By Chuck Woodbury
PUBLISHER’S ROADSIDE JOURNAL
Do you see the people above? I assume you do. You may wonder why I ask.
The thing is, I created them. They never existed until a few minutes ago when I created them, at least their image. I used artificial intelligence. I asked ChatGPT: “Create an older couple, man and woman, sitting in lawn chairs with a small table with wine on it in front of their motorhome, and they look very contented.”
That’s all I asked. What you see above is the result. It took a minute. I have been involved in publishing my whole life: The ability to do something like this is mind-boggling. Honestly, it makes me crazy! How is it possible? Did I mention that it did not cost even a penny to create these people?
I feel very sorry for my illustrator friends, many of whom will be put out of work by this new technology. But what choice do I have, as a business person, to not use this incredible, artistic gift for my own, ethical purposes? Oh, I know that the ability to do this is already being abused. It’s happening with video, too. I would bet serious money that porn producers are already plotting to use this. They can create and then command their own goddesses to do as they wish.
Look at the couple again. I bet some of you know someone who looks like one of them. Or maybe both of them. They would fit perfectly in any RV park, sitting outside their RV beneath their awning, sipping their wine, greeting other RVers as they walk by with their Poodles and Pomeranians.
You may think me silly over what I am saying here. I won’t argue.
It’s just that I feel so confused when I look at these people. They never existed and that makes me feel sad. How is that possible? They look so real. Okay, the guy has six fingers on one hand, but I bet you didn’t notice. But then, in elementary school a friend of mine named John had six fingers. Just sayin’.
They look like a grandma and a grandpa to me. Yet they have no grandkids, no kids, no friends, no dog, no nothing. They don’t talk, they don’t hold hands. The can’t because the only place they exist is in this image. They did not exist until I created them, and so easily. They are just a bunch of creatively arranged pixels. Right now, my mind is really messed up in a major way. No, I am not on drugs, except caffeine.
“These are people,” my mind tells me. It tells me that maybe I met them once, maybe camped next to them. But, no! No! No! No! They never existed. How did a computer come up with these people based on my simple instructions?
I wish that right now that I could grab a lawn chair and join them. I would have many questions. Maybe they exist in a parallel universe. Frankly, I could use a drink. I’m not sure about their wine which has no label.
You may think all this musing is stupid. I understand. But I can tell you this: Right now, I could keep writing for another two hours to try to understand all the thoughts that are racing through my brain, bouncing off its sides, messing with me. But, no, not two hours: I could write for 10 hours! Either way, I’d never learn why I am so confused. So I will stop.
Now, I will stare at the photo for another 10 or 15 minutes to keep trying to understand why I feel so conflicted about this. It’s futile. But I will do it. I am one confused puppy!
Your thoughts?
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RVT1244
This is why us oldsters die,
With each new invention or change in values etc, the world becomes too strange for us. Just think of the length of skirts and society’s reactions to that over the years. Think of the nuclear bomb and the damage from it.
Like AI, all these changes come from humans and become part of life. Scary but then accepted.
It’s amazing and scary at the same time. We’re cautious now, but all too soon that caution will wane for many. It’s our responsibility to keep humanity alive to the best of our abilities. Keep the faith!
I think there’s a lot of jobs whose days are numbered. Unless a role requires the sentient dexterity of humanity, companies will embrace AI to reduce costs, theft and inaccuracies.
It’ll be as impactful yet forgotten as when boiler/furnace tenders were replaced by wall thermostats.
Gas station attendants, film developers, newspaper vendors, projectionists and bank tellers are a few jobs currently on life support via technology and the evolution of business.
I think true, self-learning AI will be an amazing chapter in human evolution. Until then, it’ll be just another tool of the greedy.
Chuck, you are using AI ethically. That is big. You see it as a tool, not a solution. You tell the reader what is a fabrication. It is a suggestion; a simile not a parable.
Just as so many believe everything they read on the internet is non-fiction, so many see AI as a solution rather than a tool. They let a machine do the work and blindly accept the output as correct and factual. It is the responsibility of those who use the tool to continually remind people that they have a helper, but it is the user who still has to do the work.
AI can be a great tool, but like everything else in our lives, it will be abused extensively. The internet was a fascinating tool when it first started but has been abused to the point that it has questionable credibility, at least to me. Unfortunately, we can no longer rely on the people we used generally to have to trust. Like politicians, the media (sorry Chuck), advertisers, etc.
My question is why you feel so conflicted about an illustration. An illustration isn’t a photograph obviously. If you had requested a human illustrator to produce this work the result would have been the same. Imaginary subjects in an illustration.
Is the deeper conflict the process of creation not the outcome. One process sentient the other code?
Do you have the same emotions about other objects created by machines now such as cars, furniture, etc?
I agree. In my lifetime, I’ve probably seen millions of illustrations without having a second thought about them or how they were created. Some were beautiful, some mundane, and some ominous, but they’re just illustrations. I don’t regard AI illustrations any differently, other than perhaps challenging myself to find the inevitable flaws in them..
I have to agree with you two…think of it as an art form, albeit a ‘newer’ type – why make a big deal over how it was created? Just because it was done on a computer vs ink, or paint – those mediums were “created” images as well. One just needs to change the way you look at it.
