With the ever-expanding technological advancements within our civilization: the innovation of artificial intelligence has exploded in the digital world. A.I. holds a great deal of future influence in many aspects of society with these types of automated software. In the same way robotic arms innovated production in factories: A.I. has the potential of automating several sectors within the job market. And amongst our lives in general by creating better ways to make daily life easier for the average person outside of work as well.
But within these types of innovations also brews fear among those who see A.I. as a looming threat. Especially within the creative world, where A.I. is viewed by many to be a danger against the people who rely on being a writer for a living. And that then A.I. has the potential of making this profession obsolete.
It is because of that reason why I think its important to go over the purpose of creative writing as a whole and to talk about the arguments suggesting obsoletion to be imminent for creative work in its entirety.
“We are Finished” and the Misunderstanding of Purpose
A common fear heard echoing throughout the masses is that A.I. can generate an infinite amount of text. And because of that: the ability for people to be a writer is then an impossibly since the need for writers in the job market will disappear. In my experience: Defenders of this argument will commonly refer to the “ostrich effect” to downplay oppositional opinions who bring any other alternative voice opposed to pure fearmongering. The ones with this viewpoint might also refer to the “Infinite monkey theorem”, saying that even though most of the A.I. generated text is bad, some of it will turn out good out of straight statistical probability. And yes, ‘fear’ is the correct word to use in this context.
Because, to understand how this argument both undermines and completely misunderstands the purpose of creation: one must first give a clear and concise definition of the purpose of creation itself.
The purpose for creative work—genuine care for the creative work, not just for the sake of making it—is to express, invoke and explore human thoughts, emotions and experiences both for the benefit of personal growth of the creator and to provoke thoughts and feelings among those who consume it.
Period.
The viewpoint of having an “A.I. takeover” mindset (which is just an extension of a capitalistic viewpoint on life as a whole) makes the person miss several key aspects within the purpose of creating art to begin with. For in this mindset, the thought pattern is:
- Person’s actions generate money = person’s life and times well spent
- Person’s actions do not generate money = person’s life and times wasted
- Have a large amount of money = has a successful life and is a fulfilled person
- Have a small amount of money = is a failure in life and is an unfulfilled person
This mindset doesn’t view art as human expression. But rather as a way to make a living out of craftsmanship. To generate money and to make money only. So, because of this mindset having this fixed perception mentioned on what art is and why art is made in the first place: the failure of making money means that the action of creating art is pointless. And therefore, will go extinct due to creative work being unable to generate money.
After the Sewing Machine Took over the Clothing Market
Before the sewing machine: the entire clothing industry consisted of people sewing clothes and weaving fabrics by hand. After the sewing machine: most of the people who relied on hand-sewn clothes as their main source of income went out of business. This was due to how the sewing machine—alongside many other types of machinery of importance for clothing production such as weaving fabrics and spinning thread—were able to produce clothes to a much larger and faster scale than a person was able to physically keep up with. Machine-made clothing was then manufactured with less manpower, thus reducing the cost of each article produced. And over time, machine-made clothing took over the market from the people who were making their articles by hand. Since they were not able to keep up with the low costs of the produced clothes: most seamstresses lost their jobs and was replaced with machines.
However, the thing about it, is the word ‘most’.
Within current time, there are still people who make clothes by traditional means. Cobblers who make shoes, tailors who make suits. All within a period where we as a civilization can produce mass-quantities of fabric articles for literal pennies per item. In theory: the purchasing of clothes costing hundreds-of-times the price then available articles of similar or exact style and quality is an act of stupidity in its purest form. Yet as the largest portion of the population is aware of, that in practice, there is more to life then just a one-pathway mentality.
Money isn’t everything.
The reasons are too many to list in this post alone (and would just be a bore to read). Whether its for supporting small businesses, the care of traditional methods of craft making or buying name-brand articles for the feeling of luxury: people will spend more money on things they care about. And thus, with the money spent on clothes without the necessary ‘need’ to be buying it also comes the ability for people to pursue professions which would otherwise have gone extinct if humanity only cared about ‘budgeting’. And to only spend as little money as possible just for the principle of ‘saving’.
And the same goes for books. In theory: people have the ability in current time to consume an infinite amount of text generated by A.I. software. But in practice, a large portion of the population will still care about and buy books written by other people despite it costing more than machine-made books with the focus on fictional worlds and stories.
Because in the end: people, care about people.
The Eferian Day’s Future Prospects in a A.I. World
no A.I. software—meaning self-learning and deep learning software whose presence have major implications and influence of the text—has been used nor will be used to help, write, or assist in the making of any of the work I do surrounding The Eferian Day series.
And it shall stay that way.
This is to keep the text I write to the full extent of my own creation. The usage of A.I. software would then tarnish the way in which I want it to be made. The creation of this project would suffer a tremendous deal using these types of tools giving up a large portion of the project’s development to the outcome of synthetic thinking. So, the creation of The Eferian Day will always stay separate from tools taking partial credit for its making.
Related: “What is The Eferian Day?”
The Eferian Day has given me as its creator a lifepath I otherwise would not have taken if the series did not exist to begin with. All my educational paths have been based in the knowledge that I was going to use much of the information gathered from my times in craftsman schools to further the development of the series. And to flesh out the books in ways I otherwise would have had major difficulties doing if it weren’t for my own experience with the subjects mentioned in them. And the progression of my educational path and mentality in its entirety can also be seen throughout much of the text (not public) I have since I first started the project back in 2015. Both in the text’s content and in its writing style. This makes the series much like an extension of myself as the creator.
Related: “my educations (About V. C. Wahlström)”
Using A.I. would then destroy all of it.
In Conclusion
Artificial Intelligence will most certainly hold a great deal of influence on the world within the coming years. Though for the creation of “The Eferian Day” project: A.I. will not change anything about the series whatsoever. This is due to me as the creator having a close relationship with the project and the making of the series has nothing to do with making money. Being able to generate income from creative work is a privilege, but not being able to does not serve as any acts of discouragement from the project’s creation.
For as long as I as the creator can continue making it in the way I intent to: The Eferian Day will continue to grow alongside myself.
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V. C. Wahlström 