[capnrefsmmat]

I don't think the AI companies are systematically working to make their models sound more human. They're working to make them better at specific tasks, but the writing styles are, if anything, even more strange as they advance.

Comparing base and instruction-tuned models, the base models are vaguely human in style, while instruction-tuned models systematically prefer certain types of grammar and style features. (For example, GPT-4o loves participial clauses and nominalizations.) https://arxiv.org/abs/2410.16107

When I've looked at more recent models like o3, there are other style shifts. The newer OpenAI models increasingly use bold, bulleted lists, and headings -- much more than, say, GPT-3.5 did.

So you get what you optimize for. OpenAI wants short, punchy, bulleted answers that sound authoritative, and that's what they get. But that's not how humans write, and so it'll remain easy to spot AI writing.

[JKCalhoun]

That's interesting. I had not heard that. I wonder if making them sound more human and making them better at specific tasks though are mutually exclusive. (Or if perhaps making them sound more human is in fact also a valid task.)