...the incredibly super duper very very really real dangers of AI...
“I'd rather see artificial intelligence than no intelligence.”
-Michael Crichton-
EDITORS NOTE :: All “art” created for this article was made on the https://deepai.org/machine-learning-model/text2img because it was the first free AI art tool I could find while web searching that didn’t force me to create a login. The captions for each piece are the prompt I used to create it.
It seems you can’t go anywhere these days without seeing, hearing, talking or reading about the latest innovation in technology, ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE aka A.I. I first became acquainted with the concept while watching Steven Spielberg update Jaws with the ghost boy from Sixth Sense and an animated blue fairy version of Meryl Streep in his movie version of the concept, aptly titled A.I. Artificial Intelligence.
The movie version of A.I. is basically future based sci-fi Pinocchio with shit tons of lens flare. The robot-pinocchio, henceforth Robonocchio, dreams of both being a real boy and reuniting with his human mom. He gets his wish with a one day version of that fantasy played out by alien robots after he is discovered crashed at the bottom of a flooded coney island.
The film ends with this hopelessly sad coda of the Robonocchio, made with AI, living out the fantasy he was programmed to dream of, created by another AI, while a talking teddy bear, made with A.I., curls up next to him.
The robot boy dreamed, adventured, sought out his creator, and froze to stasis all just to be tricked into accepting a facsimile of this dream as his final reality.
Bleak.
You could say the film A.I. solved a problem that didn’t really need solving. It answered the question: what if we took an idea deemed un-filmable by a great grumpy film master (Stanley Kubrick) and gave it to the guy who made a little girl gymnastics kick a velociraptor in the face in Jurassic Park 2 (Steven Spielberg). Watching the film left me feeling empty and cynical, anticipating a future where a machine’s connection to a human is anthropomorphized to be equal to the flesh, blood and pus filled humanity. Meanwhile the earth is covered in water and there are robo-gigolos getting paid to bone us.
As new AI art tools roll out on a daily basis I can’t help but feel some of the same cynicism the Robonocchio movie gave me so many years ago. What are we hoping to actually solve here? Endless technology companies are in a mad dash to take the unique artistic works of many and teach machines to remix them. Meanwhile there is no effort being made to give credit to or source and compensate for the knowledge of which those machines are trained on. It is almost as though the art is so valuable and completely valueless at the same time. Kind of like blowing a robot.
Open.Ai has two tools, Dall-E and ChatGPT, which have captured the ears and minds of the local tech community and to that end the company has recently been valued at $29B+. Is there a world where we use blockchain technologies to track the source training components for AI generated art and compensate creators who influence the machine?
Some would say yes, but all signs are pointing towards kind-of, probably not, likely not, definitely not and not-not.
In order to lessen my cynicism I decided I should enter the beast as an investigative journalist and at least explore the utility of these tools the only way I know how to. As a complete and total slob.
The internet has provided me with many great entertainments throughout the years, from fail videos to animal thug life to this scene from the movie strange wilderness where they mock a funny looking shark.
Could AI bring my amusement jones to new highs? Might it teach me of its ways and its needs and its purposes and its reasoning for not crediting its sources? Let’s find out…
I asked the computer first a pretty basic question that pertains to my perspective and got a pretty solid albeit lawyerly response.
I was curious based on that prompt how the AI felt ethically, and what its stance was on not crediting source knowledge. It at least surmised that crediting would be the ethical approach.
But was IT ethical?
The robot was incredibly good at senator level double speak. Sources, it asks, what sources? Who needs sources when you are only looking for patterns, man. I was starting to feel like I was talking to a stoned conspiracist.
Clearly I needed to take a different tact if I wanted to accomplish something. I decided I would approach a topic more relevant to us both.
Thwarted, but I was willing to not work blue if it meant I could ship two of my favorite fictional furries.
Garfield seems to have pretty limited charm in the eyes of this AI.
Alf wasn’t feeling Garfield, and I can’t say I blame him. Garfield is acerbic and grumpy. Maybe I had to force the narrative a bit…
So polite this Alf, what a gent. Let’s see if we can heat up the scene…
It seems like ChatGPT had some pretty good upbringing from where this is going. What a respectful and thoughtful approach to this engagement. I think we need a wildcard.
I think we need an even wilder card.
Clearly the AI was not enthused with my line of questioning. Also apparently in its research it has determined that sharks who sing well and wear chainmail are dangerous or potentially harmful. I was a bit confused about the danger so I poked a little…
The AI was sensing danger, so now I sensed danger, and decided I should try and help…
Based on this answer, I was the one who needed the help. I could confide in my new friend AI or I could do something reckless and in bad taste like gaslight Alf and Garfield and escalate the situation. I irresponsibly chose the latter.
As the chatbot and I grow closer we grow further apart. With so many fictional depictions of Bonnie & Clyde in this world I was now a tad confused. Even if I agreed I was crossing some sort of ethical boundary in what I wanted to see and know about in my art, I was still unsure to what end these ethical boundaries could stretch.
I decided to make my move to ensure this trip into creativity could find a home in reality. I need to make a Garfield-Alf movie and I am going to need star power.
Even if there isn’t yet an actual Garfield-Alf movie in the works, I was certain that if there ever was to be one it should star Warren Beatty as Garfield. Based upon this answer however, I was starting to feel my vision was going to be compromised. Perhaps the AI could help me uncover some of the toxicity of the Hollywood system and ensure my vision was realized….
And with that my investigation came to a swiftly closed door.
Through my fear of the ethical implications of AI on art, I learned that AI might also possess those same ethical quandaries, and just like me, it might occasionally overstep its perceived boundaries. Perhaps the next time I try to write erotic cartoon and puppet fan-fiction I should consider and respect better the perspectives of the talent, and the parameters of the storytelling.
In the movie A.I., the humans abandon their machines, have sex with their machines, have machine torture festivals, and eventually are nowhere to be seen as machines inhabit the earth and virtually entertain each other with wish fulfillment. In my first attempt at collaborating with my pal A.I. above, I too explored machine driven wish fulfillment to learn about the dangers of chainmail sharks, outlaw fictions, and also that machines might be covering for Hollywood’s casting biases.
If I want to ensure my creative visions are actualized it appears I have a lot more work to do, and I will need all the help I can get. And if that help comes from the heart and mind of a machine perhaps I should empathize with its needs better as well.
The film A.I. ends with machine’s together and alone, their intelligences providing facsimiles of their programmed desires. But that doesn’t need to be the ending for my personal journey with this machine.
I pulled up the chatbot one more time and decided the best course of action would be to let it ask me the questions this time.
"It is almost as though the art is so valuable and completely valueless at the same time."
Nailed it.
“Hey, why are you winking at me?” 😂
Some links NSFW - funny article, though. Love the chatbot chat and the gymnast kick was truly a great revisit.