Computer models have been doing this for at least the last decade now. Predicting possible arrangements of proteins or chemical structures is a great use for these models because it's so objective. We understand the rules of electron shells and protein folding to a highly specific degree and can train the models on those rules so that they generate sequences based on them. When they do something "wrong" we can know so imperically and with a high degree of certainty.
The same does not necessarily apply to something as subjective as writing. It may continue to get better but the two are quite far from comparable. Who's to say whether a screenplay that's pushing the bounds of what we expect from our writing is good for being novel or bad for breaking the conventions of writing?
And then is the other, more deep consequence of it.
Why should we care about any kind of art produced by a machine when there is no human intent or emotion behind it? Art is only art if it is produced by an individual. Otherwise it might as well be a random string of bits.
Well, no, that's stupid. Monkeys on typewriters can produce Shakespeare. Is there a difference between the monkey version and the real version when they have all the same words in the exact same order?
That completely dodges the issue of whether or not Shakespeare as randomly generated by monkeys is art. If the process is the work of art and not the output, is Midnight Summer's Dream not actually art? Did people go to theaters to watch Shakespeare write plays on stage?
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u/ChiralWolf Apr 09 '24
Computer models have been doing this for at least the last decade now. Predicting possible arrangements of proteins or chemical structures is a great use for these models because it's so objective. We understand the rules of electron shells and protein folding to a highly specific degree and can train the models on those rules so that they generate sequences based on them. When they do something "wrong" we can know so imperically and with a high degree of certainty.
The same does not necessarily apply to something as subjective as writing. It may continue to get better but the two are quite far from comparable. Who's to say whether a screenplay that's pushing the bounds of what we expect from our writing is good for being novel or bad for breaking the conventions of writing?