Take Another Little Piece of My Heart Now

AI-yi-yi

And a R's-b-p Toothpick

Roy Blount Jr's avatar
Roy Blount Jr
Jun 11, 2026
∙ Paid

According to Dan Chiasson in the New York Review of Books, you can tell a text was generated by AI if it uses (falls back on? bandies about?) the word delve.

So. White House spokespeople can call a critic a “sack of shit,” but I can’t say delve? (Or spokesmen?)

Delve rhymes with twelve and shelve. Bound to be poetry there. Something might even be said for the verb to elve, meaning to turn someone into an elf. To prove we are flesh and blood, I suppose, we have to abandon the old counting verse:

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