AI and the Obsolescence of Humanity..

[Cynder]

I recently watched a documentary about how human beings are literally becoming obscelete.  At first robots were able to replace manual laberors.  Now we are getting to the point where AIs can do a lot of thimgs humans can do, faster and cheaper.  

AI writers are writing articles, copy for ads, and even fiction.  The SciFi magazine Clarksworld shut down submissions becauae they got flooded with AI generated short stories.  

I'm an artist, so of course I'm going to talk about AI art.  A lot of artists I know feel threatened and even get angry when the subject comes up.  And I can see why.  AI art has won some competitions.  Companies can spend a few dollars and get an AI to create whatever they want instead of paying a graphic designer.  

I have a MidJoirney account.  (MJ is one of the most well known AI art generators, for those not familiar.)  When I first started using it I just played a lot.  I put my name in and it painted the face of a woman who looked eerily similar to me, but prettier.  And she had amber eyes which to me was the creepiest part since I also have amber eyes.  Thats a rare eye color.  And I only fed it my first name, not my full name.  I put my SOs name in (first and last, he actually asked me to use his last name too.) And it painted a very aristocratic looking older man who was dressed like someone from Medeival Europe.  It looked nothing like my SO, but still was interesting to see.  Then I put my nephew's name in and it painted a young man (late teens) who looked nothing like my nephew but actually looked like a young version of my SO.  

Unlike a lot of other artists who are outraged, I am learning to use the AI generator as a tool instead of fighting against it.  It's here whether we like it or not.  I don't mean selling my AI generated images.  (There are artists who do this, IMO that's going too far.) But I do use it for inspiration.  Like, if I decide I want to paint a lion.  And more specifically I want it to be a very regal looking lion.  Instead of spending hours on Google finding the right reference photos, I can just ask MJ to paint me a regal lion.  It makes a lot of variations.  I'm sure there will be a couple I like.  Then I use that as a starting point.  I draw it on the canvas and put my own spin on it during the whole drawing and painting process.  

I know there are ppl reading this who are disgusted.  But artists use what tools and resources are available to us.  And just about all of us work from reference photos at some point.  I had multiple professors tell me in art school, there is no right or wrong way to create.  I know about a dozen other artists who are using AI in this way, too.  

When my nephew is over tomorrow I'm planning on letting him play with the AI and see what he comes up with.  I think he will have a lot of fun with it.  

AI art always looks a little off, though.  Human hands are almost always distorted.  People have 3 fingers, 7 fingers. 3 hands, one arm, etc.  It always gets something wrong.  And the eyes almost never look right.  This is why I think AI art will never measure up to what a human artist can create.  

I really did start this thread because I think how AI will change things is an interesting topic.  I wasn't planning on going off on a tangent about AI art.  But as an artist, obviously that's the thing I have thought about the most and it will have the most impact on my life.  

I won't link the documentary because it's probably too political.  But this is an interesting topic for discussion imo.  

Also, I'm on my phone so I'm sorry if there are typos.

[Jibralta]

3 hours ago, Cynder said:

Unlike a lot of other artists who are outraged, I am learning to use the AI generator as a tool instead of fighting against it.

We were just talking about this at work last week. A couple of my coworkers used it to generate quick designs. It saves a lot of time.

[Kwothe28]

Freelance client asked me to make him some message to send other connections on Linkedin. Literally 3 seconds work in ChatGPT. If you know how to use it, it can save a lot of time for some small tasks. There is a whole new episode of South Park dediated to it. And how you can just type a perfect response to message to somebody or even whole school report, just by using AI. 

Ive seen AI art. Its scary how unrecognizable it is from "human art". Except for hands thing, AI just cant do hands lol. I think somebody made AI art and send it to some art show. And it won. That is where uproar for artists started. Because machine officially made better and more creative thing then a human. And frankly I dont think its that big of a deal. Its human progress. 20+ years ago they made AI capable of beating Kasparov at chess. Biggest chess Champion of maybe all time. Beaten by machine. Its something inevitable. Workers at factories had to do things manually before machines. Afterward they needed to learn to operate machines in order to do work. Because it was easier and more efficient. Same with AI art. You would still need somebody to "lead" the AI in order to make it properly. Though I am afraid many artists would look at all that as "sacriligious". 

