From Buffett’s letters to shareholders to Howard Marks’ memos and several others, there is a pattern of good investors also being good writers. As in most cases, the writing began as a ‘note to self’ of sorts, which is in some sense a practice of clarifying one’s own thinking. Most good writers write for themselves to think better. As Paul Graham, himself an original thinker who can write brilliantly, puts it in this piece, that skill is under threat by you-know-what -AI.
Writing is a powerful tool to express your ideas to impress or influence people and hence most people attempt it even if they aren’t particularly good at it.
“Not anymore. AI has blown this world open. Almost all pressure to write has dissipated. You can have AI do it for you, both in school and at work.
The result will be a world divided into writes and write-nots. There will still be some people who can write. Some of us like it. But the middle ground between those who are good at writing and those who can’t write at all will disappear. Instead of good writers, ok writers, and people who can’t write, there will just be good writers and people who can’t write.
Is that so bad? Isn’t it common for skills to disappear when technology makes them obsolete? There aren’t many blacksmiths left, and it doesn’t seem to be a problem.
Yes, it’s bad. The reason is something I mentioned earlier: writing is thinking. In fact there’s a kind of thinking that can only be done by writing. You can’t make this point better than Leslie Lamport did: “If you’re thinking without writing, you only think you’re thinking.”
So a world divided into writes and write-nots is more dangerous than it sounds. It will be a world of thinks and think-nots. I know which half I want to be in, and I bet you do too.
This situation is not unprecedented. In preindustrial times most people’s jobs made them strong. Now if you want to be strong, you work out. So there are still strong people, but only those who choose to be.
It will be the same with writing. There will still be smart people, but only those who choose to be.”
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