[awongh]

> LLMs are really only capable of combining different things into output

In terms of how writers think about creativity this doesn’t reflect reality- there’s the old writer’s saying that there are only 7 stories (and other variations of this idea) and that writing is about creatively remixing these well-worn ideas.

The LLM’s capability to write acceptable fiction and nonfiction is coming soon if it’s not already here. (I think right now it still needs some high level input from humans, depending on length and topic)

It’s clear to me that, especially as LLMs get better and better, there’s only one real difference- it’s that I don’t want to hear what an LLM has to say. I’m only interested in what other humans have to say. I feel the same way about AI music- even if it sounds ok, even as good as the kind of unoriginal pop music that’s not AI made (but is a kind of it’s own slop) or a bad committee made hollywood movie, it’s still fundamentally more interesting than something that’s been generated. Even if it’s 100% fiction it’s still based on a real human’s life experiences.

[keiferski]

This is a bit like saying “there are only five fundamental flavors” and everything is some combination of them.

Maybe, but that has basically zero effect on the experience of actually eating food. Just because the form may be the same doesn’t mean an LLM will be able to supply original content.

[awongh]

I’m not sure I understand the analogy. You could say that the reason why artificial flavors work in food is because we know how to recreate flavors from first principle chemistry. The dislike of the artificialness of cheetos also doesn’t stop many many people from eating them.

I would say human made slop writing isn’t any better or worse quality than LLM writing.

Knowing if it was made by a real person makes a difference to me, but I also know it won’t to everyone.

[keiferski]

Just because the form of a story is the same as another story does not imply that the content is interchangeable.

I could write you a story right now about being an expat living in Poland in 2026. It’s unclear to me how an LLM would have the cultural knowledge or experience to write such a story that is actually accurate and up to date, without already having something like my story already in its dataset.

[lordnacho]

Yeah but you would just be doing the same thing: mashing up some known information about humans and Poland. You would pick plausible names like Marek or Piotr, plausible places like Warsaw or Gdansk, and some random flavour of story that is either completely general across cultures (hero's journey) or some local tale from Poland.

Shakespeare did the same, so I wouldn't blame you for it.

[keiferski]

I am an expat in Poland, that’s why I used it as an example. The point being that I have knowledge of that experience that is not written down in an LLM dataset.

[ModernMech]

Which would you rather watch:

Superhero Wars Trek 42 - the latest franchise installment, billion dollar Hollywood budget, financed and produced by billionaires, audience tested committee-made script, lots of people involved, designed primarily to push merchandise.

Personal Story - a movie about someone's personal reality or fantasy, something typically not made by studios because the story isn't profitable to a wide audience, painstakingly generated and edited by one person using AI, designed primarily to tell a story.

I put up a different strawman because your strawman is too beatable. As humans, of course we're all interested in what other humans have to say. But you haven't explained why you feel people can't use AI to say things, or why AI output can't be based on a real human's life experiences.

Personally, it seems like movie studios are the ones with only 7 stories to tell, and I've seen the movie and its sequel, the prequel, the requel, the remake, the gritty reboot, the musical, and the animated series. I'm excited that AI will let people skip the studio gatekeepers to tell some new stories for a change.