In recent years, artificial intelligence has made it possible to generate high-quality illustrations. The question that arises in this situation is: "Will artificial intelligence take away the jobs of creators?" I am neither a creator nor an artist, but I would like to write an article about my thoughts on this issue. The reason why I am writing this article is because I like English and writing is much more fun than drawing these days.

SCP-like approach

First of all, I would like to discuss this issue in an SCP-like manner, so I have constructed a world or "My Universe" in my mind regarding this issue. There are three standpoints in "My Universe". This means that no matter how much the discussion progresses, I will not be able to discuss the issue outside of "My Universe".

1. Creators: These are the ones whose jobs may be eliminated with the advent of high-performance image-generating AI.
2. Consumers: they are the ones who enjoy the creator's production. The majority of them have only an average person's level of aesthetic sense. Although they are comfortable with the fact that they are irrelevant bystanders to this issue, they are a little concerned about the possibility that AI will create works that surpass their own aesthetic sense. As this statement indicates, I belong to this category.
3. Operators: or "AI artists," are beings who have the ability to manipulate the AI to generate images.

When I would like to emphasize that they are inhabitants of "My Universe", I would label them as "1. creators", "2. consumers", and "3. operators". Thank you for your understanding. Now that I have modeled the inhabitants of "My Universe" as described above, let's revisit the issue. As a matter of fact, AI is now capable of producing illustrations of quality comparable to that of professionals, and further technological innovation is expected in the future. Assuming that within My Universe, an all-powerful AI that surpasses all human creations thanks to remarkable technological innovation will appear, I would like to consider the question, "Will AI eliminate humanity in this world?"

Pessimistic opinion

It is commonly asserted that "AI technology has already opened Pandora's box, and as the technology advances in the future, everything that humans would produce will be reproduced and creators will no longer be needed." It is interesting to note that many of these claims seem to implicitly assume that if 1. creators are to be exterminated in the future, this will be caused by an influx of 3. AI operators into the creator world. This argument is based on the natural law that an increase in supply decreases the value of a product. However, even today, there is already an oversupply of human-made products, and I hear that it is difficult to make a living as an artist. If this is the case, it seems premature to think that an oversupply will in itself cause the disappearance of artists.

Optimistic opinion

It is commonly asserted that "AI can produce the 'right' things that humans have produced in the past, but there is a power in the art produced by human suffering that AI can never emulate." If I were to force myself to question this as well, I would say, "Only humans may be able to create works that express suffering, but in 'My Universe' AI is already capable of creating works that 2. consumers cannot tell whether they were created by a human or an AI." No matter how much technology advances in the future, I think it will not be possible for AI to put their soul into something as human beings do, but they are already at the stage where they can create something that "looks like it has a soul". I have named this problem the "Ghost of the Philosophical Zombie".

Putting both opinions together, we can conclude that in the future, as the pessimists say, AI artists will replace human artists in some fields, which will lead to the elimination of human artists in those specific fields, while as the optimists say, human beings are still stronger than AI in specific fields, and such fields will not disappear in the future, so I think artists will not be completely exterminated. This is my (boring) opinion.

Has DeepL eliminated translators?

I think the translation business was the first to face this problem. There are three genres of translation: "practical translation," "literary translation," and "video translation (translation of movies and TV programs)." Currently, the performance of machine translation has improved dramatically, and its power, especially in "practical translation," needs no explanation here.

Here is a simple quiz for you. There is a joke in Japanese: "yokkora sex (よっこらセックス)". "Yokkorase (よっこらせ)" is the equivalent of *grunt*, and in Japan it is mainly used when lifting heavy objects or sitting on a chair. And "sex" is a word borrowed from English, meaning sexual intercourse. The word "yokkora sex," a compound of "yokorase" and "sex," is a vulgar word used by middle-aged men with a strong sexual appetite. How would you translate this joke into English? I am sure that this problem is unsolvable by machine translation.

(from "Yuugai Shitei Dokyusei" by kuroha)

The answer is "There we hoe." Frankly, I think the translator who came up with this translation is a genius. As a specific area in which humans can triumph over AI, literary translation work requires the ability to translate foreign language jokes in the work into one's native language, i.e., extensive knowledge of the foreign language and extremely high skills in one's native language.

