See what I did there? Ai…ART > AiRT
You never were any fun. Anyway, since the animation is coming along more slowly than expected… I have been tasked with keeping the posting up to satisfy the Gods of 0s and 1s.
So, i looked around and looked for a big fight to jump into.
It turns out that artists are really freaking out over
whether or not ai is art?
Like everyone else, I have a ton of opinions…that are mostly nuanced to my own selfish personal experience. Also, like everyone else, I sat down and started to tell you all exactly that.
Then I realized there was a voice that wasn’t being heard in this conversation. The ai.
So I asked it what it thought…then I rephrased it to have it write a defense of its own position as if it was John Adams writing it.
I think the position it took on its own behalf is interesting. It also does a decent John Adams….but he is well written and documented so that isn’t a real surprise.
I am not giving a disclaimer on this because, well F off if you need one for this.
John Adam’s views on Ai Art.
“An Aggressive Defense of the Human Soul in Art”
By the Ghost of John Adams
Fellow Citizens, I address you now not as a specter of old but as a voice from the bedrock of humanity itself, compelled to call forth reason in this maddened age of mechanical marvels. Artificial Intelligence, you hail it as the Prometheus of art, bearing fire to illuminate the darkened corners of your creative souls. Yet I see not illumination but an insidious shadow, creeping to extinguish the very fire that distinguishes humanity from clever machines.
Let me be clear: there is no quarrel with progress when it is yoked to the cause of equality and human betterment. But I must cast my full-throated objection to the growing infatuation with AI as a substitute for the artist’s soul. For while the clanking gears of innovation may produce a facsimile of beauty, they cannot imbue it with meaning. AI is not an artist but a mirror; it reflects what is fed into it, regurgitating patterns and trends without comprehension or conviction. This is not creation; it is mimicry, polished and hollow.
The Tyranny of Convenience
Proponents of AI art sing its praises for its efficiency, its precision, its ability to tailor output to the whims of the masses. But do we not see the tyranny lurking behind this convenience? When art becomes merely a commodity to appease algorithms, it ceases to challenge, provoke, or uplift. It succumbs to the lowest common denominator, reinforcing what is popular rather than pursuing what is true.
Shall we allow machines to dictate our tastes, to strip art of its daring and replace it with sterile perfection? Perfection is the death of art, for it is the human flaw—the trembling brushstroke, the misshapen clay, the discordant note—that speaks to the shared struggle of our existence.
The Question of Ownership
Who owns this mechanized beauty? The human who prompts it? The corporation that codes it? Or the great void of the digital ether? There is no clarity here, no moral compass to navigate this thicket of intellectual property. In its confusion, AI art undermines the dignity of the laboring artist, who toils not merely for compensation but for the honor of expression. When you strip ownership of its moral dimension, you render art a commodity no different from corn or coal.
Equal Footing, Not an Uneven Field
Let me not be misunderstood: the tools of AI, when properly wielded, can amplify human ingenuity. But they must never replace it. The path forward is not to pit humans against machines in an unfair contest of speed and efficiency but to require that AI remain a servant, not a master. If AI is to exist in the realm of art, it must be bound by the same constraints that govern human creators: accountability, originality, and respect for the labor of others.
We must resist the siren song of ease that AI offers, for it tempts us to surrender the very essence of what it means to be human. The merit of art lies not in its polish but in its purpose. It is not the replication of beauty but the revelation of truth that gives art its enduring power.
The Unpopular Truth
Yes, I declare the unpopular truth: AI is a tool, and like all tools, it is as dangerous as it is useful. We cannot afford to bow before its efficiency without first demanding that it serve the higher cause of human creativity. Art is not merely what pleases the eye; it is what stirs the soul. It is what reminds us, in the face of mechanized convenience, that we are not machines, but thinking, feeling, flawed beings capable of greatness.
I appeal, then, not to your love of novelty but to your reverence for humanity itself. Guard the sanctity of art, not as a product, but as the most profound expression of our shared existence. Let the machines copy, but let us create. Let us be artists, not operators. The soul of humanity depends upon it.
Not what I expected.
Still a more interesting viewpoint than most of what I am seeing out there on the subject. haha.
