joonsooyoon

ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude are but a few generative artificial intelligences that have become as synonymous with the internet as a Google search. Look up any image, and some of the first results will be AI-generated; AI summaries are often the first informational advice given in a search; chatbots are gaining widespread use in both personal and corporate settings. Its quantity has also corresponded with its ability. Generative AI can write novels and stories, create songs, and generate various art. It can respond to human texts and use previous knowledge within new conversations. Although these AIs are not general intelligence and are merely large language models, nevertheless these AIs are growing in popularity and ability.

I believe it is foolish and unrealistic to propose that AI will disappear. As a technology, it will continue to naturally develop in capability. As the internet was to libraries, so too will AI be to the internet. It will be continually used in research, generation, texting, translation—and creating art.

In my opinion, human created arts are superior to AI created ones. Ask why, and I will answer thus—is it unreasonable for me to prefer a human construct over a machine created on, simply because a person has created it? Regardless of quality or distinguishability, AI can never change the inherent nature of its creation.

But beyond its nature, I believe stark differences between AI and human art exist.

Foremost, there is a passion, emotion, and humanness that AI can not replace. I refer to the quality of creativity and the subjective feeling which art evokes. AI can imitate the emotion, and that imitation is often hard to distinguish. But in the end, it is merely the words of humans spelled out by AI. I sincerely believe AI can not replicate the complex, emotional, and subjective human experience.

AI can not be original. Only humans can create inherently new creations. Indeed, many of human creations are a product of an amalgamation and collaboration between generations across time and space. However—ultimately, these influences and causes had a beginning. It is an undeniable truth that the beginning was human, and that the beginning could only have been human. No machine could have been the originator of creation without the human hand to be the cause.

Finally, I believe there is value in the human struggle. Time and effort, after all, are irreplaceable and valueless. These values that human arts have embedded in their creation, in itself, are a worthy aspect that differentiates them from AI. The final product may be similar, perhaps even indistinguishable; however, it is the journey to create that art, I believe, which is as important as the final creation. For AI, imitating the human process is natural. Yet, it can not truly add the effort and time and tears that are inbuilt within the process of the creation.

In the future, I believe there will be a conscious division between AI and human arts. Just as we divide between fiction and non-fiction, we will divide between these two types of content. This division could arise from a wide verification system for human-created works. Perhaps advanced AI detectors could be used to mark AI works. Perhaps there will be international or national regulations for AI works that must label or otherwise illustrate that a creation is AI generated.

The value of human creation in the future will also be given more weight. As the use of AI becomes easier and faster, human creation will be more valuable. Just as hand-crafted items are often more expensive and of better quality than mass-produced, machine creates items, I believe the same will occur for the human arts.

Some argue that AI will never be accepted by society and should be shunned. However, this overlooks the process of desensitization. Those who did not grow up with AI might indeed reflect upon it in an unfavorable light. Thus, in the contemporary time where AI is being developed, this might be the wide, popular opinion. However, consistent use of AI will inevitably normalize the concept of AI creation. As generations continue to arise with AI, the concept of such will no longer be foreign—and that normalization means it will be accepted.

Others argue that AI creation will drown out human creativity. I believe the human arts will simply react to AI. History and artistic/literary movements are a pendulum; they react and move to society’s conditions. The current technological, AI-driven society will produce a stylistic and thematic change in human arts. Just as romanticism reacted to the Enlightenment, modernism to the world wars and global events, a new movement will coalesce to respond to current society. One such example is thus: AI is often limited in its topic of graphic and polarizing content; perhaps, then, human arts will gravitate toward more diverse and distinct topics that may be difficult to face. But that is a mere possibility. In general, I believe AI will drive human creativity to unexplored boundaries, rather than limiting its potential.

I believe that human artists—writers, painters, musicians, etc.—produce value in art. Although it will only become more difficult to compete with AI, I do not believe that human creativity will fall. Art is only truly lost when human artists stop struggling within the process of creation. Distinguishability and quality aside, the passion, effort, and emotion of human artists and the very nature of creation within human minds give value to art. The value of art lies not just in the creation, but within the human mind that creates and views it.