Appreciation of Literature and Film

In Everything Is a Remix, Kirby Ferguson discusses how machines can create stunning artwork. He shows many examples of music, writing, and images made by machines during his presentation. Despite these examples, he affirms that human beings produce most art. He has a point. Machines are capable of incredible things, but of course, not in the same way as humans are capable of creating things.

Artificial Intelligence has no feelings, no memories, no experiences. It merely copies and remixes what has been made by other people. When a machine generates a piece of music or a picture, it takes elements of other pieces of music or pictures that it has studied. It does not know what makes a person feel sad, happy, or in love. Genuine art most often results from profound emotions or real experiences. A machine cannot know these things. It can merely pose as if it knows them.

AI cannot take over creativity but can be a helpful tool. Both writers and musicians can utilize AI when stuck on where to start. Both can allow it to experiment with different colors, melodies, or styles. It can also do mundane tasks fast, such as creating outlines or background music, but the significant decisions should be left to the creator. It is the creator who imbues meaning into the piece of work. The AI can only do what it has been instructed to do. For instance, a painter may utilize AI to propose various colors. The musician can use AI to produce a simple beat and then layer instruments upon it. The writer can incorporate ideas from AI but then pick what he considers to be his best ideas to write his rendition of the story. In these instances, AI merely acts as a tool, not a creator. The camera doesn’t make a wonderful picture by itself; it has something to do with what its user wishes to do when operating it.

More people will be able to create art with AI. Even if a person cannot draw or create music, he or she can make things through AI. It allows more people to express their emotions, even though they cannot. However, if people do not make decisions, we may have a world filled with fantastic art but no true meaning.

AI isn’t against art, but it isn’t a helper, either. It is merely a tool. It matters how we utilize it. We can enhance the art-making process if we utilize AI to aid us but maintain the human aspect of creating art. But if we become too reliant on AI and lose track of human emotions behind creating art, we lose what makes art significant. Art isn’t merely a matter of putting things together but expressing something real. Only human beings can do that.

I did not use generative AI to write this essay.

Art is a human enterprise, but AI is very much a tool capable of mimicking that enterprise. AI trains on other online images, most of which are human created pieces of artwork, not created by an AI. Thats the appeal of AI image generation though; that people with no time to work on or achieve an artistic ability can have AI refine and build their ideas with near pinpoint precision. To demonstrate this, I am going to include two things; first a hand drawn image that I created a few years back with nothing except a pencil and sketch pad, and then finally a 1-minute video capture of me using a basic online AI image generator to produce a similar concept. This will also demonstrate as evidence that what I drew with a human hand was not perfect, but AI is near precision perfect. In fact, you could almost say it is other worldly perfect.   

Daisy May- Drawn by me

Video of image creation tool in action

As you can see there’s my drawing, a little rough around the edges, and then the three images created by the ai looks almost too perfect and its lines are overall very smooth. By these examples, I feel that replacing hand drawn human art with AI is highly implausible. What makes human art different isn’t necessarily how beautiful it is, but how imperfect it is and the emotions/stories behind it. The image I drew was of my family’s first dog, daisy. If I had asked AI for a painting of daisy, I would have had to train it on old pictures of her or I would have gotten flowers instead. I would also need to continuously run the algorithm, constantly tweaking the output with new inquiries to get a less otherworldly output in theory. 

Leaving the philosophical aspects though the important discussion is where all roads lead; money. Copywrite and ownership are central issues to this, since in order for AI to create certain artworks they need to be trained on images in order to mimic them. While I have no exact number, we can assume the number of artworks used to train ranging from some to many pieces are either under a copy write or the work of some artist off the internet whom did not give permission for there work to be trained on by AI. Now if the created images were not going to be used in the economy, then this wouldn’t be an issue. However, there is no clear law against that and here comes the overall point of “Why should they be able to take my artwork, scan it, have AI put out a potentially cleaner or more beautiful piece of artwork, then profit from it. At then end of the day, the only way they can make a profit is by training their AI to mimic or create their ‘original pieces’ is by training the AI on my original work.” If allowed, what stops business and corporations from attempting to automate creativity and attempting to eliminate nearly an entire work force. Quite frankly if the intent of AI in this manner is to cut a companies cost at the expense of their workers, then I feel in its entirety that there should be either an outright ban on the use of AI for such purposes or extreme limitations at least, especially since they need artists to create the images the AI is trained on in order to replace them.  

I did not use generative AI when writing this Assignment.

Charlotte Foreman

I honestly think that at the beginning of AI’s creation, it was impossible for it to generate art, but now I do believe that it can. When AI was new, as most things, there were more bugs, and didn’t work as accurately or fast as it does now. Something that at the beginning, when everyone was skeptical of AI was is that really art, or is it just a really well-trained pattern? AI basically just takes the work that they have produced before from other prompts, and learns from it. When people ask to change the photos, they learn from it. They learn from trends, what people are asking the most for, and are getting smarter. Something that AI is unable to do is to need to create, they only want to, for others. AI can feed you a picture when given a prompt, but you can’t see the emotion through it, as there is no emotion. You can’t see the pain or sorrow, or the joys, or the real effort, or the blood, sweat, and tears that is being put into this art. And while the work that is being generated might not be bland, without emotions, and a story (a real human story) it isn’t worth anything. 

