving money, and empowering ignorant consumers against unscrupulous football outfit vendors.

If sometime the fear arises that the machine is taking over, think of it as a waterproof umbrella. When it rains, use it to your benefit; when it stops raining, close it. Remember that you can always pull the plug, and take some time to embrace a moment of digital minimalism to create meaningful connections with your human peers.

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