Is It Plagiarism If AI Wrote It?

The further we progress and the more we innovate, systems such as AI are becoming much more powerful and sophisticated. There is a steady rise in the number of people who are beginning to feel uneasy when it comes to the progression of artificial intelligence. The only thing is - it is showing no sign of slowing down.

One of the more recent topics of conversation surrounding AI is content. Whether that be writing or digitally created art, people are concerned. Many users have created several celebrated art pieces created using a machine. Does that make the user an artist simply because a button was clicked?

Another concern for people is AI writing. With a few short prompts programs are able to create curated essays. A university professor and historian, Carli Ionescu tweeted that she was standing next to two students who discussed which AI platform they would use for their essay. My question is, is this plagiarism if a series wrote it of algorithms?

The idea of having AI write for you is to have an original piece of writing, without actually having to write a thing. With a few simple keywords to prompt the algorithm, the software can write a well-thought-out essay within seconds. Many are beginning to wonder whether this is ethical or if it will drive people to lose any creativity or originality within their work.

Whilst I am an avid supporter of AI and all of its capabilities, I do believe that if used in the wrong circumstances, this could become a treacherous territory. AI, at the best of times, is difficult to navigate and adding in the dilemma of originality, copyright and plagiarism open a completely different can of worms.

The main reason why people believe that AI-generated content is not plagiarism is that the machine is not copying someone else's work; it is creating its own original content. This line of thinking suggests that, as long as the final product is not identical to another person's work, then it cannot be considered plagiarism. Proponents of this argument also point to the fact that humans have been using machines to help them write for centuries, such as typewriters, word processors, etc., and no one has ever accused those products of being plagiarism.

On the other hand, you could argue that AI-generated content is plagiarism because it is copied from other sources that the machine has access. After all, when a machine "writes" an article, it is taking information from other sources and rehashing it in a new way. While the final product may not be identical to the original source material, it is still derivative work. In addition, some people believe that humans should be the only ones creating original works of art and that anything created by a machine cannot truly be considered "original."

For all intents and purposes, I used AI software to write a portion of this blog - however, it is extremely difficult to tell, what was personally written and what was created by a machine. Personally, I do not see the use of AI software as plagiarism, I just think that we need to be limited and conscious of how we use it.

For more information on Tej Kohli as a philanthropist visit tejkohliruit.com and to read more of his views go to his Medium.

To read about Tej Kohli as an investor visit Kohli Ventures.

Find out more about Tej Kohli: Tej Kohli the technologist investing in human triumph, Tej Kohli the philanthropist trying to cure the developing world of cataracts and Tej Kohli the London tycoon with a generous streak.