Saying "if you use AI and don't tell me, you're a liar and if you use AI and tell me, I won't trust anything you write" is not critical thought. It's a sledgehammer filter and basically impossible to apply because there is virtually no way in 2026 to identify the provenance of any content you consume.

The likelihood that the author has consumed and trusted content that was produced using AI in some form, and not even realized it, is close to 100%. It's literally everywhere these days, and not everyone using it is using it to do all the work. But it leaves little hints that it was involved.

There are frequently posts that hit the front page of HN that have numerous AI fingerprints that produce discussion devoid of any comments questioning whether they were produced using AI. And HNers are probably one of the groups more likely than the general population to be able to identify AI content.