[Cynder]

18 minutes ago, Kwothe28 said:

Freelance client asked me to make him some message to send other connections on Linkedin. Literally 3 seconds work in ChatGPT. If you know how to use it, it can save a lot of time for some small tasks. There is a whole new episode of South Park dediated to it. And how you can just type a perfect response to message to somebody or even whole school report, just by using AI. 

Ive seen AI art. Its scary how unrecognizable it is from "human art". Except for hands thing, AI just cant do hands lol. I think somebody made AI art and send it to some art show. And it won. That is where uproar for artists started. Because machine officially made better and more creative thing then a human. And frankly I dont think its that big of a deal. Its human progress. 20+ years ago they made AI capable of beating Kasparov at chess. Biggest chess Champion of maybe all time. Beaten by machine. Its something inevitable. Workers at factories had to do things manually before machines. Afterward they needed to learn to operate machines in order to do work. Because it was easier and more efficient. Same with AI art. You would still need somebody to "lead" the AI in order to make it properly. Though I am afraid many artists would look at all that as "sacriligious". 

I haven't played around with ChatGPT yet.  But I have used SudoWrite in similar ways. 

I think it's funny that AIs can't draw hands because hands are so hard to draw for humans, also.  I remember in art school we were given a project in life drawing where we had to draw 10 hands in different positions and from different angles.  IMO the hand is the hardest part of the body to draw.  And AI can't even do it.  It's weirdly validating. 

I was a quality inspector in an automotive plant for 11 years (because most artists still need to work a day job.)  A good chunk of my time there was spent inspecting a certain subtype of parts, by hand measuring and gauging them, and by looking for imperfections.  Then they got this robot that could inspect the parts 10 at a time by scanning them and with resonance testing.  It made my job so much easier.  But I still had to program the robot.  And when there were bad parts found I still had to contain them, etc.  It's all a matter of learning to work with it instead of against it.  

Coding an AI generator does take some skill.  AI images are generally pretty small and the resolution is low, unless the person writing the prompt codes it right.  So yea, I agree.  Someone still needs to lead the AI. 

It's also interesting that 20ish years ago digital art was pissing a lot of artists off.  Digital art was my main medium in the early 2000s when it was still up and coming.  And I got some crap for it from other artists.  I remember getting this one really nasty email from someone I kinda knew at the time.  Like, we had met maybe twice.  She was a friend of a friend.  I got hired to do a CD cover for a friend's band and I guess this girl was also interested in doing it.  This girl sent me this several paragraph long email telling me that I'm not a real artist.  Anyone can be a pixel pusher.  No self respecting artist would ever do digital art.  Digital art takes no real talent to do. I should enjoy the CD cover money because it's the only money I will ever make, etc.  Now digital art is seen as a legit medium and no one thinks anything negative about it.  Makes me wonder if 20 years from now AI art will be just another medium and all artists will be doing it. 

I still refuse to sell AI generated images, though.  Some of my AI stuff is really beautiful.  But that give me more motivation to draw it and put my own style into it on canvas. 

[Cynder]

11 hours ago, Jibralta said:

We were just talking about this at work last week. A couple of my coworkers used it to generate quick designs. It saves a lot of time.

Yes, it saves boatloads of time. 

[Coily]

AI everything I find interesting and troublesome, Ironically on the day this was posted I was having a similar conversation with a proponent of AI for programming.

His point was that AI would help coding and all of the background operations, making things cheaper and more manageable. We wandered into AI Art, his pet projects on GPT, and my dabbling with Deep Fake voices; it's really fascinating how all of these emergent technologies all raise concerns over the human element. But for me the greater concern is what happens when AI breaks?

With Automotive robots we have technicians who can fix the devices; but what happens when the basic knowledge is lost? When we start using AI for the background functions, will in 20 years people know how to do those things for oversight? I look cars today, previous generations knew more about how to do basics; now there is lane correction and "you can only refill your washer fluid."

I like AI and I also hate it.

[Jibralta]

6 hours ago, Coily said:

what happens when the basic knowledge is lost?

Great point. And it's been happening for thousands of years. Society forgets a lot.