[W]e will become deeply skeptical of one another’s realness. Every time you find a new favourite blog or Twitter account or TikTok personality online, you’ll have to ask: Is this really a whole human with a rich and complex life like mine? Is there a being on the other end of this web interface I can form a relationship with?

Ms. Appleton explains how we can use the limitations of language models to prove our humanity:

This leaves us with some low-hanging fruit for humanness. We can tell richly detailed stories grounded in our specific contexts and cultures: place names, sensual descriptions, local knowledge, and, well the je ne sais quoi of being alive. Language models can decently mimic this style of writing but most don’t without extensive prompt engineering. They stick to generics. They hedge. They leave out details. They have trouble maintaining a coherent sense of self over thousands of words.

Also human beings can vouch for other human beings using classic web methods such as blogrolls or webrings, or by linking to other interesting articles.