From the above, I personally feel that in the world of translation, a situation similar to the (boring) conclusion of the previous section has already emerged, where "humans can win over AI in specific fields, but are still being eliminated in some areas," and I think this can be considered an analogy to some extent regarding this issue.

My dream

The topic up to this point has been the possibility that the role of "1. creators" will be replaced by "3. AI operators," but I believe that another factor, "2. consumers," should not be ignored.

A technology that I personally am intensely waiting for is the "lover robot." Even today, there are quite high-quality products on the market, but they are basically silicone dolls that do not move, and occasionally there are products on the market with a motorized waist swinging function. The use of this product is a horrifying sight to see from the side, but the current situation is that this product is being sold at a price of thousands of dollars. As a man myself, I cannot deny the fact that men sometimes show amazing adaptability as a "2. consumer" when it comes to satisfying their sexual desires, and this is also a point that feminists find offensive.

Whether or not a perfect robot will ever emerge, I hope that a conversational AI that can perform natural language processing flawlessly will emerge in my lifetime. The question of whether or not the perfect conversational AI will appear is similar to the question of whether or not there will be a philosophical zombie ghost AI that can "act like an emotional being" to 2. consumers, which I expect will come sooner. I believe that a large part of such technology will be supported by "3. AI engineers" and another part will be supported by the high adaptability of "2. consumers."

Artists who will survive

So far, "My Universe" has been structured in such a way that "1. creators" are threatened by two problems: "3. AI operators" are too good, and "2. consumers" are too adaptable. Also, a little while ago I concluded that artists can beat AI on specific fields, but will be eliminated on some. Then, in "My Universe", what kind of artists, if any, are there who will not be exterminated?

It must be said here that it is very difficult to accurately predict such an existence, even within My Universe. This is because, even if we can predict to some extent what AI technology will be able to do, it is difficult to predict what 2. consumers will come to value. Just as consumers did not need board-type cell phones before the iPhone, it is natural to assume that the value criteria of "2. consumers" will vary greatly depending on "1. creators" and "3. operators".

But even so, can we predict the "specific fields" where humans can beat AI, based on the translator analogy mentioned earlier here? I think this can be "translated" as "areas where AI cannot reach". I think of it as if one real solution is "value added other than drawing technique which is also recognizable as value to the 2. consumer". In comics, it is "story," but it is hard to say because AI for writing stories is also developing remarkably. Another example is "who painted it," when Van Gogh's paintings are mentioned in combination with his life and suffering when they are evaluated. In addition, more and more artists are nowadays disclosing their production process on YouTube. Through this process, artists have succeeded in creating the extra value of "proof that it was created by a human being." The act of "educating people on how to draw" can also be of great value.

There are so many specific examples of "value added other than technique," which I listed as "areas beyond AI's reach," that I am sure there are many more options available, and I am sure that people will step out of this narrow framework of thought and find various options in the future. In this article, I state that it is impossible to predict how "value added other than technique" will be changed by 2. consumers in the future. If this is the case, my optimistic outlook is that many of these changes will work to push 1. creators into a corner, but some will work to help them. When I explained the characteristics of "2. consumers" earlier, while many "2. consumers" are indifferent to this matter, they readily accept "art" created by "3. operators," while there are a certain number of people who have the feeling that "I prefer something created by humans, but there is no way for me to tell the difference. I wonder if my eyes are not good enough to recognize them." There must be a way for 1. creators to survive, is what I am trying to say throughout the article.

Finally, in "My Universe," I imagine a more futuristic world where "3. operators" are treated in the same way as "1. creators". This is a society made possible by the high adaptive capacity of "2. consumers," but in such a dystopia, "creation" is likely to take a form that is unimaginable to modern people. However, no matter how much AI technology advances and the value system of the "2. consumer" changes, if the "2. consumer" is the one who enjoys it, the structure of "creation" by the "3. operator" who has the same or better aesthetic sense as the "2. consumer" will never be disappeared. So I believe that human beings will never disappear from the field of "creation". In other words, my vision of the future is that even if the world comes to a point where the standard for "what is creation" is changed by the adaptability of "2. consumers," the existence of Tadashi, who has programmed robots like Baymax, will not disappear.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)