Artificial Intelligence in The Art World, Pt.I
BEFORE WE GET STARTED...
In this article series, we are going to have an in-depth look into the AI artworld; we are going to discuss what AI is, what AI art is, why some aspects of it should be considered a valid art form, what artists are saying about the huge current trend that AI is having in the art community (the good and the bad), and what it could mean for us in the future of being an artist in a digital world.
This article will be split up into sections, as there will be a lot to cover!
WHAT IS AI?
AI stands for Artificial Intelligence; first, you need to know what artificial intelligence is before even knowing what AI art is. Artificial intelligence is using the ability of a digital computer or a robot-controlled computer, to perform tasks that are commonly associated with intelligent beings.
This term is frequently applied to the project of a developing system that are equipped with intellectual operations and process characteristics of humans like the ability of reason, discover the meaning, to generalize and to learn from past experiences. Since the development of the digital computer during the 1940's, it's been successfully demonstrated that computers can be programmed to carry out a variety of complex tasks, such as discovering proofs for mathematical theorems, or even playing a game of chess, with great expertise.
Still in 2023, despite the continuing advances in the computer processing speeds and developing more memory capacity, there is still yet no programs that can match the human flexibility over wider domains or even in tasks that require everyday knowledge. However, there are some programs that have attained performance levels of human experts and professionals in performing certain tasks; this means, artificial intelligence are limited to specific tasks that are found in applications as diverse when it comes to a medical diagnosis, computer search engines (Google), and voice (speak-text) or handwriting recognition.
To properly define intelligence, would be to describe it as all but the simplest human behavior is ascribed to intelligence; it's the ability to acquire and apply knowledge and skill, the collection of information. Intelligence is the capacity for logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. These are attributes to intelligence. Apply these characteristics to computers and other machines, you get artificial intelligence.
In general, psychologists do not characterize human intelligence by just one trait, but by the combination of many sundry capabilities. Research in AI has focused on learning, reasoning, problem solving, perception, and using language as the chief components of intelligence.
The key words to focus on here in relation to AI art are perception and language-based.
PERCEPTION
With the current advances in AI technology, artificial perception is sufficiently well advanced to enable optical sensors to identify people, self-driving cars to drive at moderate speeds on an open road, and robots that are free to roam around buildings collecting trash.
When it comes to perception, the environment is scanned by a variety of sensory organs, real or artificial, and from there, the scene is broken down into separate objects in a variety of dimensional correlations, that get analyzed, but with certain dimensions, an analysis can be complicated and distorted by the fact that an object may appear different, depending on the angle from which the object is viewed, the direction, and the intensity of illumination in the scene, as well as how much the object contrasts with the surrounding field/environment/landscape.
With the current advances in AI technology, artificial perception is sufficiently well advanced to enable optical sensors to identify people, self-driving cars to drive at moderate speeds on an open road, and robots that are free to roam around buildings collecting trash.
LANGUAGE
The definition of language is a structured system of communication that consists of grammar and vocabulary, and is the primary means of convention by humans in spoken and written forms, as well as sign-language. This means that language is not to be confined to spoken word. Let's say, for example, you look at a deer crossing sign, you know the message that is being conveyed to you, this is a form of mini language (AKA minimal language). It's a distinctive language of linguistic units possess meaning by convention, and linguistic meaning is different from what is called natural meaning, that can be demonstrated in statements like, "Those clouds mean rain," or "The fall in pressure means the valve is malfunctioning."
When writing computer programs to be capable of responding fluently in human language to questions, statements, and prompts/commands, it has to be put into a restricted context, in the way a human would. These programs do not actually understand language, but in theory, these programs may reach a point where their command of a language is indistinguishable from that of an actual human.
There is one theory that, whether or not one, "understands," depends not only on ones behavior, but also on ones history, is said in order to understand, one must have learned the language and have been trained to take ones place in the linguistic community by means of interaction with other language users. This is known as the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis, or the linguistic relativity hypothesis.
This concludes Part I of Artificial Intelligence in The Art World: What Is AI? I hope that this article helps you to better understand what AI is, as an introduction to what I will be talking about next; Pt. II of Artificial Intelligence in The Art World: What Is AI Art?
-Vanessa Moylan-Theodore
Founder of The Art Collective
FOR FURTHER READING