this is a succinct comment on A.I. art from a marxist perspective. i have a couple of nitpicks, but the general conclusion is accurate. basically, marxists support automation, democratization of information, and the abolition of private property, so we are not hostile to A.I. as a technology. we are hostile to capitalism. everything below is a direct quote from reddit hell site user chayleaf:
“I find it interesting how many people say that they oppose AI art "because we don't live in communism". At the same time, some people claim that AI art is reactionary, which contradicts the former (if you want to speak against AI art, you either say that it is reactionary, or that it is progressive BUT...)
I think the latter is an easier claim to debunk - AI technology does nothing fundamentally different from what humans do, it just does it imperfectly for now. Over time, we will see new AI being better and better at the tasks given to it. AI has only one limitation - it doesn't have inherent goals put into it by nature, it must be told to do something by a human. This means AI is a means to achieve a task for a human - or means of production, if you will. Objectively, AI allows humans to perform certain tasks by exerting less labor, by spending less time. This means the technology itself cannot be reactionary.
Let's focus on the claim that AI art is only desirable in a perfect society then. First, let us draw parallels from history. Capitalism caused many petty bourgeois artisans to become members of either bourgeoisie, or in most cases proletariat. This is a natural progressive process of the centralization of production that lets the society enact all new kinds of innovations. The process continued with the advent of imperialism - or monopoly capitalism. Indeed, many small business owners, artisans, craftsmen, peasants were forced into the life of a proletarian by this process.
As Lenin said: “Imperialism is as much our “mortal” enemy as is capitalism. That is so. No Marxist will forget, however, that capitalism is progressive compared with feudalism, and that imperialism is progressive compared with pre-monopoly capitalism. Hence, it is not every struggle against imperialism that we should support. We will not support a struggle of the reactionary classes against imperialism; we will not support an uprising of the reactionary classes against imperialism and capitalism.”
The only revolutionary class in modern society is the proletariat. Petty bourgeoisie may act as an ally in certain cases, but will always seek to stop the process wherever it benefits most. Technology that forces petty bourgeois artists to become ordinary workers might be sad for those artists - but from a Marxist viewpoint, that's hardly a bad thing. If more of the petty bourgeoisie becomes proletarians, their class consciousness will not tell them to stop the revolution when it happens. They will be ready to let it reach the end, to complete the democratization of society.
On the one hand, AI art hurts (to an unknown extent) the interests of the petty bourgeois artists. On the other hand, AI helps immensely to those unable to dedicate lots of time to learn to create art from scratch. You can say the same about piracy if you want. To me, this looks like yet another contradiction between the interests of individuals in capitalism and the interests of society in general, yet another sign that the world yearns for a revolution. This is not a sign that we must oppose something that is within the interests of the entire society because it hurts certain individuals.
Unfortunately, petty bourgeois influence is to be expected from purely theoretical Marxism, Marxism that is separated from practice. I, too, find it hard to shake it off at times. Only by handling the body of information available to mankind as a common can we rid ourselves of the last vestiges of petty bourgeoisie. That's why I release all of my works either into the public domain, or under a copyleft license. If you are for socializing the means of production, it's only natural you should also be for socializing information.”
prguitarman
blakekathryn
germansingergirl
