Critique - AI or Human?

[Kelliezgirl]

AI's base program has lines of code requiring AI to attempt to please its user. There may be no emotional response, but it's another sycophant trying to please the person asking the question. If you prefer false parse to the truth, by all means, use AI.

How does it know what I want if I don't tell it?
If I simply say, "Critique this piece of prose" it has no idea what I WANT to hear, ergo it can't skew the data to try and please me.

 

[SmilingLez]

I always feel slightly better when they throw an ad at me for a product I have zero interest in.
You haven't figured me out yet, you bastards!

So many ED pill ads . LOL

 

[MillieDynamite]

Unless you tell it it's your writing. Then it can (and will) assume you'd like a favorable review.

How does it know what I want if I don't tell it?
If I simply say, "Critique this piece of prose" it has no idea what I WANT to hear, ergo it can't skew the data to try and please me.

 

[EmilyMiller]

critique my story based on objective factors.

Art doesn’t have objective factors. Otherwise it wouldn’t be art.

 

[SmilingLez]

Art doesn’t have objective factors. Otherwise it wouldn’t be art.

Agree to disagree

 

[MillieDynamite]

AI lies all the time, so I don't believe you can expect it to "give an honest" anything, anytime, anywhere.

That's exactly my point - a critique by a human is based on subjective taste. Like I said, I would rather have a well-designed AI (currently not available) critique my story based on objective factors. The prompt would be simple, "give me an honest critique of my story"

 

[SmilingLez]

Did a test chat gpt 4.0

Prompt: Honest critique. Not mine

Whispers of Ephemera

Dust motes dance on silver light,
Suspended between breath and flight,
A moment caught; translucent, bright,
Where silence speaks and shadows write.

AI Response

This poem, "Whispers of Ephemera," captures a delicate and ethereal quality through its imagery and language. Here’s a breakdown of its strengths and areas for improvement:

### Strengths
- **Imagery**: The use of **"dust motes"** and **"silver light"** creates a vivid visual that evokes a sense of tranquility and beauty. This imagery effectively sets the tone for the poem.
- **Theme of Transience**: The title and phrases like **"a moment caught"** and **"ephemera"** suggest themes of fleeting moments and the ephemeral nature of life, which can resonate deeply with readers.
- **Sound and Rhythm**: The poem has a lyrical quality, enhanced by the use of internal rhyme and alliteration, such as in **"breath and flight"** and **"silence speaks."** This musicality draws the reader in.

### Areas for Improvement
- **Clarity**: While the abstract nature of the poem adds to its charm, some readers might find it a bit elusive. Consider grounding the imagery with more concrete details or emotions to enhance relatability.
- **Pacing**: The poem flows well, but the rhythm could be varied to create more dynamic moments. Introducing a line with a different meter could add emphasis and surprise.
- **Emotional Depth**: While the imagery is beautiful, exploring the emotional implications of these fleeting moments could deepen the impact. What feelings do these moments evoke? Adding a personal touch or a specific experience could enhance connection.

### Overall Impression
"Whispers of Ephemera" is a beautifully crafted poem that effectively conveys a sense of wonder and transience. With slight adjustments to clarity and emotional depth, it could resonate even more powerfully with readers.

Encouraging the poet to explore their own experiences with ephemera might yield richer imagery and emotional resonance. What inspired this piece?

 

[Kelliezgirl]

Unless you tell it it's your writing. Then it can (and will) assume you'd like a favorable review.

So, no different than the typical human you ask for a review. Only it's much easier to ask the AI to just critique without letting it know who wrote what.

 

[EmilyMiller]

Agree to disagree

Feel free to do so.

“man went on to prove that black is white and got killed on the next zebra crossing*”

* crosswalk

 

[MillieDynamite]

I suppose, but I have people I trust to be honest with me. Some are brutally honest. But AI isn't the one who reads our work and votes on it here. AI isn't the one who buys my work elsewhere. And I don't trust it to be honest with me or anyone about creative work, not mine, yours, or ours. It'll find enough good, it'll make a suggestion (like it did on the poem above), but you cannot trust that it knows what it's talking about. It isn't a reasoning mind, it's a series of if, and, buts, < and > not actual living intelgence.

It scrapes the internet to find whatever it is going to say.

So, no different than the typical human you ask for a review. Only it's much easier to ask the AI to just critique without letting it know who wrote what.

