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15: AI Is Not Good for Writing · Finding God at Work

• 0:05
  (Transcribed by TurboScribe. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Hi, I'm Chris.
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  This is Finding God at Work.
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  Just a reminder that Finding God at Work
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  isn't just a podcast, it's also an online
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  course.
• 0:19
  Check it out at findinggodatwork.org.
• 0:27
  Our current series is A Mysterious Business, bringing
• 0:30
  ministry and marketplace wisdom together.
• 0:34
  I have here in my hands a happy
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  anniversary card from my parents.
• 0:40
  It's actually not from Katie and Mai's most
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  recent anniversary, which was just a few weeks
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  ago.
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  This has been sitting on my desk for
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  over a year now.
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  It's from our anniversary a year ago, which
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  was 12 years.
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  So on the inside, there's printed as part
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  of the card itself, a nice gold font
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  centered on the page, wishing you a wonderful
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  time celebrating your love.
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  And then handwritten in, you know, ballpoint ink
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  is 2025 in the upper right-hand corner.
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  And then, we love you, congrats on 12
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  years, mom and dad.
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  And that's clearly in my mom's handwriting.
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  Now which of those two parts do you
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  think I care more about?
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  Do you think I care more about the
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  nice, elegant, wishing you a wonderful time celebrating
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  your love that some author at some paper
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  card company came up with?
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  Or do you think I care more about,
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  we love you, congrats on 12 years written
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  in my mom's hand?
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  Of course, I care more about the personal
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  touch, right?
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  If my mom had mailed this card with
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  the elegant phrase, but without signing it, that
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  would have been really strange, right?
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  Because what is the purpose of this communication?
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  This is highly personal.
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  It's from my parents.
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  It's to me and my wife, Katie.
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  It's celebrating our marriage, right?
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  It's like the point is not that it'd
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  be the most polished or the most elegant.
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  The point is that it reflects the personal
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  relationship and it does that really well, which
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  is why I've had it sitting on my
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  desk in my office here for over a
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  year.
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  Now what does this have to do with
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  the use of AI in the workplace?
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  Well, if you're like me, one of the
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  main use cases for AI that people around
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  you are encouraging is using AI for writing,
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  using it for brainstorming, for drafting, or maybe
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  coming up with your own writing, but then
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  using AI for editing it or polishing it.
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  Just yesterday, I was in a gathering with
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  about 15 other professional fundraisers and we were
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  debating this.
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  And a lot of them were saying, look,
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  AI can make it better than I can.
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  And so you see the attraction, right?
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  It's like if you're searching for a word,
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  if you want it to have that professional
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  tone that's maybe hard to capture, AI can
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  maybe fill that in and make it work
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  faster than you could do, get to that
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  final product that feels like what you want
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  to send out better than what you could
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  do on your own.
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  So is this not just a case of
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  another tool, another technology, just like we use
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  digital communications to go faster and more conveniently
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  than written communications, even though they're less personal
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  because they don't have handwriting, they have the
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  digital text.
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  Is this just another example like that or
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  is something different going on?
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  Well, as we've looked at AI over the
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  past couple of episodes, we've mostly looked at
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  a very high level view of like, how
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  do we think about what it means to
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  be human, right?
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  And the teaching of Pope Leo has helped
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  us.
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  The teaching of scripture obviously guides us because
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  it's inspired by the Holy Spirit.
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  We have this vision in scripture of becoming
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  full grown human beings in Jesus Christ, that
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  God's grace is ultimately what helps us become
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  human.
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  And we need to think about that and
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  treasure that and protect that as we think
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  about the relationship between humanity and technology and
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  work and not just embrace things willy nilly
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  without really thinking about it.
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  In this episode, I want to get really
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  practical and look at one use case for
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  AI writing and argue that the most thoughtful,
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  faithful Christian response is to not use AI
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  for writing, not to use it for brainstorming,
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  to not use it for editing, to not
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  use it for coming up with sentences and
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  paragraphs, despite the apparent efficiencies and advantages of
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  doing it that way.
