Fake Plastic Trees, Baudrillard, and AI Reliance

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Her green plastic watering can

For her fake Chinese rubber plant

In the fake plastic earth

Warning: This blog post is the product of my loose understanding of Jean Baudrillard's philosophy, specifically his notion of the hyperreal, my love for Radiohead's "Fake Plastic Trees," and my latest thoughts about society becoming overreliant on generative AI, such as ChatGPT.

Consider this: the real-world referent of a photo of a tree is the actual tree captured in the image. A tree that the photographer could touch with their own hands and see with their own eyes. A real-world referent being the concrete connection to reality. Similarly, the real-world referent of a poem is the poet's authentic emotions and pathos expressed in their words. 

But what happens when a student asks ChatGPT, “Write me a poem about trees”? The response is an instantly generated synthesis of data from unknown referents—perhaps drawn from other poems about trees, photos of trees, research on trees, or even prior AI-generated outputs. Crucially, that AI-generated poem has been distanced from concrete reality and the real brown bark and real green leaves of a real tree.

Over time, generative AI, including ChatGPT, will be trained on data increasingly disconnected from real-world referents. AI-generated information and images will be synthesized into new AI-generated information and images, ad infinitum. The result is a simulation: simulated knowledge, simulated emotion, and simulated meaning. Fake trees born of fake trees.

As the years pass, our information ecosystem will drift further from reality, and our understanding of the world may become increasingly artificial with time. Convenience will drive individuals, including ourselves and our students, to rely on generative AI rather than traditional primary and secondary sources. 

Calls to "Just Google it!" will become "Just ChatGPT it!" Real-world referents—the grounding of our knowledge in our own and others' lived experiences—will become relics of the past. As omnipresent as AI may seem today, its pervasiveness in the future may exist beyond our current comprehension.

What are the consequences of this shift? Are we, as a society, missing the forest for its fake plastic trees?

AI Disclosure:

I leveraged ChatGPT for editing purposes: "Refine this blog post for punctuation and clarity, but maintain its diction and spirit."

I leveraged ChatGPT to create an image of a tree. Which one of the two tree photos is a "fake plastic tree"?

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