Here is a pdf of the ICJ's Order of 26 January 2024.

For convenience, I will list the provisional orders below edited for ease of readability:

(1) The State of Israel shall, in accordance with its obligations under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, in relation to Palestinians in Gaza, take all measures within its power to prevent the commission of all acts within the scope of Article II of this Convention, in particular:

• (a) killing members of the group;
• (b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
• (c ) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; and
• (d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

(2) The State of Israel shall ensure with immediate effect that its military does not commit any acts described in point 1 above;

(3)The State of Israel shall take all measures within its power to prevent and punish the direct and public incitement to commit genocide in relation to members of the Palestinian group in the Gaza Strip;

(4) The State of Israel shall take immediate and effective measures to enable the provision of urgently needed basic services and humanitarian assistance to address the adverse conditions of life faced by Palestinians in the Gaza Strip;

(5) The State of Israel shall take effective measures to prevent the destruction and ensure the preservation of evidence related to allegations of acts within the scope of Article II and Article III of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide against members of the Palestinian group in the Gaza Strip;

(6) The State of Israel shall submit a report to the Court on all measures taken to give effect to this Order within one month as from the date of this Order.

This is a fascinating survey of the political realities of contemporary Israel from the perspective of an Israeli leftist. Although I don't endorse every view expressed by the author I do consider this piece to be an excellent tool to understand the internal political influences pushing and pulling in Israel right now.

Please be skeptical of the claims made in this article. This was posted for purposes of cultural insight

🍉🍉🍉

I'm drunk. My partner deleted what I originally wrote. It was about how fallible we humans are to put it nicely. Regardless of our failings which we know we have, I really wish y'all as great a 2024 as we can manage. At the very least I hope we can have a better year. I won't be forgetting any auld acquaintances. Have a good time in 2024. Bee cool.

Step 1: Add a little bit of oil to taste.

Done.

Take your crappy canned soup and toss in a bit of butter, olive oil, or regular vegetable oil. Sprinkle some sesame oil into your homemade ramen. This is basically the single most important difference between the soup which traumatized you as a child and the inexplicably edible soup you get from restaurants.

Don't suffer through fall and winter. Soup can be a lazy convenience meal you which can taste good without a lot of effort.

Inspiration strikes! Your muse has finally appeared and blessed you with a story, fully formed! It's so vivid in your mind. It's engaging, impactful, expressive, and beautiful. All you need to do now is put pen to paper and move it from nine o'clock to three o'clock.

You look at the blank document and suddenly anxiety floods you. Where to begin? How to begin? You write out a few sentences hoping to echo the grandiosity of what you have in mind. They suck. Obviously. These pathetic sentences are unbecoming of the story you have in mind. You crumple the page and toss it aside.

Clearly, you think, this is a story so deep that it requires intricate planning. You grab a second page and now your ideas flow out. A governmental system here, a character dynamic there, even a summary of the ending chapter. Now you have traction! This must be the way!

Weeks later, you have a binder of disjointed notes and not one page of story. The project has expanded exponentially and your expectations for yourself have risen accordingly. The story is essentially flawless, and it's yours. Why the hell can't you write it then!?

Cliche, trite, messy, plain, boring, inconsistent, unreadable. That's what those few paragraphs you've managed to get down have been. The shocking disparity between how the story goes in your mind and this childish attempt at storytelling is causing massive cognitive dissonance. Now when you look at the page with every intention to give it another try, you know whatever you end up with is going to be crap. Screw it. You decide to keep worldbuilding and hope that one day your plan will be so perfect the story will come naturally. Maybe.

This has been a dramatization of why I stopped writing for almost a decade and I'm sure I'm not the only one who has experienced this trap. This is called perfectionism which has affected me in other ways as well. I'm still very miffed that this tendency of mine kept me from engaging in one of my favorite activities for so long. Fortunately I've finally accepted that the reason my writing hasn't been up to my own standards was that I haven't been honing my craft. That was it. Simple.

I'm now no longer embarrassed by what I write, just a little embarrassed that I stopped myself from engaging in the art for what in hindsight seem like very silly reasons. I still write many things that I'm not satisfied with and probably always will. Instead of regarding this as somehow a personal failure, I can now ask myself why I'm not satisfied with it. The answers to my own questions here have informed the direction I take my writing stylistically and conceptually. I discovered that it was not actually a problem that my prose looks vastly different than that of many of my favorite authors. I'm not them and I'm not doing the same thing that they are doing even though we're all technically writing. I used to regard writing as somehow needing to conform to the proper academic style such as the neoclassical paradigm of the plastic arts in eighteenth century France, but in reality there isn't one aside from basic standards of formatting and readability (which are not hard rules themselves if you know them well enough to subvert them).

