Goetterfunke: Creativity in Machinae Sapiens. About the Qualitative Shift in Generative AI with a Focus on Text-To-Image
It addresses the philosophical and practical implications of machine creativity for art and human-AI collaboration, but is largely conceptual and incremental in analysis.
The paper examines the emergence of generative AI in 2022 as a qualitative shift enabling creative tasks like text-to-image generation, arguing that AI can act as a responsible collaborator with independent authorship in art.
The year 2022 marks a watershed in technology, and arguably in human history, with the release of powerful generative AIs capable of convincingly performing creative tasks. With the help of these systems, anyone can create something that would previously have been considered a remarkable work of art. In human-AI collaboration, the computer seems to have become more than a tool. Many who have made their first contact with current generative AIs see them as "creativity machines" while for others the term "machine creativity" remains an oxymoron. This article is about (the possibility of) creativity in computers within the current Machine Learning paradigm. It outlines some of the key concepts behind the technologies and the innovations that have contributed to this qualitative shift, with a focus on text-to-image systems. The nature of Artificial Creativity as such is discussed, as well as what this might mean for art. AI may become a responsible collaborator with elements of independent machine authorship in the artistic process.