Hacker News Reader

Comment by weeksie | Hacker News Reader

Ah, I guess I misunderstood. Would it be fair to characterize your point as: AI art isn't art but neither is most conceptual 20-21st century art so why does it matter, we're already living in a world without art?

If that's your position, I have some sympathy for that but I'd say that the difference is that in a world where AI art can be generated at the push of a button, we end up in a world where it's impossible to determine if a piece has been made by human hands. The cultural equivalent of grey goo.

To me there's a big qualitative difference between some art being bullshit and (effectively) 100% of it being bullshit. Of course that includes narrative art as well, since GPT-N language models are already pretty capable in that department and will only be getting better.

View on HN

We're living in a world where we've lost the idea of art. There is still real art being produced, but the dominant philosophy of art no longer has any connection to humans. There's no place for humans as producers or viewers of art in their philosophy any more. Well, as a human, that idea (and the "art" it produces) seems literally inhuman to me.

In that case I disagree strongly with your premise, but that's fine. I don't argue past epistemological closures but (sincerely) thanks for the discussion!

> I don't argue past epistemological closures...

Let's talk about that instead, if you don't mind. I think that might be a really useful thing to have in my mental toolbox, if I understood it.

What is "epistemological closure"? How do you know when a conversation has hit it? Why do you stop there?

Sure! Informally, it's when there is a disagreement about methods of finding truth. In practice that's when the two positions in a discussion are using a different framework for deciding what's true in the world.

Are illnesses caused by bad humors or are they caused by an imbalance of cold and hot foods? That discussion will eventually reach a point where both participants realize they're arguing about theology, but it'll take a little while to get there. Once there, it's not like there's nothing left to do but unless both sides are willing to go "hey we disagree about truth here do you want to talk about the reasons why instead of the object level stuff about what's true" it's better for all involved to just smile and call it a day.

Avoids a lot of less filling/tastes great shouting matches

That explains some of the most annoying threads that I have seen on HN. Both sides are at that point, but neither side will stop. So they just keep going, blowing their talking points past the other side that isn't listening, not just because they don't want to (though they probably don't), but because they can't - each position makes no sense within the other framework.

And by the way, I deeply appreciate your style of argument and disagreement. You disagreed without being disagreeable, and without even really arguing. You listened, made sure you understood, stated that you disagreed, and moved on cheerfully. May your style spread.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com