Economist flags AI's worst academic 'tell': bad judgment on what matters
paulnovosad · x · 2026-10-15
Economist paulnovosad argues that a signature tell of academic AI writing is poor judgment about what matters and what doesn't — and it's among the most damaging tells, because it also reflects the author's own bad judgment.
He links to Refine, an AI verification tool claiming to do several days' worth of expert reviewer work in 30 minutes. Example findings: a propensity-score weighting error (ATT requires control weights ω/(1-ω)), an unstated nonnegativity assumption in a lemma proof, and internal inconsistencies between text and Table 2 results. Refine says it won 9/10 head-to-head reviews against top frontier models and is used by researchers at 24 central banks.
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