Why the Amish Are Falling in Love With AI

"Valentine's Day was weeks ago, yet Mary Ellen Wengerd is still tickled about the love note her husband, Daniel, co-authored with generative AI. " It was so eloquently written," she says, biting back a grin. "Reading this, I was like, This is so not my husband." Mary Ellen wears a white bonnetlike cap over her hair and the ankle-length dress she'd put on for church. She’s curled into an overstuffed armchair alongside the youngest of their six children, Jethro, 7, who's parked his feet on her lap."

""And I was like, 'Did you write this?'" Mary Ellen says, looking at Daniel. "'Or did you ask ChatGPT to put a little love letter together?' And he was like, 'Ummm -'" "I actually did!" Daniel says as laughter erupts in the room. "But I made a couple changes!" Daniel's blushing on the couch opposite Mary Ellen, stroking his wavy gray beard. Daniel points at me, the writer visiting from New York, in the corner. "Read it to him," he says, "and then tell him what doesn't sound like me.""

"As Mary Ellen reads aloud and ribs Daniel about the fancy phrasing, she still sounds touched by the note. "I know the intent was right," she tells me. "He's on a tight schedule, and I imagine he got into a pinch." The new AI wingman offering to help those in a pinch - whether writing love notes or code - is finding a toehold in Amish country. Holmes County, Ohio, has the highest concentration of Amish people of any county in the U.S."

A family in Amish country spends a Sunday afternoon at home after church, teasing the father about using an AI chatbot to write a Valentine. The mother reads the love note and reacts with surprise, saying the wording does not sound like her husband. The father admits he used the chatbot but made changes. The mother says the intent was right and suggests he used the tool because he was on a tight schedule. The scene shows AI being used for personal writing, including love notes and potentially other tasks like coding, while Amish life continues with traditional routines and no televisions in the living room.

Read at Intelligencer