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  Okay, now I'm going to go to scripture
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  and try and make this argument from scripture,
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  applying it to our current context.
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  But I want to just say at the
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  outset, like, this is a new technology.
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  We're figuring it out together, right?
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  I'm not infallible.
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  And so if you have a different take,
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  I would love to hear from you.
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  What does AI look like in your workplace?
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  I've heard lots of different use cases.
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  And I also want to hasten to add,
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  I'm not against AI.
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  I'm not against thoughtful, intelligent use of AI.
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  I simply think that writing is not a
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  good use case for AI.
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  I think AI is really good for, for
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  example, transcription, transcribing meetings.
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  I use AI for that, for taking text
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  in one form and putting it in another
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  form.
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  I have an AI app on my phone
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  that I use to listen to articles.
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  If the article doesn't have an audio version,
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  the AI app turns it into audio for
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  me.
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  I think that's great.
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  If I have a conversation with somebody at
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  the food bank and they don't speak English
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  or Spanish, they have some other language, they
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  usually have a translator app, Google Translate or
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  something else that's using AI to translate.
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  And I certainly am willing to do that
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  to try and communicate with my neighbors.
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  So I think there are a lot of
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  really good use cases for AI, but I
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  think that writing is not one of them.
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  So let me start by exploring the purpose
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  of writing, the meaning of writing, and then
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  we'll go to scripture to look further.
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  OK, so first, what is the purpose of
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  writing?
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  Well, before writing existed, how did people have
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  to communicate?
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  Well, generally they had to be in the
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  same space.
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  They had to communicate voice to voice, face
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  to face.
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  So what did writing allow?
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  Writing allowed to capture in a different medium
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  the human voice.
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  And so even when that person is no
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  longer present, even when that person is no
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  longer alive, you can still, quote unquote, hear
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  their voice.
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  Right now, it would be many, many more
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  centuries until you could literally get an audio
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  recording of their voice, but you could get
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  their written voice.
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  And it was almost like you could have
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  a conversation with somebody who was not there.
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  This is an incredible technological breakthrough and one
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  that humanity embraced and that the people of
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  God embraced.
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  Right.
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  God inspired people to use this technology of
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  writing to write the Bible, among other things.
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  And so we know that God is not
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  opposed to technological advances that change how human
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  language works in different modalities.
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  OK, but again, think about it.
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  What does writing accomplish?
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  Writing allows a human voice to be captured
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  or to be put inside of a medium
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  that can then be accessed in a different
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  time or a different place.
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  But what does AI do?
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  What does AI do to writing?
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  Does AI help capture a human voice?
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  Actually, when you use AI to brainstorm, then
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  it's coming up with, quote unquote, ideas that
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  are not your unique creative human ideas.
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  It's not the light bulb moment that comes
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  to you.
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  It's not the thought in the shower.
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  It's like, oh, that's how we get it
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  done.
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  It's pulling through the statistical technology that works
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  within large language models from lots of other
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  people's ideas in history and then throwing things
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  at you that seem plausible.
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  That's not the same as a human being
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  having a light bulb moment.
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  What about when AI creates sentences and paragraphs?
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  Similarly, it's drawing on the previous writing of
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  human beings over many centuries, and it's combining
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  those together in what seems like a plausible
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  form.
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  That is fundamentally different than a human being
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  with their own will, with their own imagination,
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  with their own capacity to arrange words on
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  a page saying, I'm taking all of the
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  things that I know in my experience, all
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  the things that I've read and that I've
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  connected with.
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  And I'm now through my human person arranging
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  those ideas into into a new form that
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  I can offer to somebody else.
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  You see how AI doesn't actually amplify the
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  human voice.
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  It actually kind of takes the author out
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  of the text.
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  It anonymizes all of these inputs.
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  It's not like we know the names of
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  all of the the training data, as it's
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  called, that AI is drawing from.
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  And in that anonymized form, it gives you
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  something that can feel quick, fast, efficient, polished,
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  but it's no longer you.
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  It's no longer coming from a person.
