David Brooks on being human, Jonah Davids on sad psychologists, Dan Klein tempers techno optimism, Arnold Kling on AI mentor creation, Doc Hammer on wants/needs, and Scott Alexander Age of Em redux
Regarding AI art and authenticity. One has to ask how authenticity manifests itself in different types of art. Is authenticity in painting the same as authenticity in a novel? Kandinsky's paintings would not lose much value if they were created by AI instead of a real person. "Storm of Steel" by Junger, on the other hand, would have lost great deal of its value if it turned out that the personality that created it did not exist. Depending on the type of art - and according to the taste and temperament of the audience - different degrees of what Benjamin called "aura" are needed.
One French writer said that "to read books is to breathe in souls." I'm not a big believer in the idea that AI will succeed in creating a great novel. Which is not to say that the great novelists of the future won't use some form of AI to simulate the life course of the various characters they want to put in their work.
I would say that AI will produce a lot of art that will be appreciated and consumed with pleasure, but I don't think it will create anything that will count as part of the canon.
I suspect that we will see a new wave of artists emerge that combine an appealing personal aura with art that is mostly generated by AI. The branding will dominate the technical craft, but most people will not actually care very much, or even be able to really tell the difference.
One of my friends is a studio art graduate and a skilled painter. So I assumed that the cool cover of her fantasy novel was something she made herself or else contracted to another artist she knows. Totally AI generated.
"His belief was that the computer, at its most base level, is a fundamentally conservative force and that despite being a technological innovation, it would end up hindering social progress."
This seems similar to something I ended up omitting—AI mentorship may effectively cement the dominant personalities of our day in a way that makes it difficult to welcome new influences. Just as we can't move beyond hip-hop and superhero movies because those happened to be the most popular modes at the time we embraced big data to guide production.
I'd agree with Weizenbaum in that computers allow existing social forms to continue far beyond where they could without them. For example, the modern welfare state couldn't exist without computers; there's just too much stuff to be done manually.
It also reminds me of the East German state; they (manually) collected far more data than they could process, and much of it lay unused until the state collapsed. It almost makes one wonder if that was intentional; the state organs needed to feel useful, but also needed to not provoke an outright rebellion.....
I'm not entirely sure what 'the case' is here, since my last comment was rather scattershot.
But since I like to hear myself type, I'd say that increased governmentalization is the default behavior ("The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanded bureaucracy...") unless somehow limited.
Regarding AI art and authenticity. One has to ask how authenticity manifests itself in different types of art. Is authenticity in painting the same as authenticity in a novel? Kandinsky's paintings would not lose much value if they were created by AI instead of a real person. "Storm of Steel" by Junger, on the other hand, would have lost great deal of its value if it turned out that the personality that created it did not exist. Depending on the type of art - and according to the taste and temperament of the audience - different degrees of what Benjamin called "aura" are needed.
One French writer said that "to read books is to breathe in souls." I'm not a big believer in the idea that AI will succeed in creating a great novel. Which is not to say that the great novelists of the future won't use some form of AI to simulate the life course of the various characters they want to put in their work.
I would say that AI will produce a lot of art that will be appreciated and consumed with pleasure, but I don't think it will create anything that will count as part of the canon.
I suspect that we will see a new wave of artists emerge that combine an appealing personal aura with art that is mostly generated by AI. The branding will dominate the technical craft, but most people will not actually care very much, or even be able to really tell the difference.
One of my friends is a studio art graduate and a skilled painter. So I assumed that the cool cover of her fantasy novel was something she made herself or else contracted to another artist she knows. Totally AI generated.
AI as therapist reminds me strongly of the original ELIZA (and Joseph Weizenbaum's subsequent book Computer Power and Human Reason).
His critique of AI in general still stands, IMO, even though it was made in 1976.
Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.
"His belief was that the computer, at its most base level, is a fundamentally conservative force and that despite being a technological innovation, it would end up hindering social progress."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Weizenbaum#Apprehensions_about_Artificial_Intelligence
This seems similar to something I ended up omitting—AI mentorship may effectively cement the dominant personalities of our day in a way that makes it difficult to welcome new influences. Just as we can't move beyond hip-hop and superhero movies because those happened to be the most popular modes at the time we embraced big data to guide production.
I'd agree with Weizenbaum in that computers allow existing social forms to continue far beyond where they could without them. For example, the modern welfare state couldn't exist without computers; there's just too much stuff to be done manually.
It also reminds me of the East German state; they (manually) collected far more data than they could process, and much of it lay unused until the state collapsed. It almost makes one wonder if that was intentional; the state organs needed to feel useful, but also needed to not provoke an outright rebellion.....
Do you feel that increased governmentalization is inevitable in that case?
I'm not entirely sure what 'the case' is here, since my last comment was rather scattershot.
But since I like to hear myself type, I'd say that increased governmentalization is the default behavior ("The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanded bureaucracy...") unless somehow limited.