The most powerful thing however is that I'm now writing only because I want to do it, and practicing writing only because I want a better story to read from myself. The only way to be a better writer is to write, and the only way I can write is if I want to do it. When you really care about what you're writing you can see its potential through the mess of your initial attempts and you have the opportunity to bring it closer to your vision, or in my case, go in a completely different direction from the original idea. It really is what you make of it.

Whether it's a few hundred words or a few thousand, any amount of writing of any kind is better than no writing of any kind. The epic can wait. Until then you can write episodes, short stories, essays on topics you're interested in, and whatever else your fleeting desires pop into your mind. Even writing comments on Beehaw is something. If you want to write, write!

I've been writing much more consistently over the last few years after a years-long hiatus starting in college. Basically, I dropped all my useless expectations of what my writing should be and started to pay a lot more attention to my own writing sensibilities. I've been leaning into the way I like to write without regard to anything else. I have a career elsewhere which I'd like to stay in so the only audience I have to care about is myself so I can go as niche as I want.

Here are some of my quirks:

• My descriptions tend to be functional or absent. I will describe features of characters and settings only as necessary and leave to the imagination whatever I can. This keeps the action and dialogue moving at breakneck pace.

• While editing, when I think something is too explicit I often make it more vague. For example, a character might describe how and why a problem is happening and I will change it so that they are only mentioning their experience of the problem and obfuscating things they wouldn't want to emphasize.

• I'll write pages of notes detailing some system or concept only to hint at it briefly in the narrative. This is to imply consistency while being relevant and fast. Also, mystery is fun.

• I spend a loooot of time re-reading and adjusting the last few thousand words. I wrote it specifically so I would like it, so it's a lot of fun to go back and make it so I like it more. I enjoy editing as much as writing.

• I cut a lot of material when it's not working for me or if it starts to clutter things up. Whenever I cut something, I put it on a separate document. Sometimes I find somewhere else to insert it where it would make more sense. Sometimes I note why I deleted it to give me an idea of what I want instead.

• I love stealing from history. Characters, concepts, social constructs, belief systems, politics, etc. It's all there free to take and adapt.

• I make up a lot of stuff on the spot, then go back and add it in so it seems like I planned ro include it from the beginning.

• My outline is only a suggestion.

What are your quirks?

This morning I decided to compete with ChatGPT on who could write the best short story given my original idea. I assume my story idea is original because I have never heard of a story about this before.

Prompt: write a short story about a janitor reflecting on his existence in the universe

ChatGPT’s Entry

In a small town nestled between towering mountains, there lived a janitor named Henry. Henry was an ordinary man with a mundane job, but his deep thoughts often led him on extraordinary journeys of contemplation. Every morning, as the first rays of the sun touched the earth, Henry would arrive at his workplace—the local elementary school. He would clean the well-worn corridors, mop the gleaming floors, and empty the overflowing trash bins. But amidst his daily routine, Henry couldn't help but question the meaning of his existence in the vast universe.

One evening, weary after a long day's work, Henry sat alone at a park bench, gazing up at the night sky. The twinkling stars seemed to whisper their secrets to him, igniting a fire within his soul. He wondered, "Am I just a speck of dust in this vast cosmic dance?" As the night wore on, Henry's reflections grew deeper. He contemplated the countless galaxies, stretching across space and time, and the infinite possibilities they held. Immersed in his thoughts, he questioned whether his life as a janitor had any significance amidst such cosmic grandeur. Then, as if the universe itself wished to answer his query, a shooting star streaked across the sky. And in that fleeting moment, Henry had an epiphany. He realized that his existence, no matter how seemingly small, was interconnected with the entire cosmos. With newfound purpose, Henry returned to work the next day.