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  And so I would say that this use
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  of AI is fundamentally different than, for example,
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  the technology of writing or the technology of
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  digital writing and word processing, even though, yes,
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  writing is different than speaking voice to voice.
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  It's a different modality.
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  And then again, typing in a digital form
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  is different than writing with your own hand.
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  It's a different modality.
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  Now we're dealing with a technology that's not
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  just a different modality.
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  It's actually changing the purpose of the communication.
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  In the past, the purpose was I am
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  a human person, right?
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  Or if it's a collaborative writing project, we
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  are human persons and I have something to
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  communicate to another human person or group of
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  human persons.
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  And now I will use this technology to
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  help me get my thoughts, my ideas into
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  words that can then go to that person.
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  What large language model AI is doing is
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  it's actually disrupting that by inserting this anonymized
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  voice from nowhere into the process that you
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  can't really take credit for.
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  Now, this is problematic for a couple of
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  different reasons.
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  One is I think it compromises the purpose
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  of communication.
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  So I use the example of the anniversary
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  card.
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  Have you ever gotten like a mailing, either
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  from a nonprofit organization asking for money or
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  from a for-profit corporation advertising a service
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  or a product?
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  And it looks like there's something handwritten.
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  But then when you look at it more
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  closely, it's like, oh, this is a machine
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  that's just trying to look handwritten.
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  Does that leave you with an icky feeling?
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  It leaves me with an icky feeling.
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  Why do they do that?
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  Because they know something that's actually personal, something
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  that's person to person grabs our heart.
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  And so they fake it.
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  They come up.
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  It's not really person to person.
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  It's still a machine, but it feels or
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  looks for a second.
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  Maybe you can fool somebody like it's person
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  to person.
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  You see how that's like it's pretending to
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  be something that it's not.
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  It's disingenuous.
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  It's almost deceitful.
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  Well, similarly, when we use AI, right, we're
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  saying I'm a person and I'm trying to
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  communicate this to you.
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  But then you're bringing something else in the
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  mix that's from a machine.
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  It's not really you.
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  And you're putting it into the process.
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  So it actually compromises the meaning, the purpose
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  of the communication.
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  Rather than person to person communication, you have
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  person with a machine trying to look like
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  a person to person communication.
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  So that's one reason it's problematic is it
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  actually compromises the meaning and the purpose of
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  writing itself.
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  The second reason it's problematic is a human
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  developmental reason.
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  You can only get better at writing by
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  writing.
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  And so when you have that sense of
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  like, oh, but AI is better, right?
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  If you use AI to get better, you're
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  no longer improving your own skills as a
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  writer.
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  You're no longer going through the mental anguish
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  that it takes to figure out how to
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  put words on paper.
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  OK, so a couple of different authors here
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  I think are really wise and helpful.
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  One of them is named Brett McCracken.
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  He writes for the Gospel Coalition and they
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  recently made a no AI in writing policy
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  and released it just back on August 5th.
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  And I love it.
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  I encourage you to go read it.
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  We'll link it in the in the show
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  notes like usual.
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  But I just want to quote this this
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  view or excuse me, this this couple paragraphs
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  from Brett that I just thought are so
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  apt.
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  So he says.
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  Writing is an art form and a labor
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  of love.
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  Love is something I cannot do.
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  Writing is a product of deeply human, necessarily
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  inefficient processing, meandering, wrestling, noodling, cogitating and often
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  suffering.
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  Suffering is something I cannot do.
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  For Christians, writing is a holy calling and
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  an act of worship.
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  Worship is something I cannot do.
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  Well, I I just love that I'm like,
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  yes, yeah, that's my rallying cry.
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  These are human things, but I want to
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  draw attention to that word inefficient, right?
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  It is necessarily inefficient, the process of writing.
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  If you don't go through the noodling, the
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  anguish, the struggle, the staring at the blank
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  page to try and come up with an
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  idea, you're not developing that part of your
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  personal capacity that makes it possible to become
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  a good writer over time.
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  And so you're shortchanging yourself.
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  OK, another writer who I really appreciate.
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  She often reports for CT.
