It seems to me that you don't like reading (which is fine). Some people enjoy reading words strung together in a certain way. The value comes from the simple relationship between the text and the reader, not on some kind of social connection.
Not that I doubt that one day people will simply gather around the AI infinite story creation bot. They just won't know what they're missing. :(
More seriously, the novel is a unidirectional medium of communication. Not a relationship. That said, it is meant to convey a perspective. I don't care if it's a human, a robot, or a little green man's perspective. It just has to be an interesting, useful, or enlightening perspective that I didn't already share.
Right now LLM's don't really have unique perspectives, that may change. So I withhold judgement. As of today, I wouldn't read an LLM's novel. In 10 years, who knows?
With LLM's we can also now preserve actual thought patterns and skills beyond a single lifespan. I can't wait to see what the future brings.
I've also read it, and got to know the man that much better. It especially added a great deal of texture to the experience of visiting his home site, his church, and his grave.
I'd argue that humans rarely have unique perspectives, being highly influenced by their environment and experience. And have we not seen AI coming up with novel math?
I don't think unique perspectives are necessarily the compelling part. I think the words are just a medium for thoughts. AI only produces the former, not the latter.
That's my relationship with Ben Franklin. It's not that I read what he wrote; it's that I know what he thought.
One could certainly have a pen pal relationship where the only communication was via text. The relationship begins with the very first message.
Or a relationship with an autobiographer who spills their soul onto the page.
But if I look through the text of an AI spilling its soul, there's nothing on the other side.
I think this is exactly what I was trying to say above when I talked about perspective Reading is a form of telepathy, and there's just nothing INSIDE of most AI writing today. When that changes, I'll take it more seriously. I do suspect that it will very soon though.
As you say, AI's are already coming up with novel math and I've seen some glimmers of purely mechanical brilliance in the writing already.
Reading writing from an LLM loses all that. It's just words, there is no expression. It's literally the most boring parts of reading.
> The value comes from the simple relationship between the text and the reader
This is not some universal truth, yet you state it as such.
People can get different things from a text.