Reply to Majoring in English—why so much disrespect?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=dony898]Everyone dunks on English majors until they need help writing a single coherent sentence on LinkedIn.[/quote]

I have nothing but respect for English and history majors, but writing a single coherent sentence on LinkedIn is a perfect example of what ChatGPT is good for.[/quote]

If someone needs a little help because they have no idea how to write, then maybe. But if they truly want to write well, even on LinkedIn, then ChatGPT isn’t quite enough.[/quote]

People really need to stop commenting on ChatGPT if you don’t really understand how to use it.

Stanford trained chatGPT 3 (a paid version but a year old) on its best college essays and then had it write new ones to answer the prompts.

AOs said it produced essays in the top 1% of all essays.

So if you are using a free version of chatGPT and have no idea how to train it, then results won’t be great.  However if you are willing to shell out a couple of bucks and know how to prompt it, it can produce very good tom excellent work.[/quote]

I agree. AI is clearly becoming more useful every day. But the end result is that from this moment on, we will be producing dumbasses. Writing a twenty page paper requires significant higher thought - from the research to the organization of thoughts to vocabulary and so on. The AI shortcut is about productivity, which is why every company on the planet is embracing AI. But it absolutely kills creative thought and the discipline to work through a problem.

I find media interesting. All the talent seems to be migrating to Substack, where they can make their own money after they've established a bit of a brand at legacy media. For the English majors, if you have a unique voice, it can work out very well. But for those thinking they can pursue jobs in corporate communications - press releases, speeches, in-house blogs, and so on - I think that's dead. There will be a sea of college idiots going forward because all they know is AI prompts. And corporate America will go AI for absolutely everything they can.

But a person with a unique voice and solid research skills has real possibilities that are very untraditional. The first job at a small town paper or publishing a story in a journal somewhere is not a stepping stone to anything anymore. It's all about building a brand, and then monetizing it through other mediums. So majoring in English is fine, but you need to be driven to make it work. The value is the voice. And that's usually not happening at 22. But if they stick with it and find their subjects and their angle and voice, the written word can be very lucrative when it is authentic. [/quote]

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