The pitch. An email. Time crunch.  A need to get it just right.

A seemingly perfect solution: Have AI do it.

There’s an ample amount of research on overuse of AI to the point where “AI slop” has entered the lexicon reminiscent of the way Google became a verb.  Somewhere in the mix, expediency and tidiness became elevated standards for writing, and the very purpose of writing, the labor of confronting one’s thoughts, desires, and wants in order to see them literally on the page to communicate, to create, has been cast aside.  It’s like we’ve mistaken a Taco Bell drive-thru for a home-cooked meal.

In writing, one discovers oneself.  Thoughts, emotions, and reasons bounce around the corridors of one’s mind, some of which can remain hidden even to oneself until, with pen in hand (or fingers to a keyboard) they are released.  It’s an extraordinary process.

For a long time I couldn’t quite put my finger on the oddity of what I was reading in AI generated emails and, unfortunately, my students’ papers.  There were no grammar errors to note and the flow all seemed to work just fine.  But, I, the reader, felt empty. Unmoved.

Now that the email pitches are increasing, I find myself skimming more and more of the same no-nonsense, straight-to-the-point writing sprinkled with a hint of flattery for good measure. The reality of this disturbs me more. There’s no soul on the other end of the communication.  I could have AI respond to the influx of emails, but that would be an absurd situation as well.

My chatbot and your chatbot

sitting by the laptop…

Seriously, what is happening?

By soul, I do not mean to invoke a religious tone but rather a call to one’s unique human essence, their particular wants, their particular point of view that can be aimless at times or can connect dots that invite me on a mental excursion.  I want the journey just as much as I want the point.

A couple of years ago I was listening to an interview on the Armchair Expert podcast.  The guest, a well known lawyer from where I grew up, talked about insane homicide cases he had prosecuted. I immediately bought his book, and midway through reading it I started to imagine questions I’d want to ask him if I ever had the chance.

So, I looked him up: Matt Murphy. Deep sigh… his résumé and history of media appearances was overwhelming.  I mean, lovely for him, but improbable for me to get him on my indie podcast.  He was a regular on major news outlets, crime shows, and of course, top of the charts podcasts like Dax Shepard’s.

Perhaps there was one glimmer of hope: my podcast partner and producer, Rudy Salo, is a lawyer at a fancy-schmancy law firm.

“Okay, so hear me out,” I said calling Rudy from my car to the soundtrack of Los Angeles traffic and periodic instructions from Waze chiming in.  I gave him the scoop on the guest and how I loved the book and wouldn’t it be cool if he could be on Good Is In The Details?

Rudy responded, “Cool. I love it. Set it up.”

“Um…well I was wondering…I know this isn’t your branch of law, but do you think you could reach out to him? Maybe there’s some connections that could get us an interview?”

“No. Nonononono.  This is all you.  Trust me, it’s better if it comes from you.”

One more plea while I navigated a turn.

Also, I totally thought he’d say yes.

“You’ve got this,” he said with an air of finality.

To be clear, it wasn’t that Rudy didn’t want to do the assignment.  He wasn’t brushing me off.  He was actually doing something that a true friend would do.  Rudy registered my enthusiasm for the guest’s work and recognized that my hesitancy stemmed from a lack of confidence in my own. Insisting that I do the reaching out was to help me build my sense of worth.  He was right.

I wrestled with writing the email for over a week.  I was that nervous.

What I eventually wrote bore zero resemblance to a pitch template.  I just let my authentic nerdy self explain what I loved about his book: the theme of justice actualized in the cases, the reference to Descartes in the chapter about witnessing an autopsy, how encountering the worst of humanity affected his personal life, and the way he learned to be whole at the end of a grueling case.

In other words, it was me, pure me, pure booktrovert philosophy me who communicated my appreciation for his book and the intellectual itch to talk to him about it on the podcast.

Send.

Okay, I thought. I just did that. I hope it sounded professional.  Oh shit.  What if it didn’t? It’ll probably end up in his junk email anyway.  At least I can say I tried.

The.

Very.

Next.

Day.

His secretary responded: “Yes.”  I jumped out of my seat with the grace of The Three Stooges.

My stress, anxiety, and mental labor to craft the right message could have been alleviated by an AI template.  But that route would have cost me the joy of communicating what was on my mind and sharing that for the guest to read.

Communication requires a soul.  Outsourcing writing robs the writer and the reader of the beauty of our human-ness.  Trust yourself to express your thoughts.  Communication, be it emails, newsletters, or college papers, needs the human experience embedded in the connection.

If we remove ourselves from communication, then we aren’t communicating.  We aren’t connecting.  And we lose the opportunity to exercise this incredibly special thing we have as humans: language born of the heart and mind.

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