The Hard Problem of Artificial Creativity
Our enduring musical preferences illustrate the challenge for AI.
Your Love of Old Music Explains the Hard Problem of Artificial Creativity
It returns as predictably as the seasons. Call it Bacon’s Comet: The idea that the age of creative AI is now upon us. Machines are not only accelerating discoveries (so the argument goes), they’re now making their own independent discoveries. And just in time, since the world is demonstrably more complex than feeble human minds could hope to comprehend.
All of this is quite wrong. But I don’t want to dwell on why it’s wrong. Instead, I want to celebrate why creativity remains a uniquely human pursuit. I’d like to discriminate between the ideas of applied and fundamental creativity, which in my mind illuminates the particular niche that today’s AI may soon dominate.
Further Reading
Creative blocks
David Deutsch discusses the philosophical impediments to realizing AGI and artificial creativity. “I am convinced that the whole problem of developing AGIs is a matter of philosophy, not computer science or neurophysiology, and that the philosophical progress that is essential to their future integration is also a prerequisite for developing them in the first place.”
Deep Learning, Alien Knowledge and Other UFOs
When I first addressed this topic, much of the enthusiasm for automated discovery was carried by advances in deep learning. “Deep learning should be celebrated, not for revealing the limits of knowledge, but as a powerful observational tool, the telescope of our time, at the service of explanations.”
‘It will change everything’: DeepMind’s AI makes gigantic leap in solving protein structures
An extraordinary example of the observational power of deep learning. It highlights both the instrumental utility of AI and the inevitable misunderstandings that flow from an instrumental view of science.
An Unended Quest. “A Second Digression: Dogmatic and Critical Thinking; Learning without Induction” and “Music”
Music inspired Karl Popper and fueled his speculations about a critical imagination. He didn’t think these ideas would satisfy a psychological theory of creative thinking, let alone scientific discovery. But he found something compelling in the tension between the novel and the dogmatic.
This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession
As a musician and neuroscientist, Daniel Levitin connects the technical features of music (such as timbre, rhythm, harmony) to the neuroanatomy of our musical experiences. It isn’t an explanation of creativity, but it illustrates the enormity of the challenge.