Based on discussions and what I read, a lot of people are afraid AI, artificial intelligence, will “steal” their jobs – what the hell happened to the “one day we’ll have robots and we won’t need to work” dream of early sci-fi? But I digress… Writers don’t seem to be an exception. A great number of them seem to be worried about AI replacing them. So, can AI produce art?
In this post I argue that no, AI can’t produce art – for reasons we’ll explore. But AI can certainly write. It can already now, and I’m certain it will become even better.
Where’s the difference, then, you might ask.
The difference, to a large extent, revolves around matters central to the writer-or-artist distinction. More insidiously, perhaps, it’s about conditioning us into patterns that can have far-reaching (and unpleasant) consequences.
