Do we still feel bad for switchboard operators? Technology evolves, we have to grow with it.
Well, no, you don't
have to feel bad for switchboard operators. Or people working in the creative field, for that matter. But as someone working in that field (it’s the only thing I know how to do and the only thing I ever wanted to do), I do obviously feel very empathic towards them. (Incidentally, my late grandmother actually
was a switchboard operator when she was a young woman, and then became a seamstress when switchboard operators weren’t needed anymore.)
But that’s not even the main reason I’m personally against AI (as I've said in the full text of my post). Thinking some more about it, here are my main problems with AI image generators:
1. I am convinced the vast majority of people underestimate what this technology will mean for the proliferation of fake news. We’re basically at a moment in time where the trust we as people put in recordings will forever and irreversibly be shattered. Producing convincing fake footage is practically at every layman’s fingertips now or in the near future. And since we’re already extremely polarized as a society, I fear what this will mean for our peaceful coexistence.
2. Then there are the ethical and moral problems with AI: millions of artist’s works have been taken without any consent given whatsoever, just to initially train the AI algorithm. And I’m frankly startled to see how this is just being brushed off by the vast majority of people. And this plays into:
3. I’m disturbed by how it has already led to a stark devaluation of art in general. I don’t necessarily mean in a monetary sense, but in the way we look at art, talk about it and how much it means to us. Respect for artists’ work and an understanding of what it means to create art has always been something I perceived as very low in society. Now the first thing that people do when they see a piece of artwork online is ask if it’s “real or AI generated”. Gee, thanks AI!
4. And finally — and this is absolutely my biggest personal peeve with AI — I feel it’s fallacious to merely talk of AI image generation as another “tool”. A tool is something that helps you do something. This ain’t that, because AI just does it all for you wholesale. For all intents and purposes it takes the creative process away from humanity. And I feel the danger in that is that humanity will unlearn the importance of coming up with new art and new ways to see the world and process what we see in it. If all art is ever going to be from now on is a regurgitation or imitation of art that has been there before, it’ll be the end of one of the most important aspects of the human experience. I know I probably sound rather cynical, but that’s how it all feels to me right now.
So no, even though they are valid concerns, I think
just talking about how it’s taking away people’s jobs and livelihoods or how it’s “not real art” (which seems to be the biggest mainstream discourse that’s happening about AI generated images) is doing the implications of the technology justice. The genie is out of the bottle now and the technology will likely not just disappear anytime soon or ever. But I think what needs to happen is that people find ways to counter the worst implications that it brings with it. And frankly, right now I don’t see anything like that happening.