No longer burdened by the weight of insignificance, he embraced his role as a janitor with renewed vigor. Henry understood that even the smallest acts could have profound ripple effects. He began to engage with the students, sharing stories of curiosity and wonder. He inspired them to dream big and to nurture their thirst for knowledge. Henry encouraged creativity and taught them about the beauty of the natural world. Through his interactions, he planted seeds of inspiration, knowing that they had the potential to blossom into greatness. As the years went by, the children Henry had influenced grew up to become innovators, scientists, and visionaries in their own right. Although he remained a humble janitor, Henry found solace and satisfaction in knowing that he had played a part in shaping brilliant minds. Henry's contemplation of his existence in the universe had led him to a profound realization—that purpose lies not in the grandeur of our roles or positions, but in the impact we have on others. In every act of kindness, in every moment of inspiration, our existence intertwines with the tapestry of the universe. And so, Henry continued to navigate the corridors of the elementary school, not as just a janitor, but as a catalyst for dreams, a guardian of possibility, and a reflection of the cosmic wonders that lay within each and every one of us.

My Entry

Henry shooed the spider into the cup; he had been a bit surprised to find something alive in the office. “Sorry little guy, not sure you can afford it here.” He watched as the little creature desperately tried to escape by climbing the smooth interior to no avail until it gave up the attempt, resting in place along the bottom rim. It was kind of silly to evict it as it had been making the best use of the space in many months. Now it would have to start over somewhere else if it didn’t perish in the attempt. Of course it probably couldn’t even conceive of its predicament and wouldn’t be aware that it had lost anything while it set to work establishing itself somewhere else. It existed in a kind of perpetual flow state, even at this moment when its very fate was totally beyond its own control. He couldn’t help but feel a twinge of envy for it.

As he sauntered through the immaculate but desolate hall of the building toward the back door he began to consider whether he or the spider more represented entropy in the building. According to his job description he represented the literal opposite of entropy. It was his responsibility to maintain the office space in its entirety until such a time as tenants rented it out and took on the responsibility themselves. The office had to look its absolute best at all times because the landlord took pains to schedule tours with prospects with the fastest turnaround possible. Every moment the fallow building weighed on the expense side without revenue must have cost her in money and sleep. She always seemed frazzled on the phone as if barely containing her panic. They both knew the whole thing was a sunk cost which should be sold off to one of the big fish consuming everything else local people used to own and now had to rent. In their hands the useless building would attain a new significance somewhere in the labyrinthine exploitation of taxes and finances those companies specialized at. Even at his old job moving numbers around on a spreadsheet to minimize this and obfuscate that, Henry understood that it was ultimately meaningless for everyone but the investors. Because of some kind of calculation somewhere the building and parking lot would remain a kind of mausoleum bereft of even the dead. That was probably some kind of decay. The spider wasn’t really destroying anything. It was just making use of what was there to build something for itself. If everyone simply left the building to be reclaimed by nature, in a few years it would be teeming with new life. He was there, and anyone hired after him would be there, to ensure it remained as it was for as long as was convenient for people who had only briefly laid eyes on it if they even bothered.

He flung the spider into the grass by the door and took a brief moment to glance at the sky. The heat was overwhelming but he couldn’t help but appreciate the planet-encompassing blue and what it represented to so many across time and space. This vast uncaring universe in all of its beauty and horror giving a hint of the devastation it would wreak on the familiar but fragile human systems so many economists and politicians declare to be “natural.” At least he wouldn’t be around to see the worst of it, he supposed. All he had was the brief flicker of existence and no matter what things looked like during that relatively minuscule moment he was determined to make the most of it whatever that meant. At this moment it was to rescue an innocent creature from the throes of systems which no one could actually fully comprehend. That was worth something, at least to himself.

I’m not going to claim to be a great artist or anything, but I think I see a difference in quality here. But what if ChatGPT scrapes my story and reproduces it?

Prompt: Use the following story as inspiration to write your own original story: [My entire story]

ChatGPT’s Infringement of my Story

As Henry shooed the spider into the cup, he couldn't help but ponder the significance of its existence in contrast to his own. The spider, oblivious to its fate, had been making the best of its surroundings, utilizing the space in the office to its advantage. Henry, on the other hand, felt trapped in a cycle of monotonous responsibility as a caretaker of the vacant building.

As he walked through the empty halls towards the back door, contemplating his role in the grand scheme of things, Henry realized the building itself represented entropy. It stood as a symbol of stagnation, its potential unrealized, while he tirelessly upheld its pristine appearance. The landlord, burdened by the costs and stress, sought to sell it to larger corporations that would transform it into another impersonal entity within the financial labyrinth. In contrast, the spider was merely trying to survive, creating its own little world within the office. Henry found solace in the spider's ability to adapt and create without destroying anything. If left alone, the building would eventually succumb to nature's reclamation, thriving with new life.

