The massive popularity of ChatGPT and similar AI tools has raised lots of questions. From philosophers, ethicists, and artists come a myriad of questions about how “artificial intelligence” fits or does not with our humanity.
Artificial
The previous post on my blog was “Unlock the Power of Free Sample Libraries to Unleash Your Composing Potential“. I listed it as a guest post. And it certainly was. I did not write it. Nor did any other human being. It was written by an AI (GPT-4) application.
Yes, I decided to experiment with this technology. And, though I think that AI tools may have a place, I doubt that I’ll use one here again.
I added the links in the opening paragraph of “Unlock the Power…” just before I posted this article. They were the only edit I made to this AI article.
editor’s note
Artificial Intelligence?
Here are a few of the things I find interesting and sometimes unsettling about that AI article:
- Even when the AI mentions contents whose most important feature is their web presence, it does not include a web link. For example, in the bullet list of possible sample library sites, none of them are linked.
- The object of the article is the sample libraries (the thing) rather than a person/people who will use them. Occasionally, the GPT tool does shift to using “you” as the subject.
- The GPT tool sometimes writes in passive voice rather than active.
- The AI often uses broad generalities. Since it does not offer footnotes, bibliography, or citations, we have no way to determine what it bases these generalizations on.
AI
I’m not against technology. In fact, I use computer and other tech in my day job and my music. Technology including AI has it’s place. But I can say that I felt like I was cheating my readers when I posted this AI “guest post”. Should you know if you’re reading AI or human writing?
Ironically, the search engines seemed to think this blog post was great. As you can see in the chart above, posting “Unlock the Power…” produced a spike in my readership almost immediately. It would take lots of research to understand the how and why of this.
Back to Humanity
AI in the form of GPT (“generative pre-trained transformer”) is here to stay. Do I want it to have a place in art and creative process? Not really. But it has already shown up in every form or art from graphic to musical.
I doubt that I’ll ever generate another blog post from AI/GPT. Still, we can see that people are adopting it everywhere. Rather than trying to avoid it, how can we embrace AI as artists?