AI and Art

Hello, and the topic today is AI and art. Humans have created art for a long time. Cavemen made art. When you look at ancient tools, they were more beautiful and symmetrical than needed. We have invested time in making things beautiful and expressive way beyond their functional need. And along comes AI. It allows you to do all kinds of things by just typing some queries and suddenly new things are created. Is this good for us? There is no question that that it’s efficient, but there are many avenues to consider, and here’s just one. I was thinking about drawing. I was thinking about the way that the pencil tracks. And I was thinking about creating and feedback as I try to draw something and manage to do it. I also thought about all the things that are playful and fun. And I think that a lot of what is playful, are things that we learn to master, are things that we get immediate, positive feedback on. I play tennis and though I can’t hold the racket well, but you play tennis, and the ball comes at you a little bit more to one side and then a little to the other side. And eventually you hit it, maybe learn something, and try again. I think drawing, for example, has a lot of elements like this where we basically are marking something. And the mark gives us instant feedback on our success. Did I manage to capture it? I tried this, I tried that, and so on. Now, this tactile feedback is important for play. Like, even if I look at computer games and I think about Angry Birds. I don’t know if you remember the game, but there was the tactile feedback about the game that was very capturing. I don’t play almost any games, but that one was interesting. There was a fun element to it as well, but there was the tactile feeling of some feedback between the hand and so on. I’m wondering about what happens when we lose it. I started last night by doing some art by just writing a prompt. And I have to say that I think the outcome is creative, better quality than I could have produced, and more creative than I could have produced, certainly in the short amount of time. But do I get the same tactile feeling? Do I get the same kind of joy from it? And I think the answer is no. That’s one of the things that I worry that we’re going to lose is this feeling of joy. Now, can we make a different kind of joy? I’m sure that we could find other physical feedback to what we do is not the only way to get joy. It’s a major one, but it’s not the only one. And I think the question is whether the people who are doing AI things will also think about other ways to have joy. Will they just focus on efficiency and forget about joy? Or will they find other sources of joy? I’m hoping that we’ll find other ways to find joy including the joy of learning? So here is to hoping for AI that is joyful.