Flipping the spider into the grass, Henry briefly gazed at the vast blue sky, a reminder of the enormity of the universe. It both fascinated and terrified him, knowing that humanity's fragile systems would ultimately face its wrath. Yet, amidst the chaos, Henry recognized the fleeting nature of his existence and resolved to make the most of it. Rescuing the innocent spider from the clutches of the incomprehensible systems surrounding them became a small act of defiance for Henry. In a world consumed by self-serving pursuits, he found value in preserving even the tiniest life. For him, this act held meaning, reaffirming his determination to find purpose within the realms of the unknown.

It may be my personal bias since I wrote the source material but it seems to me that the most important aspects of my story are missing from the machine’s directly appropriated “re-interpretation” of my story.

I don’t think the machine competently reproduced my story or ideas. I don’t think the machine could possibly competently reproduce my story or ideas or even come up with its own because the machine does not have a mind. The machine does not have experiences, it does not have thoughts, and it does not have emotions. The machine has access to a database and the ability to express what it finds in that database using language programmed to appear similar to how humans use language. The story it “created” and the “interpretations” it made are the sum of algorithmically analyzing the query and re-organizing relevant database entries to deliver a response. What I want to make perfectly clear is that although this is an impressive piece of technology which I’ve found many uses for, it is not capable of creating or interpreting as you or I are able to do. It is only capable of delivering relevant processed data entries in human-sounding language with no ability to understand what it is reading or the words it delivers. I am simply not intimidated by the machine appropriating my ideas because it can’t do anything with them.

Going beyond this, I don’t think “original ideas” are the primary thing that makes a piece of media worth consuming as I hope I demonstrated above. I have seen derivative works which lack care and quality, and I have also seen derivative works which succeed where the original failed. The key is in the execution, and I personally also weigh how much it seems like the artist cared about it while working on it whether the end product works as intended or not. The kind of originality in execution which we are capable of and the thing that matters for thoughtful engagement are not things the machine can replicate.

To be perfectly clear the above argument has absolutely nothing to do with commodified art or art as a trade. In the market, quality is one of many variables influencing purchasing behavior and is probably a minor one compared to other drivers. LLM generated content is worthless artistically but its “worth” in dollars has the potential to displace a lot of actual art of all kinds which people buy. Considering the obvious lack of artistic quality from LLMs hopefully the market will develop towards producing only what humans and not unthinking machines can produce, but I really have no idea. Photography totally transformed the medium of painting in my opinion for the better, and hopefully the layups any competent person can have against the machine will also influence art for the better.

My purpose here is that I am extremely disturbed by hearing of artists of any kind losing motivation to produce their art because of LLMs or not wanting to risk their work being scraped and “reproduced” by LLMs. That to me is the worst possible consequence of this phenomenon. Even without any skill or experience, the simple fact that we have human minds makes us better artists than the machine by default. It can’t actually outdo anyone by artistic standards. If LLMs mean to you that you have to make a change, please let that change be to lean more into your own humanity rather than to stop artistic expression altogether.

Although I don't fully agree with the sentiment expressed by this thread, it did get me thinking about leaning even further into contributing to an environment I'd like to participate in. I personally much prefer dedicated discussion threads to discussing news stories myself and reading through the comments it seems like there is a huge desire among many for exactly that. In this thread I'd like to brainstorm with y'all about the conversations we wouldn't risk trying to have on reddit, conversations you don't have people around willing to engage in but would work well here, community vibe checks, or something I'm not considering. I would also like to explore what obstacles others see for why this hasn't happened already despite the apparent desire so any solutions we experiment with can avoid issues which we are already aware of.

My response to my own question will be in the comments.

Adolf Eichmann was a Nazi officer who, despite apparently not having a particular hatred of the Jews, facilitated and managed the logistics involved in the mass deportation of millions of Jews to ghettos and extermination camps. He was a key figure in the execution of the Holocaust. Hannah Arendt observed him as he went to trial for his crimes in Jerusalem in 1962, where she observed that the man displayed neither guilt for his actions nor hatred for those trying him. He claimed he was only doing his duty. From this account comes the phrase “the banality of evil” in which an average people motivated by personal success rather than adherence to ideology or malice whose sense of unexceptional complacency may lead them to participate in atrocities as if they were any other job.

