Paul Graham, the British-American influencer popular in the startup space on Monday sharply came under fire from Nigerians after he insisted that texts with the word “delve” are always written with certainty by ChatGPT.
“Someone sent me a cold email proposing a novel project. Then I noticed it used the word ‘delve,’” Graham posted on X (formerly Twitter). “My point here is not that I dislike "delve," though I do, but that it's a sign that text was written by ChatGPT.”
Critics called out what they said was Graham’s naïveté when it came to how the language is used among English as a Second Language (ESL) speakers. They said that he was speaking as a person blinded by the ripple effects of years of colonialism that compelled ESL speakers to be purists of the language.
“This is why we need to invest more in producing and publishing our own work. Imagine after being force-fed colonial languages, being forced to speak it better than its owners then being told that no one used basic words like 'delve' in real life,” the Nigerian author, Elnathan John, said. “Habibi, come to Nigeria.”
“Using more complicated words than you need isn't using a language better. Rather the opposite,” Graham said doubling down on his claim that people don't use the word in normal settings.
Critics insisted that his argument was flawed because specifically among Nigerians “delve” is a common word in communication. “Well the uproar from Nigerians specifically, is because that's a common word in everyday speaking especially when addressing a group in a formal gathering,” one user said.
Graham later changed his argument that delve is always used when ChatGPT writes the text to a general problem about the use of a needlessly big word in a communication setting.
“That's exactly the problem with it. When you're writing an email or an essay, you shouldn't use the sort of language that people would use when addressing a formal gathering. No, using formal language in essays and emails is usually a mistake. It just gets in the way,” he said.