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The use of non-experts as judges renders this meaningless.

Imagine an algorithm that drew random shapes. Then ask people who've never engaged with art theory or history to compare its output with what they see in a modern art museum. You'd get results similar to this.

Many forms of art are actually quite inaccessible to novices. What poets see in poems or composers hears in compositions is nothing like what someone from the outside sees or hears. It's a language of its own and if you don't speak the language, you simply won't get it.

This is a statement of fact, I'm not judging if its good or bad or what the layman's opinion is actually worth. But it is empirically how communities of artists operate.



The thing is that, for most of society, art exists to serve a utilitarian purpose (make us feel good/bad/inspired/destroyed/whatever other influence). Essentially just to induce a "vibe". Anything other than what most people intuitively feel after consuming it is secondary and, frankly, unimportant in the grand scheme of things.


That may be how most people see art, but it is not how artists see art.

Neither side is "right" or has a monopoly on the definition of art. You can't tell someone else how to think or feel about something.


> That may be how most people see art

...which is all that matters in this specific context as we're discussing generative AI's impact on society and what could happen in the future.


Except that the direction of art is usually influenced by the artists, without too much calibration to what the uninformed public wants.

It’s actually a really interesting question if this affects the market, at all. Because if AI can generate “art” which satisfies the public, but not artists, will the public just go for that, instead?

Or is it the case that the public never really cared for or consumes that art form, and that the entire market for art is to people who (to at least some degree) specialize in that form?


Yet Walt Whitman exists...




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