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  She's a religion reporter, Kate Shellnut.
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  Back in April, she put out 45 things
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  to do when you get writer's block.
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  So, again, if if you're like, oh, man,
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  I just wish I could use a I
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  try any of these 45 things instead.
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  One, get off social media to open a
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  fresh doc and come up with a new
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  outline.
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  Three, reread your notes slowly for eat a
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  snack.
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  Five, explain the story to someone who doesn't
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  know anything about it.
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  Thanks, Mom.
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  Six, work from a different room.
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  And it goes on and on, right?
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  Like this is part of the struggle of
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  writing.
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  Well, even in a professional environment, you have
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  to embrace the process if you're going to
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  be able to do the writing the next
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  week.
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  OK, now, now some of the skeptics, they
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  might be saying, well, sure.
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  OK, for certain kinds of writing, that makes
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  sense.
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  Like if you're writing like a theological essay,
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  sure.
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  That's why the Gospel Coalition is announcing its
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  editorial policy.
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  But what about more functional forms of writing?
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  So like, for example, I was speaking with
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  fellow fundraisers and and they were talking about,
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  look, it saves me time when I'm trying
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  to get a letter out to donors.
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  It sounds more polished than I can make
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  it that quickly.
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  And I've got a lot on my plate
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  and I'm trying to raise a lot of
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  money for a cause that matters.
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  I can help.
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  And here's what I want to say.
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  Where do you draw the line between meaningful
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  and functional?
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  Isn't human language, person to person communication, even
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  when it's about functional things and think about
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  Scripture again, the Holy Spirit inspired Scripture, but
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  sometimes Scripture was highly functional.
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  There's technical writing in Scripture in the description
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  of the temple.
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  There's fundraising in Scripture.
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  Second Corinthians, Paul's epistle is largely a fundraising
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  letter.
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  Would it have been better for us if
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  Paul had had access to A.I. and
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  he could have saved time when he wrote
• 14:06
  Second Corinthians and gotten it out more efficiently
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  because he was really caring about the urgency
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  of the needs of the saints in Jerusalem,
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  which is what he was fundraising for?
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  I don't think so.
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  I think God chose to inspire a limited,
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  flawed human being like Paul to use imperfect
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  words and language to communicate God's truth, even
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  in a functional moment of fundraising.
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  And I think that whatever your job is,
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  whether you're fundraising for an important cause or
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  whether you're doing technical writing or whether you're
• 14:34
  writing has some other purpose and it feels
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  like A.I. offers a quick and easy
• 14:39
  way to get it done faster.
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  Is that compromising the meaning of the writing
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  itself, even if it's functional, isn't there a
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  human element there that's somehow being warped and
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  long term?
• 14:51
  What does that mean for your capacities?
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  And what does it mean for our collective
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  capacity to trust written language?
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  If A.I. can make everything sound polished,
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  then a hundred years from now, when people
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  read something polished, it'll be meaningless.
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  It's like polish doesn't reflect effort anymore.
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  It doesn't reflect skill.
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  It just means they ran it through a
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  machine.
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  So why should I care?
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  OK, so again, I this this may seem
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  extreme, but I think it actually comes from
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  the teaching of scripture.
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  So I want to go to Matthew chapter
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  12.
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  And look at one of my favorite teachings
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  from Jesus, the tree and its fruit, but
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  it's also a teaching on words.
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  So let's let's listen with humility to Jesus's
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  teaching here.
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  The starting in verse thirty three.
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  Jesus says either make the tree good and
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  its fruit good or make the tree bad
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  and its fruit bad for the tree is
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  known by its fruit.
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  You brood of vipers, how can you speak
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  good when you are evil for out of
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  the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks
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  the good person out of his good treasure
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  brings forth good and the evil person out
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  of his evil treasure brings forth evil.
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  I tell you, on the day of judgment,
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  people will give account for every careless word
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  they speak, for by your words, you will
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  be justified and by your words, you will
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  be condemned.
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  OK, this is one of those high stakes
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  passages where Jesus says something really matters, really
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  pay attention here.
