Frankly, I think there are many reasons not to do this.
1. It's not computer art. I believe in the possibility of artificial intelligence, and when we encounter it it will be so different from human intelligence that asking it to make imitations of human art will seem like an insult. We probably won't understand its art very well either at first.
2. I'm getting really tired of people racing to automate every damn thing. even if we establish an economic utopia and nobody has to work any more what are people supposed to do all day if every human activity can be performed 'better' by a machine?
3. It won't really be 'better' though, it will just be more popular because so many programmers are trapped in a quantitative mindset and thus treat every problem they encounter like a nail to be hammered in. Imitative digital technologies will always be correlated with popularity, limiting creative innovation because developers can't think of a reason to optimize for or nurture anything that is initially unpopular.
Creative prostheses that all require the same amount of effort to deploy (ie none) will be hailed as 'allowing everyone to be an artist' without requiring them to in best any meaningful time or effort in ideas that don't pay off or that fail. The result, which we are already seeing, is a plethora of new material created with little effort that is as superficial as it is ephemeral, whose volume and variety will obscure its stultifying conventionality.
This is no more art than Cheese Whiz is food. It's Art-flavored mechanical product that functions to do no more than alleviate the masses' thirst for self-actualization without any adjustment of power structures and is thus fundamentally limited to reproduction of the cultural conditions from which it originates.
I think this is an anti-intellectual argument. Why would you argue against someone pursuing an idea? I don't see this as any threat to the distinction between art and mechanical reproduction.
Art has always been "ineffable" and will remain so, as long as humans have thoughts and feelings. Bad art, or lazy productions will be as ignored as ever.
Are you kidding. No one is saying this should replace art.
It's just an experiment in generative algorithms. It can though have interesting applications in assisted design, which I bet you would say is not art either anyways.
I think i get what he is saying. I see code as a kind of human expression. it would be like a machine compiling itself. the machine did not make the thing, it did what a human told it to do. so a human saying draw me a cat would not be making art, only the original code and the beautiful ideas inside would be the art. art and programming share a kind of knowledge called techne. as opposed to epistme like history and such. hence why traditional artists and programmers are both so concerned with craftsmanship.
1. It's not computer art. I believe in the possibility of artificial intelligence, and when we encounter it it will be so different from human intelligence that asking it to make imitations of human art will seem like an insult. We probably won't understand its art very well either at first.
2. I'm getting really tired of people racing to automate every damn thing. even if we establish an economic utopia and nobody has to work any more what are people supposed to do all day if every human activity can be performed 'better' by a machine?
3. It won't really be 'better' though, it will just be more popular because so many programmers are trapped in a quantitative mindset and thus treat every problem they encounter like a nail to be hammered in. Imitative digital technologies will always be correlated with popularity, limiting creative innovation because developers can't think of a reason to optimize for or nurture anything that is initially unpopular.
Creative prostheses that all require the same amount of effort to deploy (ie none) will be hailed as 'allowing everyone to be an artist' without requiring them to in best any meaningful time or effort in ideas that don't pay off or that fail. The result, which we are already seeing, is a plethora of new material created with little effort that is as superficial as it is ephemeral, whose volume and variety will obscure its stultifying conventionality.
This is no more art than Cheese Whiz is food. It's Art-flavored mechanical product that functions to do no more than alleviate the masses' thirst for self-actualization without any adjustment of power structures and is thus fundamentally limited to reproduction of the cultural conditions from which it originates.