WHO’S ON FIRST with AI? BY HARPER CRABTREE
I’m Gen Z. This means I know who rules Tik Tok with a million followers, but I’d never heard of the farcical comedy duo Abbott and Costello and their skit, “Who’s on First?” until my mom referred to it when I showed her how ChatGPT works. The premise of their sketch is that Abbott is identifying the players on a baseball team, inspiring a cyclical repeat by Costello of the same question with no resolution. As artificial intelligence increasingly
becomes the silent hand behind our words, we find ourselves at a crossroads of ethical inquiry that mirrors Abbott’s repetitive question. Can we trust AI to be our wordsmith or are we sacrificing the essence of human expression in favor of efficiency and innovation, and to what end? Why should publishers keep paying writers like me when programs like ChatGPT can write quality works faster and for free? Since its inception in 1956, artificial intelligence has etched
itself deeply into the fabric of human society, providing indispensable tools for everyday life. We may take it for granted, but AI is now an integral part of our daily tasks, whether it’s asking Siri about the weather, requesting Alexa to play a favorite song, or simply searching Google for the nearest gas station. However, as we transition from casually using Grammarly to fully relying on AI programs for our writing, ethical concerns and limitations inevitably arise.
Microsoft Bing’s image creator, powered by AI, is a fun tool with a few kinks. The prompt for this image offers a look at the outer limits of AI imagination, but still struggles with interpretation: “Image of Abbott and Costello skit ‘Who’s on First?’ with a t-rex, shark, and pot of gold.”
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