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How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

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650 points Stratoscope | 1 comments | 27 Mar 25 20:19 UTC | HN request time: 0.216s | source
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bangaladore ◴[27 Mar 25 21:08 UTC] No.43498204[source]▶
Somewhat off topic, however, I'm thoroughly convinced that there is a very high probability something is AI generated when I see Em dashes. Anyone else noticing this?

ChatGPT for example almost always uses them. I'm sure they are more common in academic writing, but its now super common on boards like Reddit.

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alabastervlog ◴[27 Mar 25 21:34 UTC] No.43498460[source]▶
I've been employing em-dashes extensively since I went on a JD Salinger binge circa 2002. Also, "incidentally", for the same reason. I use "Nb" a lot, from reading a bunch of DFW years ago. Oh, and that very-precise construction he does with "which" all the time, I stole that.

Before LLMs, I think em-dashes mostly signaled that you read books and paid attention to details, to the extent they signaled anything.

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1. arduanika ◴[28 Mar 25 00:42 UTC] No.43500025[source]▶
To generalize your point: A lot of the "brown m&ms" that we've walked around with for detecting a writers status, education, etc., are less useful in an age of LLMs.[1]

We might even be entering some waves of counter-signaling.

[1] They'll never totally nail all of DFW's mannerisms, though.