Enemy at the Door is a show about regular people enacting Hitler’s will during WWII and the lives of the people who suffer the consequences of them “doing their duty.” The evil of fascism and the consequences of Nazi ideology are depicted constantly throughout, but the people carrying out these evils consider themselves professionals in an organization before they consider themselves to be the manifestations of Hitler’s genocidal will. They are, in fact, manifestations of Hitler’s genocidal will however. The show casts the Nazi officers in a human way not to diminish what they are doing but to demonstrate what we humans are capable of when we uncritically act within the parameters of a system. Although each characters’ motivations are their own, they are uncritically operating the Nazi apparatus according to its rules or operating it anyway if they are critical resulting in the inevitable.

The show takes place on the Nazi-occupied British island of Guernsey which has been stripped of military assets so that it would be occupied rather than destroyed. The inhabitants of the island are constantly pushed between resisting or at least not helping their occupiers and ensuring their survival leading to many impossible decisions. Here as well we have a cast of characters each with their own, often clashing, motivations and desires. The give and take between the full cast of characters is intense and gripping.

Although Breaking Bad and The Sopranos are two of my other favorite shows, this show avoids a major issue which plagued them which is that some of the audience did not realize that Walter White and Tony Soprano are not people just doing what’s necessary since they themselves were taken in by the brilliant performances of justification and manipulation both actors masterfully portrayed. In staging the show theatrically rather than cinematically from the perspective of the main character we are able to see the full dynamic between the characters as equals rather than be biased from the eyes of a sociopath. Although the performances in this show are also masterful and the characters may legitimately believe they are justified in their behavior the framing of the scenes and lack of a main character allows the audience to observe as objectively as possible whether that is indeed the case. When something terrible happens as a consequence of the behavior of one or more characters the victims are themselves fully realized and not incidental as they can often be in the above shows. There is a real gut punch and feeling of loss when bad things happen to people in this show because the show makes sure you know who they are and that they are like you.

I’ve been watching it from the US through Roku, where it’s available for free with ads. This site can show you where you can watch it. 10/10, unbelievably good, gripping, and thought provoking.

“AI” can’t replace people in any way. The most it could possibly do is assist a person in performing a task because it is a tool which does not actually have intelligence or awareness. This may be a debate but I am firmly on the side of punting Wilson the volleyball and cautioning people not to anthropomorphize a program whose complexity is minuscule when directly compared to even what little we yet know of an actual human brain. What the programs actually do is use a number of algorithms to decode mathematically what the user meant by their request and encode a response based on referencing values in a way calculated to be most likely to be understood by the average person or combine a number of images according to the parameters it’s interpreted. It’s no more intelligent than a search engine. It is a search engine.

Writers can’t be replaced by “AI.” Have you, the person reading these words, ever read a story written by an “AI” program and were genuinely interested in reading more because of how engaging it was? Neither have I. The “AI” can combine input in such a way that it’s coherent, and it can even be unintentionally funny in the way it mashes things together without understanding them, but the unthinking unfeeling machine does not know and could never guess what a person would actually be interested in reading or want to watch be performed. Even the laziest bestseller or tv script composed of as many cliches as the author can think of until they hit the word limit to submit a manuscript contains more artistry as the author understands why cliches are appealing and is able to apply them in such a way as to entertain a casual audience not totally familiar with them to be tired of them yet. An “AI” program can also combine cliches but meaninglessly and without intention. It’s trash and no one actually likes it. Reading at least 1000 words in a row of any “AI” story makes a better argument against its capabilities than I ever could.

