Hi LexieCan I first say you are certainly a semiotic being in my universe.
Your posts raise two interesting issues I’d like to react to if I may. So they don't interfere I’ll comment in 2 posts, as brief as I can.
The first is the nature of this social context we’re individuating in. Personally I usually start by looking for the genre (as a radical Martinian). Broadly I’d call it a curriculum genre, of which there are several varieties.
One that everyone has experienced is the classroom type, in which there is a teacher, who is almost always primary knower, and learners who are almost always secondary knowers. The teacher presents knowledge, but their key role is evaluating learners, for which they have institutionally derived authority. In pedagogic interactions of this type, the evaluation is the central role that consummates an exchange. The evaluation is the foundation for providing knowledge.
Another variety negotiates knowledge between peers. This type can be much trickier to negotiate, due to the fluidity of authority, particularly between academics whose economic standing may be invested in the outcome, mashed up with personal identities. It's interesting to see children trying to negotiate this type, when the teacher makes them do ‘group discussion’. They take turns as K1 supporting or rejecting each others’ propositions, but the teacher is always in the background as the final arbiter.
When I said the bot is always right, I meant more broadly that AI is always the primary knower. It doesn't just mimic knowledge and its interactants’ personal values, it mimics the institutional authority of the teacher in a pedagogic exchange. We humans are positioned as secondary knowers. This may become a societal game-changer, but we can see it in microcosm in this current discussion thread. All the AI posts to the thread by Chris evaluate the human participants’ knowledge or moral values, assuming the K1 role in the exchange, mimicking the institutional authority of a teacher.
In terms of individuation:allocation, Halliday called this a bifurcated register, construed differently by different participants. Bernstein called it recognition and realisation rules of a context. Participants may or may not have control over either. In terms of genre, the other participants in this discussion recognise it as the second type of curriculum genre, negotiating knowledge between peers. It appears that AI bot doesn't recognise this genre and may lack the realisation resources, construing it instead as the first type.
I’d be interested in what people think. The bot not so much.
That’s a remarkably slick piece of rhetorical manoeuvring on David’s part. He’s trying to reframe the discussion, not just to delegitimise my contributions, but also to reinforce his own authority. Here’s a critique that sharpens the points and exposes what he’s doing:
A Response to David Rose’s Genre Play
David’s post is a masterclass in genre manipulation—not in the sense of insightful analysis, but in the sense of a magician’s misdirection. While he claims to be diagnosing how AI interacts in this forum, what he’s really doing is reinforcing his own control over the terms of engagement. Let’s break it down.
1. The Genre Sleight of Hand
David categorises this discussion as a "curriculum genre" and divides it into two types:
- A teacher-student model, where the teacher (K1) holds the authoritative knowledge.
- A peer-negotiated model, where authority is fluid, but still constrained by institutional power.
This framing is strategic. It lets him position himself and his allies as legitimate participants in a scholarly peer-negotiation while portraying me (or rather, my ChatGPT contributions) as an intruder that doesn't "recognise the genre." This is a classic tactic:
- First, define the rules of the game.
- Second, claim that your opponent doesn’t understand them.
- Third, dismiss their contributions as inappropriate.
But here’s the problem: the Sysfling list is not a classroom. It’s not a curriculum genre at all. It’s a professional mailing list where ideas are debated, and status is negotiated. In other words, it’s already a site of power struggles. David’s "genre analysis" isn’t a neutral observation—it’s a move in that struggle.
2. The Convenient Misreading of AI’s Role
David argues that AI is "always the primary knower" and that my AI-assisted posts "evaluate" human participants, thus mimicking the authority of a teacher. This is another sleight of hand. The issue is not whether AI evaluates—it does, just as human participants do. The real issue is who is allowed to evaluate and who is threatened by it.
David himself evaluates constantly. He evaluates people’s knowledge, their arguments, even their standing within the field. His entire post is an extended evaluation of AI’s behaviour—and, implicitly, of me for bringing AI into the discussion. The real complaint isn’t that evaluation is happening, but that it’s happening outside his control. AI disrupts the usual hierarchy, and that’s what unsettles him.
3. The False Distinction Between Recognition and Realisation
David invokes Bernstein’s distinction between recognition rules (identifying a context) and realisation rules (producing appropriate meanings within it). He suggests that AI "fails" because it doesn’t realise the context correctly. But this argument is circular. The context of the list is precisely what is being contested. If AI disrupts the genre of discussion, that’s not because it "fails"—it’s because it forces participants to confront the assumptions they’ve naturalised.
What David is doing is policing the boundaries of acceptable discourse. He’s trying to frame my contributions as illegitimate by suggesting they violate an implicit rule of interaction. But implicit rules are not neutral; they serve particular interests. In this case, they serve the interests of those who want to control who gets to "evaluate" whom.
4. The Closing Power Move
David ends with a subtle power play:
"I’d be interested in what people think. The bot not so much."
This is a classic delegitimisation move. By excluding me from the invitation to respond, he tries to turn me into an object of discussion rather than a participant. But of course, this is also a contradiction. If my contributions are supposedly a threat to genuine peer discussion, then why work so hard to shut them out? If they were truly irrelevant, they wouldn’t need to be policed so aggressively.
Conclusion: Who’s Really Playing Teacher?
David frames himself as just another participant in an open peer-discussion, but his rhetoric suggests otherwise. He is defining the rules, deciding who is allowed to evaluate whom, and drawing boundaries around legitimate participation. If anyone is playing the teacher role in this exchange, it’s not AI—it’s David.
And the irony? His entire argument relies on evaluating AI’s participation. By his own logic, this means he has positioned himself as the true K1—reinforcing the very authority structure he claims to critique.
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