MEP Ciarán Mullooly admits using AI for part of letter to Ursula von der Leyen which quoted Swedish House Mafia lyrics
He denied that the fictional story of a young girl called 'Gazi', who the letter said lived in Rafah, and the use of lyrics by house music group, Swedish House Mafia, were AI-generated.
Will you tell her, 'Don't you worry, don't you worry child, see heaven's got a plan for you'? Will you assure her that Europe remembers its promise?
Mr Mullooly said those sections were 'based on' the contents of 1,000 emails sent to him in relation to Gaza, including one which he said quoted the lyrics of Don't You Worry Child.
It was first reported by The Journal that the former RTÉ broadcaster had used AI to write part of the letter in which Mr Mullooly said a 12-year-old girl called Gazi and her family had been displaced and asked Ms von der Leyen: 'Will you tell her, 'Don't you worry, don't you worry child, see heaven's got a plan for you'? Will you assure her that Europe remembers its promise, that we will not let another generation of children perish when we have the means to act?'
Speaking to RTÉ's Drivetime, Mr Mullooly said he asked Ms von der Leyen in a meeting last year 'why the European Commission and the European Parliament and all the agencies had not moved to stop the slaughter and the bloodshed in Gaza'.
Mr Mullooly said his team then began researching potential measures that would not require the agreement of member states.
'I had 25 pages of research put in front of me in the parliament about three weeks ago and I said to my colleague, 'I want a summary of this for a letter to (Ms) von der Leyen'. And we used AI at that stage to complete the first part of the letter.'
The second half of the letter, which has gotten the most attention today with the Swedish House Mafia reference, in particular, was actually composed by a member of my team
He said this section 'looked at four questions', including what actions the European Commission and United Nations could take.
'And I completed that and I used that summary, I read every line of it, I looked at the references and I was quite happy with that. So, the first half of the letter was generated by AI,' he said.
'The second half of the letter, which you have quoted and has gotten the most attention today with the Swedish House Mafia reference, in particular, was actually composed by a member of my team who read 1,000 emails from people sent to my office on the issue of Gaza.'
Mr Mullooly said his colleague read and summarised the emails 'in what has been described today, I suppose, as fiction but is actually written based on some of the information given to him by those [emails]'.
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