From a New York Times column by Brian X. Chen headlined “A.I. Bots Can’t Report This Column. But They Can Improve It.”

Plagiarizing essays. Cheating on tests. Spreading misinformation. The advent of new, powerful artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT has sparked concerns about the unintended consequences of the technology and debate over the ethical implications of its use.

Despite concerns, A.I. assistants seem here to stay. After ChatGPT’s splashy debut late last year, Microsoft invested $10 billion in OpenAI, the lab behind the chatbot. The threat from a rival forced Google to regroup. And the media site BuzzFeed recently announced that it would use A.I. to write online quizzes and other content.