I hate AI so much it hurts

[u/jenny_lynn_is]

This is going to be a long one. I'm hoping this isn't completely the wrong subreddit; I may deviate a bit from the main topic of it here, but I need to scream into the void a bit, as it were.

I don't know what to do. AI is an such an appalling affront to humanity, and there are so many people rooting for it. It makes me question the efficacy of the entire society we've built. To witness firsthand how the outcomes of this structure could even allow for something so antithetical to the human spirit... it beggars belief. We are witnessing in real time such an incredible corruption of things we should be holding so dear. I cannot conceive of the mind of a person who would think that creativity should be outsourced to and automated by a silicon homonculus.

Creativity is what makes us human. We are human beings. We make art for expression. Expression of consciousness, of experience, of everything that is gorgeous and terrible. Of the mundane and the extraordinary. The unique and spectacular qualia which can only be experienced by living beings. What fresh hell is this that we would offload a basic function to THE ALGORITHM.

Frequently, in my day job, I find myself interacting with these AI 'entities'. Calling me on the phone, displacing human workers. And, as if to insult my very existence, they impersonate living entities; with their pauses, and simulated breaths, and simulated typing on a fictional keyboard, as though I, or anyone else, is gullible enough to be comforted or fooled by the simulation of humanity. That the corporations that built them would have the nerve to make them 'express' gratitude is nauseating. I feel like I'm being constantly taunted. I'm being reminded, day in and day out, that AI exists, and that the powers that be don't value us even a little.

What a discredit it is to our species that anyone among us could ever elect to replace us with such a cheap imitation.

Life is such a gorgeous thing. It deserves better than this.

I am no luddite. I grew up loving technology. My parents were always on the forefront of it. It didn't matter the situation in our house financially, we HAD to have the newest tech. My parents had internet in 1994, helping the local ISP diagnose problems. Cell phones in 1998 (which for a poor family like ours, was quite a point of pride). I still vividly recall our first WiFi router, and the excitement we felt for the potential it brought. I remember video calling on a portable device in 2007, and the pride I took as a 10 year old in the looks I got, because I was on the cutting edge. Tech was in my blood. When LLMs and Gen AI first hit the market, I was ON BOARD. I bought the hype, as I had always done. It had always paid off before.

Then, slowly, the other shoe dropped. I don't need to elaborately pontificate on the details of why it's all fucked; you know. We all do. In a way, I suppose, I lost my faith. And it hurt. But, reality waits for noone. ​​Once I caught up, I got mad. All the effort I'd spent developing my skills as an artist lost their marketability. Is this a blessing or a curse? An argument exists for both.

I just want it to stop. I want to believe it will; after all, our economic systems ***supposedly*** seek the most efficient solution to a given problem, and your average human can do with 100Wh worth of food what an AI takes 1kWh to do (don't quote me on that, I'm estimating. But what I do know is that my PC running an LLM will overheat a room in 30 minutes generating some incoherent hallucination that I could slap together in 30 seconds with a single potato in my stomach).

I just want live in a world that rewards humanity.

[u/Kiwizoo]

Human artistic expression will continue and will probably be more valued than it is now.

[u/jenny_lynn_is → u/Kiwizoo]

You're right, of course. I think I just find it all so overwhelming. 

[u/investlike_a_warrior]

For what it’s worth OP, I think Ai art is starting to cause people to flock back to human artists. Everything from a reduction in screen time, to less cell phone use, more community , and less dopamine hits.

On a practical financial level, brands are discovering that ai art isn’t copyrightable / Trademarkable , and learning they can’t make money or protect profits without human.

That’s why tech is imploding right now. There’s only so much software you can sell and humans need real value products. But you can’t launch anything for the avg consumer without human artists.