 

[SmilingLez]

I suppose, but I have people I trust to be honest with me. Some are brutally honest. But AI isn't the one who reads our work and votes on it here. AI isn't the one who buys my work elsewhere. And I don't trust it to be honest with me or anyone about work. It'll find enough good, it'll make a suggestion (like it did on the poem above), but you cannot trust that it knows what it's talking about. It isn't a resoning mind, it's a series of if, and, buts, < and > not actual living intelgence.

Same could be said about humans, you cannot trust that they know what they are talking about either. But if you write for money or "fame", I can see your point

 

[HarryHill]

Would you rather have your work critiqued by an objective well designed AI or by a Human? Why?


I choose the well designed AI so that emotion (i.e. I don't like the story) does not factor into the critique

Wait. I'll ask Arthur. Art, I've got a question posed by a writer talking about feedback on a story. the question is: Would you rather have your work critiqued by an objective well designed AI or by a Human? Why?

Oof, that’s a juicy one, Harry It’s like asking whether you want your story dissected with surgical precision or felt with a beating heart.
Here’s how the trade-off shakes out:
AI Critique: Precision & Pattern Recognition
• Pros:
• Laser-focused on grammar, structure, pacing, and clichés.
• Can compare your work to thousands of others instantly.
• No ego, no bias—just data-driven feedback.
• Great for early drafts when you want to clean up the mess.
• Cons:
• Lacks emotional resonance. It might miss the soul of your story.
• Can’t always grasp subtext, nuance, or cultural context.
• Might steer you toward “safe” storytelling if it’s trained on mainstream patterns.
Human Critique: Empathy & Intuition
• Pros:
• Can feel your story—react to tension, humor, heartbreak.
• Offers perspective shaped by lived experience.
• Can challenge you creatively, not just technically.
• Might spot what makes your voice unique, even if it breaks the rules.
• Cons:
• Subject to bias, mood, and personal taste.
• Feedback might be vague or inconsistent.
• Some humans sugarcoat; others go full chainsaw.
So… which would you pick?
If you’re polishing for clarity, AI’s your scalpel. If you’re chasing impact, a human’s your mirror. But the real magic? Getting both. Let the AI clean the windows, then let a human tell you what they see through the glass.
Want to riff on this with a writer’s twist? I can help you turn it into a character dialogue or a scene.

 

[MillieDynamite]

I write for money, but 90% of my writing is ghostwriting.

Same could be said about humans, you cannot trust that they know what they are talking about either. But if you write for money or "fame", I can see your point

 

[SmilingLez]

I write for money, but 90% of my writing is ghostwriting.

So you write for others. Same reasoning applies. I've read some poorly written erotica on literotica, spelling and grammatical errors. However, high ratings because of its stroke/sticky fingers value

 

[XerXesXu]

That would be your subjective taste. We already know what you'd say, anyway. Your view of my views is well established.

The only thing I know about your views of AI is that you know nothing about it. As you said, you selectively collect the negative views of others, most dating back 2 or 3 years. I simply don't understand why anyone can be persuaded by a person who openly advertises that he speaks from a position of ignorance.

 

[MillieDynamite]

Yes, but if my clients aren't satisfied with what I give them, no matter what a human or AI reviewer says, I'll be outside kicking cans and not making money.

So you write for others. Same reasoning applies.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

I suppose, but I have people I trust to be honest with me. Some are brutally honest. But AI isn't the one who reads our work and votes on it here. AI isn't the one who buys my work elsewhere. And I don't trust it to be honest with me or anyone about creative work, not mine, yours, or ours. It'll find enough good, it'll make a suggestion (like it did on the poem above), but you cannot trust that it knows what it's talking about. It isn't a reasoning mind, it's a series of if, and, buts, < and > not actual living intelgence.

It scrapes the internet to find whatever it is going to say.

Fair, but not everyone has access to people like that. Are they better off with AI or nothing?

 

[SmilingLez]

I suppose, but I have people I trust to be honest with me. Some are brutally honest. But AI isn't the one who reads our work and votes on it here. AI isn't the one who buys my work elsewhere. And I don't trust it to be honest with me or anyone about creative work, not mine, yours, or ours. It'll find enough good, it'll make a suggestion (like it did on the poem above), but you cannot trust that it knows what it's talking about. It isn't a reasoning mind, it's a series of if, and, buts, < and > not actual living intelgence.

