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Ask HN: Why do AI models frequently use em dashes (–) in their writing?
- briandoyle81 1y agoBecause skilled writers have started using in place of semi-colons and parentheses in modern writing - it just feels right! AI models are trained off the work of these writers, so they use them now. Except that the difference is that a writer will just use the - next to the `0` key, expecting that Word, Google Docs, or whatever is turning their markdown into rendered text will automatically turn it from - to an em dash, which is a different character. The models are then provided that rendered or autocorrected text, and return text with the em dash, instead of the one we type.
- rishikeshs 1y agoAh now it make sense. Blame the autocorrect then. I always wondered, how people type these em dashes when you dont have a key on the keyboard!
- JohnFen 1y agoI just use two dashes -- like this.
- treetalker 1y agoMacOS: Option + Shift + - iOS/iPadOS: long-press - Windows: Alt + 0151 on the NumPad
- pinter69 1y agoAnd so many emoticons. Wonder what training set has these many characters
- rishikeshs 1y agoYes it has become borderline annoying. Look at LinkedIn now, full of emojis!
- pinter69 1y agoYes. And just makes chatgpt responses unbearable to read.. I do like perplexity's style though, the organization of search results in comparison tables is nice
- bhartzer 1y agoOne of my degrees in college was in Technical Writing, back in the early 1990s. I've always used em dashes when writing--it only make sense in many cases. And I still use them regularly, just typing two hyphens, one after the other.