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  And what does he say matters words?
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  He says on the day of judgment, we're
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  going to give an account for, quote, every
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  careless word.
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  Every careless word.
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  Now, obviously, Jesus and his other teachings, he
• 16:26
  know he's very concerned about the use of
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  language to convey contempt for anger, to convey
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  unholy judgment, to convey deceit or or arrogant
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  boasting.
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  Obviously, these kinds of careless words fly in
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  the face of the gospel.
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  But I think we should take that word
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  careless seriously, even if we have noble intentions,
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  even if we're not using our language to
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  deceive intentionally or to cast contempt or what
• 16:53
  have you, is asking a machine to throw
• 16:55
  a bunch of words on the page.
• 16:57
  Is that a careful way of writing?
• 17:00
  Are we using our words with care the
• 17:02
  way Jesus would have us use with care?
• 17:04
  Are you willing to answer for every word
• 17:06
  that goes out under your name, even the
• 17:09
  ones written by AI on the day of
• 17:10
  judgment?
• 17:13
  Oh.
• 17:14
  I, hmm.
• 17:15
  I think I would prefer to write the
• 17:17
  words myself if I'm going to have to
• 17:18
  answer for them on the day of judgment.
• 17:22
  OK, I don't want to put too fine
• 17:23
  a point on it, but that seems to
• 17:24
  be what Jesus is saying.
• 17:26
  Every careless word by your words, you will
• 17:27
  be justified and by your words, you will
• 17:29
  be condemned.
• 17:30
  Now, why is this?
• 17:31
  It's because of what Jesus says earlier in
• 17:33
  the passage.
• 17:33
  He says, for out of the abundance of
• 17:35
  the heart, the mouth speaks.
• 17:37
  Language has spiritual power to reveal the heart
• 17:41
  of a person.
• 17:42
  That's something that we know from the scriptures
• 17:44
  that God has revealed to us that language
• 17:46
  has spiritual power.
• 17:48
  Words have the power to reveal the heart.
• 17:51
  That's why when you throw in a machine
• 17:53
  that's not human and you put a bunch
• 17:55
  of non-human words and structures and grammar
• 17:57
  and ideas in the mix, you're obscuring the
• 18:01
  heart of the person who's supposed to be
• 18:02
  communicating.
• 18:03
  And I would argue in many functional contexts
• 18:06
  that personal heart source of the communication still
• 18:10
  matters.
• 18:11
  Somebody is asking you for money.
• 18:13
  Doesn't it matter that it came from their
• 18:15
  heart?
• 18:16
  And here's where we come back to this
• 18:18
  sense of what does it mean to be
• 18:19
  better?
• 18:20
  We might be tempted to use AI because
• 18:21
  it can make us write faster or can
• 18:23
  be more polished.
• 18:24
  But again, what matters about the communication is
• 18:27
  not how perfect it is.
• 18:29
  It's how human it is.
• 18:31
  And I think we're going to see this
• 18:32
  that I think that, quote unquote, perfect language
• 18:35
  that comes from AI versus imperfect language that
• 18:38
  comes from real human beings.
• 18:39
  I think that's going to be the more
• 18:40
  powerful language because it comes from the heart
• 18:42
  out of the overflow of the heart.
• 18:43
  The mouth speaks.
• 18:44
  It reveals people's character with less interruption, with
• 18:46
  less warped interruption from AI.
• 18:52
  So in your work context, think about how
• 18:55
  you're being perhaps encouraged to use AI for
• 18:57
  writing and think this through in terms of
• 18:59
  your own convictions.
• 19:00
  Again, I'm not infallible.
• 19:01
  Go to the scripture.
• 19:02
  Consider what you think Jesus means in this
• 19:04
  passage and how it would relate to using
• 19:06
  AI for for writing.
• 19:08
  And then think about where you need to
• 19:10
  draw the lines.
• 19:11
  And this is really important, even if they're
• 19:13
  different than what the people around you are
• 19:14
  doing, even if they're different than what's expected
• 19:17
  of you.