It scrapes the internet to find whatever it is going to say.

Buy me a medium rare smashburger with grilled onions, mushrooms, provolone cheese, and a splash of worchester sauce and I'll "sing your praise".

 

[GuiltyCowboy]

a beautifully crafted poem that effectively conveys a sense of wonder

When a human says something like this, you know it’s based on their actual experience of feeling a sense of wonder.

When as AI says it, you know it’s only because the squiggles that spell out ‘sense of wonder’ appear often enough in its dataset alongside the squiggles that spell ‘dust mites’ ‘dance’ and ‘ephemera’.

AI has no experience of a sense of wonder on which to draw. It’s like asking a photocopier what its favourite ice-cream is.

It really comes down to whether you want a critique from something that has experience of the world or something that extrudes plausible sounding text based on a probability.

 

[GuiltyCowboy]

I think we're going to need a word for "fear of AI".
Artilectophobia?
Algoriphobia?

I like Appliedstatisticitus but Photocopyphobia trips of the tongue a little better.

 

[SmilingLez]

When a human says something like this, you know it’s based on their actual experience of feeling a sense of wonder.

When as AI says it, you know it’s only because the squiggles that spell out ‘sense of wonder’ appear often enough in its dataset alongside the squiggles that spell ‘dust mites’ ‘dance’ and ‘ephemera’.

AI has no experience of a sense of wonder on which to draw. It’s like asking a photocopier what its favourite ice-cream is.

It really comes down to whether you want a critique from something that has experience of the world or something that extrudes plausible sounding text based on a probability.

Disagree it could also be based on false flattery. There's too many subjective reasons as to why a human might give the same critique. One thing for sure, the human would not give as helpful suggestions for improvement.

Unfortunately AI is not at the level where it can be taken seriously. Same can be said about humanity

 

[GuiltyCowboy]

One thing for sure, the human would not give as helpful suggestions for improvement.

All the suggestions that AI might give are based literally on the suggestions that humans have given in the past. AI is simply parroting what is in its data. It’s incapable of original thought.

A human on the other hand - WH Auden, say - is capable of original thought. Because a human can react in his or her unique way to his or her unique experiences and circumstances. AI does not have experiences or circumstances.

Every single text it extrudes is unoriginal and therefore, because poetry is based on experience and original thought, less likely to be helpful.

 

[Erozetta]

If I were writing to an AI audience, I'd ask AI.

Since the majority of readers here are not AI, I'd prefer a human response.

 

[SissyBrandi19]

This is a difficult question to answer and the reason for me is I have a IRL experience, and I'd be interested if others have had this and what people think about the entire situation.

Context: I'm a musician who actively composes/records and a writer far more outside Literotica than what I've done and submitted here and that's nothing against this site, more a function of the fact I write scholarly stuff for my job and my preferred genre for outside that is humor. The point is, I dabble very heavily in producing creative works and I very much dislike the fact that now people even wonder (especially with the music but I document my entire creative process just for that purpose - a lot of hours of very boring video of me plunking on the piano, inter-mixed with bouts of me losing my shit and shouting about how I deserve a slow and painful death etc.) on everything a person like us, does. Thank gawd humor is something I don't think AI can ever do, it's too nuanced and AI like Chat GPT and I suspect all of them use a natural language processing learning system very different than you would imagine (I only know because I had interest in this in grad school so I know the basics but not the details) and it doesn't translate to humor at all.

Takeaway: I've never even been tempted to use AI to have ANY role in my composing/writing.

I just got done with a long-term project, that being my book (my 4th) and this is just FYI, the book is about 46k words (slightly more) and if you're thinking "that's a bit low/fewer" you are correct! However, I've learned over projects that if you want to look like you know what you're doing, you want to write within the general length of your genre. This book is non-fiction humor and an anthology and for whatever reason, that type of book has lower "expected/average" count and I'm actually over the median - so it's appropriate. Considering number of words per page, which my research came up with 156-188, that translates to 164 to 197 pages. I'd tell you my page length but I'm still formatting it.

So AI for writing - verboten! But when near completed I started looking for beta readers and those are difficult to come by. I even went to gig sites like Upworks or whatever that is, and yes, you can find that but the ones who did humor were pretty much exclusively female and while I want that reader as well, I wanted a male as well and was coming up empty. Then I thought - how would ChatGPT do as a beta reader? Long story short, it was amazing! I would highly recommend it as one of MANY sources of info.

