I am not interested in most AI content. I am interested in people making art specifically because it is made by a person. I am possibly interested in a human using AI specifically for the eccentricities of AI content (like the funny hands as an example) but a person giving me an image she had produced by AI only because she could not produce it herself (for lack of ability of her own or for lack of capital to fund another) I am very much not interested in. My primary concern is humanity within art. A human using AI because she can’t get human art is not interesting. If it is above her abilities, I would prefer a “bad” attempt over perfect AI content.
Using AI to produce your art , as a tool in a digital suite for example, is outside my concern. Asking “where the line is?” is a hard question to answer, but I am not discussing the search here. Whether it is even possible, I do not think that it challenges the validity of preferring human art over AI content. “I know it when I see it” and this follows here, to my thinking.
Even if the time comes when AI is indistinguishable from human art, I am not interested. Some have asked “but what is the difference if you cannot detect?” It is simple; for the same reasons I prefer the poor painting of a dog from my nephew over an identical painting from a “real” artist. I am not solely concerned with the utility of the painting itself but the intention of the artist and my connection to them. In the case of an AI image and artwork by a human, a human is a person that I can relate to and has feelings and a personality. An AI is an algorithm; it cannot feel, it has no personality. It cannot even think. A hypothetical painting by a woman that is intended to look like AI is more interesting as well. Even if she is producing undetectable paintings that can fool anyone, it is infinitely more worthy to my sight than the ai content that is extruded.
Another example; my grandmother has knitted me a blanket. It is not perfect, but she has made it for me and it serves it purpose as a blanket very well. A machine-knitted blanket from a factory serves an identical purpose as merely a blanket. It may even be superior as a blanket. But it is a machine-produced object verses something that was made for me by someone I care about and cares about me. The product can never replace the blanket. Even if the machine-knit is made to replicate the grandma blanket down to the last molecule, it is not identical. It can never be identical by the nature of it’s production. It is like how we still hold homemade food above McDonald’s or even frozen meals from the grocer.
This is why I do not care about AI or AI content as ersatz art. It is not art. It is content, a mass-produced object. I am not interested in content. I am primarily concerned with humanity.
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