Search Here ….

Tags

affect AI AI slop AI STORIES alumni Blogging book care ChatGPT conferences cultural bias data analysis electronic literature ELMCIP ephemerality exhibition fascism Gephi history journalister lip-syncing LLMs machine vision network analysis norsk open access presentation publication publications R representation research science fiction self-representation selfies Snapchat social media Surveillance talks teaching trip report twitter UiB visualisation workshop
AI and algorithmic culture

How to use ChatGPT to get past writer’s block

Jill7 Comments

Having your own words processed and restated can help you improve your thinking and your writing. That’s one reason why talking with someone about your ideas can help you clarify your thoughts. ChatGPT is certainly no replacement for a knowledgable friend or colleague, but can can definitely help you remix your writing so you can see it anew.

Here is some advice if you’re stuck writing a nearly-finished paper: Paste the whole thing into ChatGPT and ask ChatGPT questions like this.

– to summarise the whole paper for you
– to state the main argument (do you agree?)
– to write an abstract
– to write a conclusion
– to explain why this paper is important (for society? for the future? for the field?)
– to write an article in the style of Wired Magazine about the paper
– to write an interview with the author of the paper about its contents for the New York Times
– to write a hate piece about the paper for Fox News
– to write a series of tweets promoting the paper
– to write a reply to one of those tweets criticising the paper
– to write a Reddit post about the paper etc.
– to explain the paper as though to an 8 year old
– to write a peer review of the paper
– to write a cover letter to the editor of [whatever journal] explaining why the paper will be of interest to the journal and what its strengths are
– …..and what else can you think of?

Many if not most of the results will be silly or wrong, of course. But some will be interesting, or make you see something you maybe didn’t consider, or help you see what your main point really is (or isn’t). If it writes you an abstract or conclusion you actually disagree with or that focuses on something you hadn’t expected, reread the paper – maybe your real argument isn’t as clear as you hoped?

I’m not suggesting you copy and paste the text ChatGPT generates into your paper. I’m suggesting that you use it as a remix engine to see what else your paper might be, to respark your inspiration, and to make yourself laugh and enjoy yourself. That’ll make finishing to write the paper much more fun!

You’ll have to paste the text in a 1000 words at a time or so as there is a word limit for each “bit” of text it can process. Tell ChatGPT “This is part 1 of of a paper titled “TITLE OF PAPER”, and then “Here is part 2” and so on. 

After all this, revise your paper!

Discover more from Jill Walker Rettberg

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

7 thoughts on “How to use ChatGPT to get past writer’s block”

  1. Eleanor

    I’ve used ChatGPT as a sounding board for a project description, “reword this for clarity in academic voice”, was the prompt. It worked well to help me edit the short piece of about 200 words (when I was a bit blocked and bored tbh).

    I’m wary of giving ChatGPT or other similar systems more of my words, ie a nearly finished paper, even in chunks. Do you see any issues or pitfalls with this?

  2. KI som journalister – Kommunikasjons fagbloggen

    […] er flere fordeler og ulemper med KI, og ifølge Jill Walker Rettberg så kan KI hjelpe mot skrivesperre. Noe som kan være et fantastisk hjelpemiddel for forfattere, […]

  3. KI i redaksjonelle medier – Kom109-bloggen

    […] Rettberg, Jill Walker (2023). How to use ChatGPT to get past writer’s block: https://jilltxt.net/how-to-use-chatgpt-to-get-past-writers-block/ […]

  4. KI Kunstig Intelligens i Journalistikk   – Hazar Alsaed

    […] https://jilltxt.net/how-to-use-chatgpt-to-get-past-writers-block/ […]

  5. Selvlagd er vellagd – Malias verden

    […] Rettberg, Jill Walker (2023). How to use ChatGPT to get past writer’s block: https://jilltxt.net/how-to-use-chatgpt-to-get-past-writers-block/   […]

  6. Bruk av kunstig intelligens – Fagblogg i digital formidling

    […] Rettberg, Jill Walker (2023). How to use ChatGPT to get past writer’s block […]

  7. Denne teksten er (ikke) skrevet av KI – Skrivestund

    […] Rettberg, Jill Walker (2023). How to use ChatGPT to get past writer’s block: https://jilltxt.net/how-to-use-chatgpt-to-get-past-writers-block/ […]

