AI put "synthetic quotes" in his book. But this author wants to keep using it.
Author Steven Rosenbaum's new book, The Future of Truth, has come under scrutiny for including inaccurate quotes attributed to AI tools. Despite acknowledging the errors, Rosenbaum expresses a desire to continue using AI in his research process. He emphasizes the importance of AI in generating ideas while also recognizing the need for more rigorous fact-checking.
- ▪A New York Times investigation found improperly attributed or synthetic quotes in Steven Rosenbaum's book.
- ▪Rosenbaum is conducting a citation audit to correct these errors in future editions.
- ▪He acknowledges the intoxicating yet dangerous nature of AI tools in the writing process.
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Record
| Original publisher | Ars Technica |
| Canonical URL | https://arstechnica.com/ai/2026/05/ai-put-synthetic-quotes-in-his-book-but-this-author-wants-to-keep-using-it/ |
| Publication time | Fri, 22 May 2026 14:05:56 +0000 |
| Retrieval time | 2026-05-22T14:17:02.368Z |
| Last seen | 2026-05-22T14:17:02.368Z |
| Headline source | Publisher (no WeSearch rewrite) |
| Excerpt source | publisher body |
| Excerpt method | First ~120 words (~800 chars) of extracted publisher body, fair-use limited. |
| Summary | WeSearch · cerebras-chat (WeSearch summarizer) |
| Summary source text | contentText |
| Citation coverage | Summary is a WeSearch-generated derivative; primary citation is the original publisher URL. |
| Cluster | BP6THbNz4hCb |
| Cluster logic | Grouped by semantic title/content similarity across sources within a rolling window. Same-publisher template collisions are excluded from coverage comparison. |
| Ranking reason | Story pages are not engagement-ranked. Hub feeds use recency, with optional source-diversified chronological ordering (cap consecutive stories per source). No personalized ranking. |
| Publisher visit | Yes — open original |
| Substitutes article? | No — link-out required for full text |
Rights status (four layers)
WeSearch handling by dimension
| Indexing | May the item be indexed (stored, ranked, made findable)? | Allowed |
| Snippet | May a short excerpt of the publisher's text be shown? | Allowed |
| AI summary | May WeSearch generate its own short summary of the article? | Limited |
| Retrieval / RAG | May the content be exposed for third-party retrieval-augmented generation? | Not asserted |
| Model training | May the content be used to train AI models? | Not asserted |
| Commercial reuse | May the content be reused commercially? | Not permitted |
Basis: Derived from the published RSS/Atom feed. Contact: [email protected]. Reviewed: 2026-07-24.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
I wish I knew how to quit you AI put “synthetic quotes” in his book. But this author wants to keep using it. Steven Rosenbaum explains how inaccurate quotes got into his book The Future of Truth. Kyle Orland – May 22, 2026 10:05 am | 4 "I've never been in a place where I thought the tech that I was using was both intoxicating and dangerous." Credit: Aurich Lawson | Getty Images "I've never been in a place where I thought the tech that I was using was both intoxicating and dangerous." Credit: Aurich Lawson | Getty Images Text settings Story text Size Small Standard Large Width * Standard Wide Links Standard Orange * Subscribers only Learn more Minimize to nav Journalist and author Steven Rosenbaum has more reasons than most to distrust AI.
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Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at Ars Technica.
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