AI in Arts: Revolutionizing creativity or diminishing human input?
Nelson Shwe, Staff Graphic Artist
That headline above was written by ChatGTP, an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot.
ChatGTP, as Q.ai said in a Forbes article, is a chatbox run by AI that generates responses based on users’ input.
For example, ChatGTP was asked to generate story headlines about the pros and cons of AI in art and writing. Within seconds, it compiled a list of ten acceptable and realistic story headlines.
Not only can AI write and generate ideas for you. They can also generate art.
DALL·E, an AI system that will turn users’ text into art. Users can write descriptions and the AI will spit out many variations of art and pictures.
Google Cloud defines AI as the field of science that deals with how computers and machines are made to reason, learn and act in ways a human would.
Deborah Batson, a computer science instructor at North Greenville University (NGU), said that AI is machine learning. People are teaching computers to perform tasks and jobs humans usually do. She said this aspect of AI is great because it automates and streamlines the workplace.
“Imagine that if you needed to fertilize a greenhouse with something that’s very dangerous to humans, then using robotics to do that is a type of artificial intelligence saves the human from being exposed to that or even in the medical profession,” said Batson.
Batson said that there are definite values that can be found in AI. In manufacturing, AI is used to perform repetitive tasks. In the automobile industry, AI helps put cars together. In the medical field, certain types of AI and robotics help perform surgeries, and operations and help assist doctors.
The rise in AI technology can be helpful to people as a useful tool to help generate ideas, synthesize information, or create art. However, there are some concerns with AI technology in writing and art.
Writing
Businesses and companies can use AI writing bots for copywriting which could save them time and money.
Jasper, an AI copywriter, can create blog posts, marketing copy and even AI-generated art for teams.
Haley Gambrell, an NGU English professor who taught English literature and composition for 13 years said there is some usefulness to using AI.
“It can be helpful when there are types of writing that don’t necessarily need, like a new, fresh, creative approach,” said Gambrell, “and in those regards, I think for things like memos or press releases, those sort of standard types of writing, maybe AI could be really helpful in that regards.”
As helpful as AI can be in copywriting, there are concerns and ethical issues to examine.
Gambrell said that one issue at higher levels of education would be students using AI to turn in papers.
“We were very much against that because we want students to engage with the material, respond to it, analyze it, think about it very critically, and then be able to formulate that into some kind of argument, or even creatively, like a work of their own literature,” said Gambrell.
Using AI, students will not exercise the skills, critical thinking and creativity that teachers want them to practice.
Gambrell said that if someone uses AI and people know and allow the use of it, then it should not be an ethical issue. The ethical issue is turning in AI-generated papers as your own and claiming them as your own.
“I think the problem is and it’s what we run into with every sense of plagiarism or academic dishonesty is that our expectations as educators is that you are responding to what you’re learning in class and writing your own work, said Gambrell, “And when students turn in something that they did not generate like that. That’s a lie. That’s a fabrication and that is ethically wrong.”
AI used in writing can be a helpful tool. However, if used incorrectly, AI will limit thinking, creativity and cause ethical issues. Batson said that relying too much on AI in an educational setting can decreases our own brain power because we are not using our abilities to think and perform.
Art
AI art generators are on the rise as well. AI systems like DALL·E can generate realistic art and images from descriptive text. Could AI be used creatively in art?
For example, you can ask DALL·E to make you a painting of the mountains in the style of Van Gough. The AI will generate different paintings of mountains in the style of Van Gough. The painting style, colors and characteristics will be similar and look as if Van Gough painted it himself.
Marques Brownlee, a well know YouTube tech reviewer with a degree in business and information technology, discussed in his recent video “The Truth About AI Getting Creative.'”
In the video, Brownlee discussed some claims on AI replacing humans which he later revealed was from a script written by ChatGPT. He also discussed online creators and how to use AI creatively.
Brownlee also talked about how AI is stealing art without consent. He also pointed out in the video how creativity is lost when using AI.
Lensa AI, a paid photo and video editor app, allows users to upload photos of themselves and have the AI generate art and avatars to their likeness in different styles. The AI creates its art by pulling different data from other artists’ works like the color, texture and stroke.
Brownlee asked how artists who had their art sampled were being credited or paid. He said that AI uses data from other works because some of the users’ generated artwork have the signatures or marks of the original artists who made them.
Zac Buser, an art professor at NGU, said that looking at AI-generated images can be interesting to look at. However, it is not as edifying as human-generated fine art.
Buser said, in the AI models he has seen, little input is provided by the artist. They type a prompt, sit back and wait to see what comes out.
“That’s very little input now. And so, in that sense, when I put a work of art in front of an audience, there’s a lot of my skin in that game. Metaphorically and literally put my skin in the artwork. A lot of blood, sweat and tears have gone into that,” said Buser.
Buser said art is a dialogue between two people and establishing relationships. AI-generated art does not have that value.
AI has many capabilities. It can perform tasks from writing poems to creating Van Gough-style art. It can write songs and point researchers to sources said, Batson. However, AI is all automated. It leaves out all the human emotions.
People should not use it to replace their creativity. If they use it, they need to expand on it and find a way to make it uniquely theirs.
As Gambrell puts it, “AI is always going to be missing the human element. It can reproduce and it can copy and all of that but it’s missing the heart and soul, which I think is what gives really good writing.”
