ENCORE: Digital dilemma: Does AI help or harm the creative community?

It can write emails, essays and even songs. It has created award-winning pieces of art, and it can take simple text prompts and generate eerily life-like videos. That’s right—we’re talking about artificial intelligence.

Generative AI programs such as ChatGPT, Sora and Midjourney are getting smarter and more powerful by the day—just this week, Nvidia, one of the world's leading AI companies, announced a powerful new chip that could supercharge AI's already rapid growth. This technology is already worrying artists of all kinds about the future of art. Is AI coming for artists’ jobs and livelihood, or is it a helpful tool pushing art to a new horizon?

Jason Allen used generative AI to create his work “Théâtre d'Opéra Spatial,” which won the Colorado State Fair’s annual fine art competition in 2022, making news headlines. He says artists should be excited and more open to working with AI as a new artistic medium that can help break down barriers and democratize art for everyone. On the other side, Molly Crabapple, award-winning artist and writer, says artists—and everyone—should be concerned about generative AI, arguing that these programs are not only stealing from, but “sucking the lifeblood,” from living artists. Additionally, she contends that the limited creativity of AI art programs will ultimately impoverish human culture. Listen to Doha Debates Podcast as our guests debate the controversy surrounding AI art, the economics of artificial intelligence and the future of art around the world.

Doha Debates Podcast is a production of Doha Debates and FP Studios. This episode is hosted by Joshua Johnson. Thoughts on this conversation? Let us know! Follow us everywhere @DohaDebates and join the post-episode discussion in our YouTube comments.