Hank Green, a novelist, comedian, and YouTuber with 3.2 million subscribers, recently apologized to his audience for his growing reliance on AI chatbots.
The controversy started when, in the middle of a video posted on the educational channel Complexly, Green used the phrase “I appreciate the pushback” – leading viewers to speculate that he’d written the script with a chatbot and accidentally included its response to one of his prompts.
The Explanation
In a since-deleted post on X, Green acknowledged that he’d produced the video “under a ton of pressure” and used ChatGPT “for research on this script.” At the same time, he said the “pushback” line was actually a response to the episode’s guest.
Green then offered a more in-depth apology on Reddit, where he said he was “mortified” that he’d “let so many people down” and that he plans to reduce his video production as a result.
A Nuanced Position
Green insisted he’s only used ChatGPT to “locate papers and other resources for learning about topics,” and that the words and “takes” have still been his. At the same time, he admitted it was fair to criticize him for “diluting” himself.
He also clarified that he’s “not a pure AI-hater,” while listing concerns about the technology, including its impact on climate change and “the speed at which these companies are trying to consolidate economic power.”
Moving Forward
“You need to know that my words are mine,” Green said. “I don’t think that this hasn’t been true, but I’ve been moving so fast that my own process isn’t actually clear to me and I want to have it be a guarantee moving forward.”
Green said he’ll be pausing or posting less frequently to his channels while he figures out how to make that guarantee a reality. He plans to return to more meditative, personal work – “where the writing was the whole thing and I felt it all the way down” – and more “dumb unscripted straight to camera thoughts.”
“But mostly I need to come to terms with the fact that the level of dopamine I’ve been getting from interacting with LLMs … with doing more and more and more and more … is not healthy for me or good for the world,” Green said. “It is careless, and has disconnected me from where people are on this.”