Plastic artists can’t be replaced. Painters, sculptors, digital artists, doodlers, etc. no matter their skill level can produce an image infinitely more interesting than anything an “AI” could possibly produce. When I read about plastic artists being intimidated by “AI” art or despairing about having a skill which is no longer relevant I truly can’t imagine why. To see an image briefly and walk or scroll past it one is probably as good as any other, but is this really what artists hope for from an audience? When you actually look at an image with the understanding that every component part of it was applied by an artist whose methodology and inspiration you may or may not know, a human mind can provide fertile content to react to while an “AI” can’t. Why did the AI compose the image in this way? Why did the AI include these elements? Why did the AI reference this historical style? What did the AI intend to say through this image? The only answer to these questions and to all other questions is that it scraped existing images and created one from that data mindlessly. Compare this to a child’s drawing of a cat. You can tell a lot about the child, the details they find the most significant about the cat, the attitude of the child about the cat, and perhaps even learn something about how a cat exists in the world from another perspective that enriches your own perspective. An artist constantly creating and developing their ability for a number of years packs all that experience and themselves into what they produce, so everything in what they produce has a depth of meaning whether they intend for it to or not. An artist who creates what they feel like without putting much deliberate thought into it is still manifesting a pure expression of themselves informed by their nature and experiences which is relevant to all other human natures and experiences viewing it. An “AI” can put something together that may look cool, but there is just nothing to it.

There are tons of other things that I could get into which “AI” could never competently replace due to its nature but I wanted to use art as an example for what I feel the actual concern about “AI” replacing people is. The problem of “AI” and all labor-saving technology in the last few centuries is not the technology itself but is actually Capitalism. Capitalism is when Capitalists aka investors utilize their Capital aka money as an investment with the sole purpose of yielding a return on their investment aka making their money work for them to make more money. When a Capitalist invests in an enterprise their only concern is that they will receive more money from investing in that enterprise than the money they invested. Capitalists care less about every other quality of an enterprise than that they make a return on their investment because that is literally the only reason they would ever invest in a project; otherwise it would be charitable donation and not capitalism. A business run by capitalists themselves or hoping to appeal to capitalists for investment is most concerned with maximizing profit through some combination of minimizing expenses and maximizing revenue.

“AI” can’t possibly replace a writer or a painter, but “AI” is replacing writers and painters in the market. This is not because “AI” can produce a better or similar quality product because it clearly can’t, but that it can produce an “acceptable” product at minimal labor cost which contributes to profit on the expense side. The reason “AI” products are “acceptable” is not because consumers are rational actors in the marketplace as the myth goes. It’s because of so many myriad factors of consumer behavior that I can’t even reliably list them all here because despite over a century of direct study and numerous ancillary fields of study, our understanding is limited despite a massive amount of evidence for numerous drivers of behavior.

When I was a teenager fresh off of taking my AP Art History classes and really getting into the world of art which had opened up to me I was really into going to art markets and talking to the artists about their work. I had many enjoyable conversations but one of them really stuck with me. He regretted his lot as a professional artist because it was clear that he loved art. There were two sides of his stall: one side was “Florida crap” and the other side was “Texas crap,” both of which he had a severe distaste for. He recounted to me that as a young man he painted billboards in the 60’s and getting into scene more seriously. At that time he could have conversations with his patrons about what they wanted and produce meaningful work which set him up with false expectations for how his career would end up heading. He had glimpses of the business side at that time and described watching Andy Warhol, who was and is notorious for criticizing and vastly benefiting from consumerism, work. He and a number of art students waited in anticipation before the very late Warhol stumbled into the studio too high to even stand up while his assistants literally held him and printed the art with the machine while he slurred words and gestured. Almost literally printing money. From that experience and many others he slowly started to come into the reality of art as a business. By the time I was speaking to him most of his customers’ only concern as he described it was whether his paintings would match their couches. He painted for local decorating sensibilities, which themselves were not expressions of individual decorators but local magazine-derived design aesthetics which he could expect his Florida-style or Texas-style paintings to match. This was from the perspective of one non-capitalist just trying to survive in a market but the same forces apply at the highest level. For this kind of consumer interacting with several levels of market-manipulated consumer taste an AI-genterated painting would probably be suitable to complete their room the way it looks on Instagram.

Quality of work is only one out of many factors involved in marketplace success, and its importance to profit is relative. Due to the quarterly nature of planning at the highest levels of economy, that which is most profitable now is by orders of magnitude more valuable than what may be profitable in 10 years. Low quality “AI” products could crap up a variety of fields as non-expert Capitalists and CEOs shift their money around in the hopes of minimizing expenses within the next few quarters. As far as the most well-known products backed by billions in investment and marketed so aggressively everyone has to deal with them in one way or another, “AI” contributions being abused to replace entire professionals could be a big problem. This and enshittification in general caused by the same market forces is part of the reason I’m getting back into FOSS and Open Source stuff made by only people who care about the project rather than the bottom line.