I wouldn’t say that AI is the enemy though. I think when used for the right reasons, it can be a tool, but can be easily misused. We very quickly realized how Ai can make some parts of our life easier, but it really just made us more lazy. And in some cases, AI can lead to possible cheating and plagiarism. We have become lazier after covid as well, after being stuck at home for months, and where it was easier to sit on the couch and watch tv or look at our phones, than go out and be active.

AI can be used in collaboration with an artist to create amazing pieces. AI can help brainstorm ideas for new pieces, or help give prompts of what to paint. You don’t necessarily have to look at an orange sitting on a stool, AI can create inspiring prompts that can help be a co-pilot that can help get you where you’re going faster, or to even help you get somewhere you never would’ve thought to go. Some artists are already taking advantage of this tool, in the broader realm of art, filmmakers are using AI, and so are musicians to help create melodies or help think of a word to go in a song. This isn’t saying that they are giving any kind of necessary credit, they are just expanding on how they create. We can create things that we never thought was possible, use different mediums, create new songs, storylines, and installations with the help of AI, when used properly and to its fullest extent.

The photo attached was created by AI, and while it seems very dull, I see possibility  in there. This is a space that any kind of art can be created in there, and I see curiosity and the ability to look deeper into the photo, even if there isn’t any deeper meaning, I can hone in on this idea that there is more, and create using that feeling.

I did not use generative AI to write this essay.

In Kirby Ferguson’s video, “Everything Is a Remix”, he goes into detail about the many artists in history whose work was derivative in some way of another’s, and concludes that every artist in the past and in the future has/will not create art that is entirely unique. He makes claims that art imitates by default, that AI ‘art’ is another example of this, and despite that, that art will always belong to humanity. While I do agree that art will always remain the human’s domain, what Kirby blatantly fails to understand, and consequently doesn’t make clear to his viewers, is the inherent harm that AI brings to the world of art, and why AI cannot and can never create art in the way that humans can.

AI cannot create art in the way that humans do for the simple reason that it is not conscious. It is incapable of having intention, and only gives the appearance of sapience. To put it simply, AI in its current form is not actually intelligent, or anything like the AI’s that have been portrayed in popular culture throughout history. It is, in essence, a predictive blender. When it comes to image generation, images are “labeled” by humans (a step which Kirby entirely forgets in his video) so that the model is able to associate that word with that image, these labeled images (the vast majority being copyrighted material) are then fed into the model, and from there, whenever you type a phrase or ‘ask’ the AI to give you a particular image according to what you ask for the AI will take all of the images labeled with those words and blend them together into one. Beyond all of the labor and ethics violations behind the training and use of these AI’s, there is no thought behind this process, no intention, and the individual inputting the prompt has no control over what the algorithm spits out either. Not to mention, the images these models are trained on are now feeding into themselves, which means that they’ll begin to get worse and worse over time as AI images beget worse AI images, but I digress.

With that out of the way, there are two important things to note. 1, because of the way these AI models work, no matter what advancements may occur in the field, there’s only so far they can go, and they’re reaching that plateau at an extremely rapid rate. 2, this AI process can never possibly result in the creation of anything that we as humans would consider art, because art requires intention, rather than the blatant theft of copyrighted material that these models subsist on.

So, to put it bluntly, I’m confident in my declaration that AI, as it is most commonly used, can never be used in the field of art. It is not a tool, it is an obfuscation of the labor of real artists being hijacked so that individuals can claim to be artists without putting in any effort or soul.

(AI “art” found in Addlestone Library)

I did not use generative AI to write this essay, and I’ll never use it to write any essay.

It can’t write after all.

Maya Tinney

             In the video, Everything Is a Remix, Kirby Ferguson shows some impressive examples of art made my AI. He includes AI-generated images like a beautiful portrait of a women in futuristic clothing and a detailed sculpture of a creature that looks almost like it came from another planet. The art is cool, and it is hard to believe that a machine made it. But even with all of this, Ferguson still says that art is an “essentially human enterprise.” I think he’s right; AI can create things that look like art, but it can’t create art the way humans do.

                  The images that AI can create may look deep and meaningful, but the AI has no idea what it means. It was just following a pattern based on what it learned from millions of images online. AI process the images online and will create a model of them. Then they change the image by adding noise, so the image created is different but as the same meaning. The example in the video is a cat. AI can create a cat but not an identical cat to the one before it, although it is still a cat. It was responding to a human prompt of “create a cat.”  Without the human giving it the idea, it wouldn’t make anything at all.

                  That’s why I agree with Ferguson that art is human. Real art comes from emotion and experience. A painting by someone who is grieving or a writing by someone who is in love can carry feelings that AI simply cannot have. AI doesn’t get inspired by anything. It simply just writes what you tell it to. AI does suffer, laugh, cry, or even care. So when It produces something that looks beautiful or emotional, it didn’t actually feel anything while making it.

