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Cory Doctorow

What Cory Doctorow thinks about LLMs

@cory-doctorow · 24 positions · On ppll ↗

Science fiction novelist, journalist and activist, a special adviser to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the author of the daily link blog Pluralistic. He coined the word "enshittification" in 2022 to name the way platforms decay, and it was the American Dialect Society's word of the year for 2023.

Cory Doctorow did not write this page.

We collected these quotes from things they published elsewhere, and every quote links to where it was said. They have no account here and have not endorsed this site. Quotes are word for word; the short line under each one is our own restatement, not their wording. Their own site. Is this you? Claim it or ask us to remove it. Or tell us what is wrong here.

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Only Cory Doctorow on LLMs. See everyone on LLMs

4 dated positions, 2026, in their own words. Our reading of what Cory Doctorow has said — not written or endorsed by them.

4 positions so far — this page is not yet offered to search engines.

  1. Our readingAI systems built on statistical inference cannot form intent, because they have nothing with which to form it.

    Their wordsAnyone who understands how the theory-free statistical inference systems we call "AI" (at this time) work will understand that they are systems that cannot form intent, that have nothing to form intent with

    ↗Pluralistic: The Claude Delusion (21 Sep 2026)pluralistic.net 1st of 3 in this piece

  2. 3 days earlier

  3. Our readingThe statistical extrapolation method LLMs rely on has hard limits.

    Their wordsNaive, "theory-free" statistical extrapolation (the method that LLMs rely on) has hard limits.

    ↗Pluralistic: Textured (18 Sep 2026)pluralistic.net 1st of 3 in this piece

  5. Our readingBeing able to statistically predict what someone will say does not mean you understand them.

    Their wordsthe fact that you can use a statistical lookup table to predict what words someone is going to say doesn't mean you understand them

    ↗Pluralistic: Textured (18 Sep 2026)pluralistic.net 2nd of 3 in this piece

  7. Our readingA system trained only on what is already known cannot produce genuine surprises, because a known thing stops being a surprise.

    Their wordsBut - by definition - it can't contain any of our future surprises, because it's just trained on the things we already know, and if we knew about something, it wouldn't be a surprise anymore.

    ↗Pluralistic: Textured (18 Sep 2026)pluralistic.net 3rd of 3 in this piece