I have a laser focus that you’re not going to believe. I’ve had this superpower even before I became a writer. But non-writers think I’m exaggerating. If you’re a savant, it’s no big deal to you that you can count how many toothpicks fell out of a box onto the floor in just one glance. But if you’re not, it seems impossible.
Yesterday, I picked up a medical brochure in a doctor’s waiting room. I skimmed the front cover without really reading it, then I flipped the brochure over… and instantly saw the error: “indiviual.”
(If you don’t see it instantly, the word “individual” is supposed to have two Ds in it.)
I saw it immediately, but not because I was proofreading the brochure. I wasn’t even reading the brochure. My eye was instantly drawn to the mistake when I glanced at the brochure. It’s a visual focus, not an intellectual process. It’s instant.
If you have started to wonder if a writer and editor with decades of experience can be replaced by AI, then consider this:
Spelling checkers have been widely available for at least 40 years, long after they were implemented as separate, standalone software. First built in to word processors, then built into web browsers, then built into operating systems, and so it goes.
A spelling checker was all that was needed to catch the “indiviual” typo. No AI, not even a grammar checker. Just a spelling checker.
And yet, now there are hundreds or thousands of printed brochures with this mistake. In medicine, small mistakes can have serious, permanent consequences. A brochure intended to promote a service is helping chip away at the reader’s trust.
The tools were there: spelling checker, grammar checker, so-called AI, human proofreader, human editor, having any other human being read what you wrote. No tool can overcome your indifference to your reader’s needs.
Making a mistake ought not to be embarrassing. Not catching it is a little embarrassing. Not catching it because you didn’t check… well, that’s seriously embarrassing. But the consequences can be more serious than that.
Have you ever made an expensive mistake in your home because you misjudged whether you needed a professional plumber or electrician? And did you make that mistake a second time? Probably not.
But plumbers, electricians, emergency room nurses, lawyers, and technical writers all have lots of stories about people who made the problem worse because they could “do it themselves.”