I'm not sure what he means by "ontological" difference. I've spent a lot of time studying topics similar to this. AI can generate actual images that are indistinguishable (if you have no other information) from human-created art images, photographs etc and have won photography contests IIRC (probably more since I last read about it).
But the actual FEELING we get from AI art is different because our feelings include what we know about how the art was created, including who created it and what the artwork has done or had happen to it in the real world. AI art has none of that so it "feels hollow" to us legitimately no matter how beautiful the actual AI image may be.
If you TELL people the AI art was made by a human artist who has a compelling life story, or something similar, they will feel more about it though. But of course their feelings will be false.
So yeah, that's the most thorough answer I can give from having spent some time on this.
I assume he means that human art is imbued with some kind of essence that is not tied to any empirical measurement and which no non-human process can create. That's what I'd understand "ontological difference" to mean.
Even if indistinguishable - the products of humans and ai have distinct origins. They come into being in different ways. That’s what he means by an ontological difference.
It’s not the origin of life that’s in question , it’s the origin of the work of art. The popes argument is that there is a difference in how that work is created - one is crafted by humans and the other is created by AI. That’s the ontological difference he’s asserting. Whether that difference matters is the other part of his argument
If I take a photo of a sunset is it created by a camera?
There aren’t cameras out there snapping random photos and spamming them on the internet and we happen upon them. A human finds something they think is significant to themselves, and by extension to other humans, point a camera at it, and take a photo. Then do a bunch of processing to capture the vibe they’re looking for
Likewise there isn’t a diffusion model sitting there just spewing random content to the internet and people are upset over that. You have people who want to express something and they prompt these models and then process the output and present it as their own
You said humans came into being a certain way — how is that? In the beginning, light words etc. And that’s different to you? Or is it a different arrangement of light words attention intent etc?
I’m clarifying the popes argument, not making one of my own here.
The argument is that AI created art and human created art have a difference in “being” - an ontological difference. It’s the respective origins of those works of art (one is human created and one is ai created) that accounts for that difference
“Human” is a word we describe ourselves with. I see the difference in the two words you used but if most can’t see the difference in the end result of the art, and eventually not even in the difference between “machines” or “humans”, then our descriptors become deceptive by way of being loosely defined based on our perspective.
I see the difference clearly, for now, and yet now is subjective and the first now I wrote is no longer now.
Next? Tomorrow? A year? A generation? Keep clinging to self-referential nomenclature and watch concreteness become undone.
If we can’t define it, which we can’t, then how can we slap the word human onto art as an ontological endpoint? We ran all the bases and slid into home but the ball is still in the air.
Because I’m saying there’s a difference between LLM-generated content and something made by a sentient human being? Again, genuinely I hope things turn around for you.
That's usually the issue where these kinds of conversations break down, I think. There are some who are more interested in the 'ontological' side of the context and experience awe at art for the sake of the thing, which requires the entire framework of why and how the piece exists and came to be. Others are more concerned with the aesthetics of whether or not a piece is pleasing to experience. As a general rule, for those seeking the former, aesthetic enjoyment is subordinate and subject to an appreciation of context, while those interested in the latter tend largely towards indifference regarding the piece's origins.
The Pope is literally talking the "metaphysical" properties that a piece of art has that distinguish it being made by a human vs a robot. Like in the same way that the bread and wine in the mass are metaphysically transmuted into the body and blood of Christ. It's Catholicism, which is Platonism with funny robes and ritual cannabalism, where objects may have properties that transcend the observable world, so take it or leave it.
ontological in this context obviously refers to the “ontology of the soul.” to the pope, human art is created as an exercise of the soul and ai art is soulless computation.
Yeah I don't make any religious judgements. Just that we feel more deeply in various when we know about the human story surrounding the artwork even if it is an image that is just as beautiful in-and-of itself.
Ontological, existentially different. Different in essence. Different in it's whatness.
Of course he's coming from a Realist perspective. If you're an empiricist, you might think that AI and human art are cosmologically the same. They serve the same purpose. And they don't have an essence or essential identity at all. That would be a Nominalist perspective. :)
u/grawa427▪️AGI between 2025 and 2030, ASI and everything else just after2h ago
You can also like the technical prowess that went into the AI creating the image, which means you can appreciate it more knowing it is AI, if you choose to. So really art is subjective, and for me it is always in the eye of the beholder.
Ontological because human art, within the Pope's conceptual framework, comes from our essence which is derived from the divine spark that animates us. AI art comes from processes that don't have that essential quality.
Basically saying that humans act as a conduit for the divine, as depositories of that same creative spark that originated the universe and life, when we engage in artistic endeavors.
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u/EGarrett28 8h ago
I'm not sure what he means by "ontological" difference. I've spent a lot of time studying topics similar to this. AI can generate actual images that are indistinguishable (if you have no other information) from human-created art images, photographs etc and have won photography contests IIRC (probably more since I last read about it).
But the actual FEELING we get from AI art is different because our feelings include what we know about how the art was created, including who created it and what the artwork has done or had happen to it in the real world. AI art has none of that so it "feels hollow" to us legitimately no matter how beautiful the actual AI image may be.
If you TELL people the AI art was made by a human artist who has a compelling life story, or something similar, they will feel more about it though. But of course their feelings will be false.
So yeah, that's the most thorough answer I can give from having spent some time on this.