Decade of blogging - Paweł Grzybek

Paweł Grzybek celebrates 10 years of blogging, congratulations! In his post, he addresses why writing is still important in the current AI-hype cycle. This related to a quote I shared from Michał's blog about writing only providing fuel to LLMs without much benefit to the writer. Paweł writes about the benefit provider to the writer using research supported by Microsoft.

At first glance, the situation does not look like the slow process of blogging is an idea worth pursuing. Precisely the opposite is true! Critical thinking required for writing (and other acts of creation) is the only thing that can save us from becoming idiots. Microsoft, the same one that made a pretty close partnership with OpenAI, funded the interesting research about “The Impact of Generative AI on Critical Thinking.”

The study mentioned surveys 319 knowledge workers. On the topic of writing in related works, relying on LLMs fo write can hinder self development, however using the tool to request feedback can help the writer improve. The overall conclusion to the study says

Analysing 936 real-world GenAI tool use examples our participants shared, we find that knowledge workers engage in critical thinking primarily to ensure the quality of their work, e.g. by verifying outputs against external sources. Moreover, while GenAI can improve worker efficiency, it can inhibit critical engagement with work and can potentially lead to long-term overreliance on the tool and diminished skill for independent problem-solving. Higher confidence in GenAI’s ability to perform a task is related to less critical thinking effort.