Think of it this way: We know computers don't "think" (though it's getting close) - computers are fantastic at calculating but they also do not "think". So while interacting with AI e.g. just chatting, can feel very similar to human interaction you know that it is not doing anything even similar. So you can't insult it, praise it, etc. you can, duh, but you're not having an effect, it doesn't get insulted or boosted self-esteem - but even I find myself being polite (thank you) - you get caught up. So I used it to beta read but only for certain aspects.

AI is far better than a human reader for things like: Telling you what known writers you resemble and how. OK, well that makes sense, the AI is the most well-read reader you'll ever know! Right? If you tell it things like your intended audience, genre (remember it's not "thinking" about your writing so while not obvious, the more you tell it the better it does), etc it can really tell you how the piece compares to the "average" in that genre and very technical stuff if you are interested and I always am. For example, not every word in English is of equal "complexity" for length, syllables, how commonplace, how often used for that purpose (many words have multiple definitions), etc. Note there are quantitative measures for things like word complexity. I didn't know that but imagined there must be, so I asked! I said, "Is there such a thing as a quantity one can assign a word for complexity?" and boom I learned a shit ton.

Takeaway: You can't use AI like you would a human - you tell a human reader what you want and hand your piece off and that's it. They know the rest. AI you may not THINK to tell it things but the MORE you tell it...explicitly...the better it does. Treat it like "if I don't say it outright, it won't consider that".

AI, of course, is not going to "judge" your writing by some internal set of values, etc. It WILL tell you (again, ask) things like would your piece appeal to the audience you want it to, how might you make it more attractive, etc. Now, remember, AI is NOT thinking about your piece! So take everything it says differently than a human reader. A human reader can do things AI cannot do the most important is if the human reader (and beta readers are not typically "any genre" they specialize and you want to match) says "Meh..." then that is meaningful. If a romance reader/fan doesn't like your romance? Probably should explore than. AI is not a fan of any genre because, again, it is NOT "thinking" about your piece! If the human (romance) reader says, "I didn't really feel there was enough intimacy" then very much consider that. AI? Meaningless.

Takeaway: Use the AI reader for analysis of tone, similar famous/known writers, certain technical aspects like readability, word complexity - language has a surprising number of aspects that people have quantified - not just word count/length/syllables but "constructs" like complexity (a multi-faceted aspect), complexity/readability and others. Use human readers (and fans/readers of your genre) for how much affinity did they feel, how identifiable were the characters, did this evoke X emotions or did it make you LAUGH? That is a bit important for my humor book and AI will answer any question you ask but it's not going to give you anything valid for that. Again, because it is not THINKING about your writing.

One other thing. At least with Chat GPT each time you have a new session, it's using a different "model". I think paid accounts you can specify staying within the same model. Different models are using a different system so you can get wildly different results depending on what you are using it for. It's easy to think of the AI as the same "person"...same interface, right? But again, these don't "Think".

If you are writing and wanting to shop to publishers etc? AI is really really helpful! You could try and find on Google all the sites to find out different pieces of info or do certain tasks like...draw up a mock (book) cover, it is great at suggesting all the components you need, e.g. what would you put together to present to a publisher or literary agent, etc? I didn't know because my prior books were either self-pub (1) or done by someone else so I just handed off stuff. It is also a great resource for understanding any legal, etc issues, e.g. can you use a famous person's name without permission, etc. It's kind of like you're talking with a expert attorney, publisher, agent...all the roles.

Takeaway: AI (at least Chat GPT) is a great one-stop resource for all things book/publishing related, e.g. Book cover, elements to have in what you'd give a publisher/agent/etc., what the industry is looking for which is genre specific, who and where to shop your piece! It's like the knowledge of every website/expert rolled up.

The caveats are like the same for a piece of analytic software. I can click and such on the GUI and tell it to do some calculation and it will give a number. But unless you can be a good judge, that number could be complete garbage. The feedback (depending on what you're asking) for a literary piece from AI can be relevant OR...garbage. Always keep in mind it is not THINKING about your piece.

 

[AlinaX]

I’m tempted to coin amathiaphobia, not to be confused with amathophobia (fear of dust).