All that being said, “AI” can be a valuable tool to assist people in making higher quality work than they were capable of creating without it and creating work which is unprecedented. It’s interesting to go to museums and see the fairly mundane furniture of monarchs and nobility which I could now find a better quality version of from an antique store due to the well-established advancement of technology. Similarly, I have used “AI” to mitigate a lot of grunt work from my professional and artistic endeavors that would have slowed my progress to a halt due to the time and resources I used to have no choice but to exhaust which were often more than I had to devote. Even though “AI” gives bad info too often, it’s vastly mitigated the time I take to find quick answers to simple questions which I would have otherwise had to dig for. I’ve learned a lot about the specific things I want to know about spreadsheet formulas, GIMP tools, and programming syntax that I would have either had to grow a second lifetime of time and energy to take a class on and practice with else dig through piles of derisive input from individuals who are personally insulted I don’t know better but still don’t answer my specific question. As a writing companion, I’ve used it to brainstorm and explore a number of sci-fi hypotheticals that no one other than myself are interested in considering or discussing (YET) – giving me specific terms which I can then go on to research and get a real basis in. I’ve been generating image assets which I’ve been cutting up and re-contextualizing to create images meaningful to me which I haven’t ever seen anything like. It’s an interesting tool whose capabilities are only now being explored, but it’s just a tool. It can’t do what we can do but we can use it to do what we want to do.

My favorite art movement is Dada. I love the philosophy, the acknowledgment of a chaotic and unpredictable world, the challenge to traditional understanding, the satire of the art economy, and the humor of it. I like taking things from the world and re-contextualizing them.

The image seen here is garbage, but garbage that interests me. It is the result of feeding a computer algorithm a number of quotes regarding Dadaism by Marcel Duchamp and asking the program to create a satire of the contemporary art market. The algorithm interpreted the Duchamp quotes, references to the plastic works of Duchamp, its own referenced data of Marcel Duchamp, probably a lot of general information regarding cubism and modernism, and the wording of my request to produce this image.

One of the most famous examples of Dada art is Untitled(Collage with Squares Arranged according to the Law of Chance) created by Jean (Hans) Arp. When I say “created” I mean that in a different way than a person may normally deliberately create art which is a reflection of themselves in some way. This piece is the result of producing a work automatically with almost no effort. He cut some paper carelessly, dropped the pieces onto the canvas, and glued them where they fell. It has no inherent meaning other than to represent randomness and chance. It is fundamentally different in nature to how almost all other art is produced which is with intention. Is he the artist, or is gravity and wind resistance the artist?

Similarly, the above image has no inherent meaning. It was produced by referencing a number of values and arranging pixels algorithmically according to its program. It’s more of a mathematical sum than a painting. In my opinion, this image was produced by me dropping cut up Duchamp quotes through an extraordinarily complex pachinko mechanism and gluing them to where they fell.

I actually produced many images, but this is the one that I personally found striking and worth keeping for my personal enjoyment. Even though the only possible intentions featured in the image are second-hand from dead artists applied without understanding, I personally find meaning in this image. I think by chance this little piece of trash has some artistic merit in my own estimation.

This is my personal interpretation of the image: The design of the gallery and perspective of the image evokes modernism, Rothko in particular. On the wall are two abstract works which also evoke “modern art” as featured in museums in general. The works, however, are ajar and vastly disparate. Is this a challenge to the sensibilities of our expectations of an art gallery? I take it more cynically, as in the foreground there is a man in a suit with a posture indicating ownership (whether he is an owner or buyer is ambiguous). I think that the canvases were arranged by this individual or someone with a similar sensibility. The classic business tactic in the arts of throwing everything at the wall to see what sells. If the non-traditional arrangement of the canvases creates a niche for a specialized segment of customer taste then this move could add to the bottom line. The man stands not as an art patron in the traditional sense, but an investor calculating the monetary value of the works with a honed expertise. He is wearing sunglasses because he’s not directly looking at the art, but through a filter (lens or profit). His face is either referencing cubism, or is an ai glitch I’ve seen many times when faces are involved in general. That it could be either supports the satire, I think. The image was thrown together without understanding, and depicts that which is thrown together without understanding. Art is just an aspect of a transaction which is taking place in a system.

I’m interested in your thoughts on this piece. Honestly I’m most interested in the reaction of artists here to this image whether positive, neutral, or extremely negative.