• 19:17
  This is a matter of conscience for us
• 19:19
  as Christian human beings.
• 19:21
  And so some people, they might have to
• 19:24
  say, look, I can't use AI in this
• 19:25
  way and they might lose their jobs over
• 19:27
  that.
• 19:28
  Now, again, this requires discernment.
• 19:29
  Maybe there's a way that you can remain
• 19:32
  faithful to your convictions while still doing what's
• 19:34
  asked of you.
• 19:35
  I'm not saying across the board, but I
• 19:37
  think we really need to be willing to
• 19:38
  stand up for what it means to be
• 19:40
  human persons as Christians.
• 19:43
  We are the ones that know these things,
• 19:44
  and it's our responsibility to share them with
• 19:47
  the world.
• 19:48
  If we just roll over and say, OK,
• 19:49
  you asked me to use this new technology
• 19:51
  that fundamentally compromises what it means for human
• 19:53
  beings to communicate with one another.
• 19:55
  Are we really doing our job to to
• 19:57
  be prophetic voices of truth in the world?
• 20:00
  OK, easy for me to say.
• 20:02
  Hard to put into practice in a high
• 20:03
  stakes situation.
• 20:04
  Pray about it.
• 20:05
  Use discernment.
• 20:06
  Ask God for wisdom.
• 20:08
  I want to end with a word from
• 20:10
  Pastor James Brian Smith.
• 20:12
  James Brian Smith has written a lot of
• 20:14
  wonderful books.
• 20:15
  One of them is a series of books
• 20:17
  called The Good and Beautiful God.
• 20:19
  Highly recommend those.
• 20:20
  But he has this quote.
• 20:21
  I got to hear him speak at a
• 20:22
  conference and he said, outside every church, there
• 20:24
  should be a sign that says we know
• 20:26
  stuff.
• 20:27
  Because in our culture, we tend to think
• 20:29
  that, oh, it's the academics and the universities
• 20:31
  who know things.
• 20:33
  And then at church, we just sort of
• 20:34
  believe stuff.
• 20:36
  And it's true that the scholars know things,
• 20:38
  that's great.
• 20:38
  The academic research path is a legitimate path
• 20:42
  towards certain kinds of knowledge.
• 20:43
  But the revelation that God has given us
• 20:46
  in Jesus Christ is also a form of
• 20:48
  knowledge and even of more important knowledge.
• 20:51
  So in the church, we know stuff.
• 20:53
  And so in this series where we're bringing
• 20:54
  ministry and marketplace wisdom together, it's really important
• 20:58
  for what we know in the church about
• 20:59
  what it means to be human, for us
• 21:01
  to share that with the world and for
• 21:03
  that to shape the world of work now
• 21:05
  and in the future.
• 21:08
  Lord Jesus, thank you that you became human,
• 21:11
  that you are the one drawing us into
• 21:13
  true humanity in your own resurrected body.
• 21:17
  I ask that you would give us your
• 21:19
  spirit of wisdom, that we would be gentle
• 21:21
  and nonjudgmental as we lean into these things,
• 21:24
  but that we would stand for what it
• 21:26
  means to communicate as human beings created in
• 21:29
  the image of God as persons, not machines.
• 21:33
  Give us wisdom about the right way to
• 21:34
  employ technology and give us courage to stand
• 21:37
  up when we need to go against the
• 21:38
  current.
• 21:40
  Jesus, do your work in us as we
• 21:41
  do our work.
• 21:47
  Thanks for listening.
• 21:49
  Finding God at Work is a production of
• 21:51
  Mission Central, a ministry based in Aurora, Illinois,
• 21:53
  dedicated to forming Christians for mission in everyday
• 21:56
  life.
• 21:56
  You can subscribe to the podcast wherever you
• 21:59
  listen to this episode to get 10 minutes
• 22:01
  of teaching on faith and work every Thursday
• 22:03
  to get resources to go deeper with each
• 22:05
  podcast series, read our blog and get info
• 22:08
  about upcoming courses on faith in the workplace.
• 22:10
  Go to our website, missioncentral.church.