Ask HN: Should we collectively stop spell checking and fixing grammar

Spelling and grammar errors will hurt you in the job application process. Effective communication is one of the non-technical aspects you are being evaluated on. These mistakes are seen in the broader context of attention to detail and professionalism. You look sloppy, no Ai required.

(1) conventional spell checkers still exist

(2) it's ok to ask "is this grammatical?"

(3) I will bounce ideas off chatbots but I think I've used just once AI generated sentence in the last two years. On one hand it is not my voice and it also sticks out like a sore thumb. I mean, if I hear "you're not a fur, you're a therian" another time I'm going to howl at the moon or something.

I write most of my stuff in vim so use a neither a spellchecker or grammar-checker. I have found that since I started doing that my spelling has greatly improved. My grammar can be janky sometimes, but I have doubt programs will help with that. If I want to be sure of my spelling I might find some textbox on some website and paste the text there.

It's not the lack of spelling and grammar.

It's the "reduction to the mean" that turns everything into bland corporate-friendly prose like the bulk of the corpus that AI models ingest.

I've never had an AI write for me. I don't really understand why people would do that unless English was a foreign language, perhaps--even then, it should be translating, not writing.

It's not that hard to learn your own language. You presumably are using it constantly, every day. It should be a high priority to know how to spell the words you're using, IMO.

I do make occasional mistakes, but mostly from using the "swipe" keyboard on my phone, and failing to catch the mistake.

I don't proofread things like text messages or forum posts--only important emails, or documents that will be posted publicly at my business, and therefore reflect on me.

If I'm not sure about a word I'm using, I either look it up, or rephrase to use words I'm more familiar with.

Why would you have AI write emails for you? This sounds exceptionally bizarre.

Just two notices: Sentences should start with a capital letter. The question mark is missing from the end of the sentence in the title.

Absolutely not. Only humans will be hurt by bad output (like this). What we should probably consider is blocking this AI psychosis that some people seem to be having.

If collectively we do that, then you won't stand out again, so temper your need for external validation and keep some tricks to yourself instead of giving them away to the whole Internet.

Spelling and grammar are part of your communication, so failing to use them by choice is an intentional message you are sending. Failing to choose to use them due to laziness or not knowing proper grammar is a message you send without intending it to be the message.

So I would recommend learning to spell check and proof read your writing, because you want to be able to write with intent.

You'll sound like a foreigner

AI or not, I'd like to read something that makes sense.

You can very well use AI to just fix your spells and grammars instead of asking it to generate something entirely from scratch.

On the contrary, someone can still ask AI to make a few grammatical errors or spelling mistakes so it "looks like" it's human written? I don't think we should go there.

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Spelling and grammar is fine (which don’t need AI), it’s when AI is re-writing it… or writing it in the first place… that it becomes a problem.

When I’m listening to a presentation or YouTube video, or reading an article or email, and certain AI phrases are used, I’m done. It’s such a turn off.

I’ve started reporting YouTube videos that were obviously written by AI. When someone at work gets up to do a presentation and they start using AI style transitions in their speech, I’m dropping from the call. I don’t need anyone to read their AI results to me. That seems like a colossal waste of time. That person is telling me that they can and should be replaced by AI, because they’ve just publicly shown using AI is all they bring to the table, which isn’t something anyone should want to convey to a large group of people at work.