                  Even so, I think AI can be a very helpful tool for human artists. If someone has an idea but cannot draw well, they could use AI to bring that idea to life. Writers can also use AI to help imagine the settings or characters along with get ideas for the plot. Musicians can use AI to generate background music so they can then tweak and personalize it to how they want. Currently, there is a trend going around, where you put a picture into AI of a couple. The AI will then produce a family photo of what your “kids” together might look like. It’s kind of creepy, honestly. It shows how powerful AI is at faking things, but also how fake it really is. That “family” doesn’t exist. There are no real memories, no real relationships, simply just pixels. This proves that while AI can generate realistic imagines, it doesn’t create in the way humans do. Real art comes from real life. To put this into another perspective, it is like how photographers use Photoshop. Not to create the whole piece, but more to tweak and enhance it.

                  So, to answer the question, can AI create art with just a human prompt and no other help? Technically yes, but emotionally no. It can mix things together, create new patterns, and it could even come up with something completely different. But the work it creates has no true intention behind it. That is wat makes human art different. It is not just about how it looks, but more about what I means. In the end, AI is a powerful tool, that has grown very popular in today’s world. But it is still just a tool. Humans are the ones who give the art its meaning.

I did not use generative AI to write this essay.

Susanna Carns

    I do not think that AI can generate art, even if guided by exclusively human prompts, as art is defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as “[works so produced with] conscious use of skill and creative imagination especially in the production of aesthetic objects.” (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/art) Generative AI does not have the capacity of consciousness, nor of imagination, so given this I would conclude that it is incapable of producing art. Additionally, I cannot see a way for humans to use AI as a tool to create art if the final result is produced by the AI. I could see a scenario in which an artist might utilize generative AI to generate prompts for things to draw or include in artwork as practice, or to similarly recommend an assortment of colors to include in a scene or notes to include in a musical composition as an exercise, but that is the furthest extent of AI involvement in art in which I would still consider the final result to be art. Anything beyond this would remove either the component of conscious use of skill by having the end result be generated by AI, or would remove the component of creative imagination by having the components of the piece be derived from AI prompting. 

    Above I have included a side-by-side comparison of the painting “A Girl with Flowers on the Grass” by Jacob Maris (left) with a Midjourney (AI, right) attempted recreation of the painting in order to illustrate the stark contrast between humanmade art and AI image generation. On the right side, which is the Midjourney generated image, you will notice several technical errors among the flowers and the blades of grass. These errors are exemplary of a larger common trend with AI image generation in which errors are often plentiful and glaring. Considering this, even if generative AI one day reaches a point where we might consider it “conscious”, it’s evident lack of use of skill would still disqualify it from being capable of creating art. It is my personal conviction regarding generative AI in general that it is a dangerous tool for our current society to make use of, as many people begin to rely on it for tasks such as planning, outlining essays, or even writing any email, essay, or longer form piece of writing—when it comes to art, my belief is no different. I do not consider AI art to be art by definition, and beyond that, I do not believe that artists should employ the use of AI as this runs the risk of diminishing their creativity and engagement with imagination, and if they share this “art” they bring this risk to artists as a collective as well through their possible influence on others to use AI for their artistic pursuits. 

I did not use generative AI to write this essay. 

Kelly Matera

In Everything is a Remix by Kirby Ferguson, there is this overarching concept that AI lacks a level of depth required to truly compete with the human enterprise, especially in the art industry. While I do see validity in his points, I find many of his ideas to be lacking in support. One major thing to take into consideration is that this video was made a few years ago, and within these last few years, AI has developed exponentially. While some of his statements about the accuracy and efficiency of AI, especially as it pertains to artistic creation, were true at the time the video was created, they do not hold true (to the most part) anymore. One of his major arguments is that AI can only recreate based on a database that it is given, unaware of the actual work it is creating. I don’t believe that this “unaware” state can be supported anymore, as there have been many cases where modern AI proves, to some extent, an understanding of the work it creates. This idea in itself allows for AI to “dip” into the human enterprise that is art, as we are only able to create mainly based on a knowledge of what we have seen, experienced, and heard, mixed with an understanding of what it is we are creating. However, there is a major aspect that is still lacking in AI that was mentioned in this video, and does hold true in modern versions of the software. This exception is the “experience of life”. AI still cannot create based on previous experiences such as heartbreak, love, grievance, sorrows, successes, and most importantly, relationships. This is what I believe still makes human art unique and separate from AI-created art. There is no story behind art created by AI, and no true experience to back any of its creations up. This would ultimately prevent AI from creating anything we consider art, as it must have some sort of experience or story to at least mimic. Without our input, AI would not be able to create what we know as art, but rather just a series of copied, pasted, and distorted images. 

Some ways in which we as humans can use AI to our benefit when it comes to the creation of art are through recreation. AI was made to copy, so why not use it in the way it was designed? One of my best examples of this is the recreation of the dead (such as loved ones), through the copying and analyzing of photographs and paintings. AI could recreate these people, roughly, into moving figures that bring life back into a photo or painting that is completely still. This could help those bereaving a loved one, or perhaps someone studying a person who lived in a completely different century than they did. The limits to this usage are endless, but the effects are insurmountable. In this way, humans can create something for themselves that could then inspire more human-made art.