Hozier would join a music industry strike against AI, if that’s a thing anybody wants to start
“It can’t create something based on a human experience," the "Take Me To Church" singer says, "so I don’t know if it meets the definition of art.”
Music News Hozier
So-called generative AI technology, where a computer program scrubs through a list of preexisting words, sounds, or images and “makes” something “new,” is an existential threat to pretty much everybody in one way or another, but it’s also notably one of the sticking points for the striking WGA and SAG-AFTRA members—who worry that big corporations, already predisposed to doing evil, will replace artists with computers as soon as possible. But why stop at actors and writers? What about musicians?
That was the question posed to Hozier (who is about to release a new album inspired by both the COVID pandemic and Dante’s Inferno, which sounds like a blast) recently in a chat with the BBC, during which he said that, yeah, he would “absolutely” join in on a hypothetical music industry strike to protect artists against the threat posed by AI. It doesn’t sound like he’s particularly sure about what that would look like—and, to be clear, it was the interviewers who brought it up and not him—or what exactly artists can do about AI, but he does think there needs to be a “philosophical debate” about whether or not what an AI does can even be considered “art.”
“It can’t create something based on a human experience,” Hozier explains, “so I don’t know if it meets the definition of art.” (Someone else might argue that it can’t create anything at all, which also makes it difficult for AI to create art, but his point stands.) These questions came after a recent viral trend of people making fake cover songs using AI replicas of celebrity voices, eventually leading to a customer service company uploading a fake Drake song with completely digital versions of him and The Weeknd, apparently to show how cool and powerful AI is (even though, in reality, it’s stupid and it sucks).
Elsewhere in the interview, Hozier talks about the death of fellow Irish artist Sinéad O’Connor, offering his opinion on why she was so brutally attacked for speaking out against the Catholic Church while nobody objected much to his “Take Me To Church” (which he has said is meant to be critical of the way religion teaches “shame about sexual orientation”). He also noted that his song is more relevant than ever, since they “didn’t have LGBTQ+-free zones in the European Union 10 years ago” or “armed militia waiting outside of, you know, gay and queer spaces.”
19 Comments
I guess this elephant can’t art then?
Only if it worships like a dog at the SHRI-LA-DE-LAI!
Yep.Why is it painting?
Because other animals besides humans can create art, saying the human experience is necessary for art is amazingly ignorant.
Jesus, Murry, I’d expected more from you.https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/elephant-painting/
However, although these animals may be creating artworks in a purely physical sense, critics contend that the elephants participating in this activity are not actually “painting” in any meaningful sense of the word: They aren’t engaging in any form of creativity, much less abstractly making free-form portraits of whatever tickles their pachydermic fancies at the moment; rather, they’re simply actors performing in tourist trap attractions in Thailand, where they do nothing more than outline and color specific drawings they’ve been painstakingly trained to replicate — and they manage that much only while receiving a good deal of prompting and guidance throughout the process from their mahout (trainers).This is what the techbros and nerds fundamentally don’t understand about art: art is self-expression – no self, no self-expression. It’s why they’re fundamentally unqualified to comment on creativity, any more than I’m qualified on how to write Javascript.The painting, the song, the dance, the sculpture, the poem isn’t the art. It’s merely the representation of the art, the means of conveying that self-expression to others.
Sorry I just found the first example I could, elephants do make art though, quick example:
https://www.cmzoo.org/support/animal-art/elephant-art/“art is self-expression – no self, no self-expression.”Regardless: Art is in the eye of the beholder. If I like a piece of ‘AI’ art, it’s art, doesn’t matter whether or not a computer makes it. The method of creation is entirely immaterial if the creation itself invokes feeling in the observer. Claiming that the human experience is necessary to create art is ignorant, sorry.
What does that have to do with AI? We get it. You’re stoked for a total absence of human created art.
It has to do with him saying only humans can create art.“You’re stoked for a total absence of human created art.”Why do you say that? Since I defend ‘AI’ created art that means I don’t want humans to make art ever again? I’m sorry, but that’s fucking stupid.
Holy shit you people are absolutely terrified of progress.
Hoser should change his name
I mean he’s better than Hosie , but not as good as Hosiest.(I do like Hosier though)
“to show how cool and powerful AI is (even though, in reality, it’s stupid and it sucks)“Like the Internet, AI is cool and powerful. How people use it is what sucks or doesn’t suck.Also, I’m guessing this isn’t one of the AI-written articles.
Yeah AI making crazy breakthroughs in cancer treatment and other medical fields is obviously stupid and sucky.I can’t wait to see how Sam shits himself if/when real AI crops up instead of this algorithmic pattern matching that currently uses the ‘AI’ name.
I can’t wait to see how Sam shits himself if/when real AI crops up instead of this algorithmic pattern matching that currently uses the ‘AI’ name.I mean sure, but you know what we’re talking about and in that context it sucks complete ass and the music industry should do something about it.Because right now you sound like one of those crypto/web3 dead-enders who constantly promise us “no no the really good stuff is coming soon…trust us.”
“Yeah AI making crazy breakthroughs in cancer treatment and other medical fields is obviously stupid and sucky.” No one is referring to that kind of AI when they shit on AI art and writing.
You are wackadoodle
So cool and powerful it’s perplexed by human hands.
That’s not the same thing that’s simulating Drake.
Remixing does produce a new art. Try arguing this to any famous rapper. Remixing stuff to make a new thing is still art but yeah I agree some new more specific terms need to be coined for everyone on instagram posting an AI generated image of Iron Man fused with Superman in the middle of the desert. Cuz yeah it’s a little “lol random” that those dudes are referring to themselves as artists now..