The problem, Ron, and maybe you don’t see this as I do because I study it, is that A.I. Illustrations and videos are being passed off as real. It will soon get to where we do not know which is which. With every new invention comes wonderful opportunities, but evil people will quickly exploit it. How do you feel about well known, beautiful women having their heads pasted onto (so easily) naked bodies. Someone looking at the photo or video can’t tell that it is not the real person. That’s just one way this new technology is being used (and that particular way has been going on quite a while now — it doesn’t take much technical know-how). A.I., too, is a propagandist’s dream.
Who says they are “real”? Or are YOU making that assumption because that’s the world you have always come from? A picture with an article “must” be “actual” or “real” vs “art”. Maybe the new way should be looked at as “art” now…
The truth of it is I would not have known this couple real or not. Look back five years ago. How many people did you actually personally know on any advertisement in any media or any so called news from any source? I block most ads but even the ones that sneak through I completely ignore. Yours is the only RV travel newsletter I read faithfully. The others I question. I can usually spot an AI article but probably not always. Cut and paste clip art or pictures has been going on for years AI has just made it easier to find the perfect picture to put in any article. Sadly, students have been plagiarizing their essays for years thus AI has become the new ghost writer.
AI doesn’t really create anything. AI steals and plagiarizes content that a real person created. I’m sure you must realize that AI is stealing the content you’ve created over the years by your hard work and creativity.
Not to confuse your mind further, but…have you considered that maybe AI purposely puts in a mistake like an extra finger to let us know it isn’t real or to keep us dissecting it? It might be like those search for items game apps that occupy your mind for longer than they should. Silly me, AI can’t be so complex that it is toying with us…or is it? 😉
I hear you Chuck. It’s unsettling for sure. AI will introduce new and interrupt much of what we have done for a long time. It has all sorts of smart people worried. I think that’s natural and the advances in science and knowledge will be amazing…if we allow it to happen.
It used to be Don’t believe everything you read. Now it’s progressed to don’t believe everything you read and see. And I would add hear and maybe taste and smell. It is incumbent on us to use our intelligence to poke through the weeds to discover what is true and what isn’t. However, that’s becoming increasingly difficult every day. Like most great discoveries AI will be used for good and evil.
Full disclosure: The above paragraph was grammatically and spelling corrected by AI for the most part.
I was one of the “illustrators” you mention. A “pencil pusher”, if you will. When we retired, I sold my large drawing table, templates, French curves and Rapidograph ink pens to a young college student who bought them because she loved “analog equipment”.
And that’s the gist of it, Chuck. Manually creating text and art, you and I are now the historic craftsmen of a bygone era.
Well, it isn’t perfect. The man has 5 fingers and doesn’t show a thumb on his right hand.
Could your unease be coming from a sense that the human staff of RV Travel and similar publications may vanish in the next few years?
Old man is a mutant he has six fingers.
Because deep down, we know placing God-like powers, particularly in the hands of the wealthy and powerful, leaving ordinary folk out of the decision-making, rarely ends well. Drawing a picture or writing an article takes time, effort and most importantly, thoughtfulness and mindfulness informed by learning, trial and error and human experience. Being able to do these things instantly, absent the above is unnerving and robs us of humanity.
What worries me more is how long before we cede creating “perfect” thoughts to machines? Or the next logical step of creating *perfect” humans instantly through genetic engineering? What could go wrong?
Chuck, you just came up with a great premise for a SciFi story. What if everything that gets created in AI does actually become real in an alternate universe? Imagine the possibilities! Chaos
See, or listen to, John Rich’s song “Progress.”
I wonder how long it will be before teachers and schools are replaced by AI. Kids or adults will be able to call their AI instructor for whatever they wish or need to know! I share your concerns Chuck. How long will it be before AI can create its own society and people who breathe air? As Joseph P. said below – “…giving God like powers….” Hmmm! ? …to AI? This is scary stuff!
Chuck, I can’t believe you didn’t ask AI to put a label on the bottle. Yes, I thought it was a real photo until I spotted the blank label. Ha!
Chuck, I am with you 100% – IF there REALLY IS a real person named Chuck running this newsletter. ????????? Now I AM scared!
Thank you for sharing your thoughts and confusion about an AI-generated world. I can see that it has potential uses, but also mis-uses. If I can determine what is real and what is AI, then I avoid it. Not sure how well I can distinguish between the two in the future. I guess we’ll see. Have a great week and safe travels!
I was an aerospace engineering technical writer. Now, at 92, I still write articles and stories for our retirement home newsletter and our RV club newsletter. I am doubtful that AI could do what I did and am doing. Could it redraw illogically laid out electrical schematic diagrams to clearly show signal flow from left to right and top to bottom? Or accurately illustrate actual equipment outside and inside? As for your illustration, skillful airbrush artists created similar except actual people were employed and paid but we knew it was from an artist. I don’t trust AI for truth or accuracy. If it generates errors in its synthetic truth, who do you tell and can it be corrected. It is all a lie
I have much more apprehension than excitement for AI. It appears to me to be too accessible to evil doers who already exist in mainstream media where they will use it to dupe ignorant and lazy voters who blindly believe every detail of the evening network news.
If you want to see something scary go on Instagram. Don