Leave A Comment

Recommended Posts

Screenshot of a paragraph from a New York Times article published May 12, 2026. Text reads: "The price of tomatoes -tart bursts of flavor in salads and sandwiches — surged nearly 40 percent in April from a year ago on a combination of bad weather, high tariffs and climbing transportation costs."
AI STORIES

Genre glitches and unexpected promotional phrases as a sign of AI writing

A genre glitch is a characteristic of LLM-assisted writing where the text suddenly switches genre, typically inserting a short promotional phrase full of sensory details into an informational text. Genre glitches occur when a word in the generated text is heavily associated with a genre or context that is markedly […]

Top of a ransom note from Shinyhunters hacking group. Text reads: "SHINYHUNTERS rooting your systems since '19 ;) ShinyHunters has breached Instructure (again). Instead of contacting us to resolve it they ignored us and did some "security patches"."
Networked Politics University politics

UiB self-hosts the open source version of Canvas, so wasn’t affected by the breach

On May 1st Canvas announced a security breach, and then yesterday the system was hacked. The login page was replaced by a ransom note: if universities don’t pay up by 12 May, student data will be released. Here’s what the login page looked like yesterday: Way back in 2015, when […]

AI and algorithmic culture Networked Politics

AI-generated images, fascist aesthetics: Dieselbrølet and Heimatstrom

My German is pretty dodgy, so when I first saw Heimatstrom on Bluesky, shared by Roland Meyer, a professor of visual culture at Universität Zürich’s Digital Society Initiative, I misinterpreted it and thought it was a far-right campaign. But no, Heimatstrom is a group of left-wing environmentalists using fascist AI […]

Photo of a billboard ad at Oslo S train station showing a smiliing conductor and the text "Du må ikke sove. Joda, bare sov du."
AI STORIES

“Du må ikke sove”: a floating motif detached from its meaning (or: LLMs can write Norwegian but miss cultural references)

There’s a new ad for the train between Stavanger and Oslo in Norway that uses a line from Arnulf Øverland’s famous anti-fascist poem Du må ikke sove (“You must not sleep”). Du må ikke sove, you must not sleep, the ad says. And then it flips it, jovially, joda, bare […]

AI and algorithmic culture University politics

Academics in Norway: Sign this petition asking for research-based discussions of how to use AI in universities

I just signed a petition calling for Norwegian universities to use research expertise on AI when deciding how to implement it, rather than having decisions be made mostly administratively. ,  If you are a researcher in Norway, please read it and sign it if you agree – and share with anyone else who might be interested. The petition was written by three researchers at UiT: Maria Danielsen (a philosopher who completed her PhD in 2025 on AI and ethics, including discussions of art and working life), Knut Ørke (Norwegian as a second language), and Holger Pötzsch (a professor of media studies with many years of research on digital media, video games, disruption, and working life, among other topics).  This is not about preventing researchers from exploring AI methods in their research. It is about not uncritically accepting the hype that everyone must use AI everywhere without critical reflection. It is about not introducing Copilot as the default option in word processors, or training PhD candidates to believe they will fall behind if they do not use AI when writing articles, without proper academic discussion. Changes like these should be knowledge-based and discussed academically, not merely decided administratively, because they alter the epistemological foundations of research. Maria wrote to me a couple of months ago because she had read my opinion piece in Aftenposten in which I called for a strong brake on the use of language models in knowledge work. She was part of a committee tasked with developing UiT’s AI strategy and was concerned because there was so much hype and so few members of the committee with actual expertise in AI. I fully support the petition. There are probably some good uses for AI in research, but the uncritical, hype-driven insistence that we must simply adopt it everywhere is highly risky. There are many researchers in Norway with strong expertise in AI, language, ethics, working life, and culture. We must make use of this expertise. This is also partly about respect for research in the humanities, social sciences, psychology, and law. Introducing AI at universities and university colleges is not merely a technical issue, and perhaps not even primarily a technical one. It concerns much more: philosophy of science, methodological reflection, epistemology, writing, publishing, the working environment, and more. […]

screenshot of Grammarly - main text in the middle, names of experts on the left with reccomendations and on the right more info about the expert review feature
AI and algorithmic culture Teaching

Grammarly generated fake expert reviews “by” real scholars

Grammarly is a full on AI plagiarism machine now, generating text, citations (often irrelevant), “humanizing” the text to avoid AI checkers and so on. If you’re an author or scholar, they also have been impersonating and offering “feedback” in your name. Until yesterday, when they discontinued the Expert Review feature due to a class action lawsuit. Here are screenshots of how it worked.