I was originally going to put this into the Log, but it might be unwelcome.
You want a way to rattle image-generation Boosters? Most of the arguments they use can be used to defend Googling an image and putting a filter over it.
- “All forms of media take inspiration from one another, so that means it’s fine to Google another image, download it, and apply a filter to call it mine!”
- “Artists are really privilieged, so it’s morally OK to take their art and filter it!”
- “Using filtered images I downloaded from Google for game sprites will help me finish my game faster!”
- “I suck at drawing, so I have to resort to taking images from people who can draw and filtering them!”
- “People saying that my filtered images aren’t art are tyrannical! I deserve to have my filtered images be seen as equal to hand-drawn ones!”
AI Boosters use a standard motte-and-bailey doctrine to assert the right to steal art and put it into a dataset, yet entice people to buy their generated images. When Boosters want people to invest in AI, they occupy the bailey and say that “AI is faster and better than drawing by hand”. When Boosters are confronted with their ethical problems, as shown above, they retreat into the motte and complain that “it takes tons of time and work to make the AI do what I want”. Remember this when you find Boosters. Or don’t, since I doubt the sites where they lurk are worth your time.
If someone could take your anti-AI argument, change almost nothing and make it an anti-digital art argument, it’s probably not a good argument.
- “All forms of media take inspiration from one another, so that means it’s fine to digitally reproduce a traditional artist’s style using my digital tools.”
- “Traditional Artists are necessarily really privileged to be able to afford their supplies - canvas, paint, brushes, are expensive! - so it’s morally OK to draw digitally, since that’s lower cost and doesn’t hurt anyone.”
- “Using digital art instead of scanning in traditionally painted tiles for game sprites will help me finish my game faster!”
- “I suck at oil painting, so I have to resort to using a stylus and can undo all of my mistakes and can even apply filters to the whole image and undo it if I don’t like it!”
- “People saying that my digital art isn’t are tyrannical! I deserve to have my digital art be seen as equal to hand-drawn ones!”
I’ve seen every one of those arguments made by digital artists.
Logical fallacies demonstrated in your post include:
- Straw Man: You’ve taken pro-AI arguments, intentionally applied them to a different and much less defensible concept, and are suggesting that refuting those misapplied arguments equates to defeating the original pro-AI arguments.
- False equivalence: you’re equating AI art to copyright infringement, with your argument that they’re the same being because the same arguments can be made defending them. If that were valid, by the same argument we’d have to conclude that AI art is the same as digital art, too.
- Hasty generalization / Ad hominem: You’re grouping all AI art supporters when describing the logical arguments they use to defend it / you’re referring to people who defend AI art as “Boosters”
- Special Pleading: Unless you would argue that digital art isn’t art, you’re making an exception for it without backing up why it’s any different.
- Appeal to Ridicule: Particularly in the last sentence, but your whole comment has this vibe.
You’re also misusing the Motte and Bailey fallacy. Even ignoring that they’re supposed to be two different things that are being conflated (the Motte, which is easily defensible, and the Bailey, which is less defensible and is what you’re really advancing), you’re suggesting that the two arguments are contradictory by presenting them devoid of any nuance whatsoever. You’re also ignoring that the people hyping up AI to businesses and shareholders and the people defending themselves as AI “artists” are different people.
Not trying to tear you down, but there are much better arguments to make the points you’re trying to prove. It’s ironic to see a post about confronting people with flaws in their argument itself that is itself riddled with logical fallacies. I felt compelled to point this out.
One argument I’ve heard from the more ancap types is that these things are okay because intellectual property is a scam the stifles innovation. Let’s take that at face value.
Another concept that ancaps often support is time-preference behavior. In a nutshell, high time preference behavior is rewarded by immediate consequences (say, stealing the item gets it in your hands immediately for free), and low time preference behavior rewards long-term consequences (buying the item costs money, but you don’t go to jail or contribute to the closing of the business). They argue that societies that primarily operate on low time preference behavior are more prosperous than those that operate on high time preference behavior.
I would argue that the use of AI image generators in particular is short time preference behavior. Sure, you get the picture very fast and for very little money, but the widespread use of AI will discourage more and more people from either becoming or remaining artists. One funny thing AI researchers have found is that AI image gens can’t be trained on AI images or else they’ll produce objectively useless garage. So taking this to its logical conclusion, the society that relies on AI for all its images will eventually run out of human artists and thus be unable to produce any new art. AI fans are taking the short-term cost savings without considering the long term consequences of eliminating an entire industry.
One argument I’ve heard from the more ancap types is that these things are okay because intellectual property is a scam the stifles innovation. Let’s take that at face value.
IP abolitionism isn’t exclusive to Ancaps. And you don’t even address it again in the remainder of your post, instead attacking a concept ancaps typically use to justify racism.
My intention wasn’t to debunk either position. My intention was to show that, from their perspective, they too should oppose the proliferation of AI. It’s not a communist-vs-capitalist thing here. It’s a question of, does the use of this stuff even make sense to begin with?
The underlying problem is capitalism. The idea that people can own information (aka IP) is a complete scam on humanity. The only “justification” is that artists would starve otherwise despite the fact that artists benefit last and least from IP. A truly just society would provide basic human needs for artists and people in general so they can survive without the artificial and violent controls of capitalism.
If you post “I need that on a tshirt” on a twitter post where an artist showcases their work, the image will be automatically plagiarized by a bot and put on a tshirt. The fact that this is profitable shows that intellectual property laws fail to protect vast majority of artists. (https://www.reddit.com/r/tumblr/comments/172vq82/i_want_this_on_a_tshirt/ I apologize for the reddit link).
If you’re only copying, you are not stealing. Ask anyone who uses BitTorrent
If someone dedicated their life to studying these styles and practiced drawing like them day in and day out, would you also say they committed theft? What if they blended the learned styles into new styles? Still theft? What about all of the artists who did exactly that and we have been building on for decades/centuries?
I do not equate copyright infringement with theft. That’s some grade A bullshit.
