Entry for ATA Scientific's Encouragement award

 My entry for ATA Scientific's Encouragement award:

Question: 500 words or less: A previous entry into the Eurovision song contest was composed by a computer using Artificial Intelligence (AI). Since most songs are related to human personal interactions such as love songs do you think an entry should be accepted from an emotionless machine? How would you feel about an affectionate song dedicated to you and composed by a robot?

 

Answer: The proposed question is basically asking ‘Are AI songs equal to human songs?’, but what this question is really asking is ‘Do humans have permission to emotionally connect with art that has been generated by an indifferent, synthetic creator?’. Being emotionally moved by something created within the intangible nodes of an unfeeling artificial neural network says more about the human condition than it does about AI’s ability to convincingly reproduce decades of ‘music-by-spreadsheet’. Music made in this way is specifically designed to financially mobilise as many of the four consumer quadrants as possible. Record labels have streamlined song-writing down to a soulless condensable formula, which means that songs are compiled by a committee based on market treads, loaded onto a standardised conveyor belt, and packaged all with the specific purpose of making people feel something. If they feel something, they buy, stream and consume music. It is already robotic. AI has just automated this process.

Giving oneself permission to emotionally connect to music constructed by an artificial neural network requires us to admit to ourselves that we are also machines (albeit meaty waterbag ones). We the meat-bags, have standard involuntary emotive responses to key inputs, with emotionally-charged music being one. Be it machine or record label, the standard emotional output would be the same if listeners were blinded to the composer. If we can let ourselves be emotionally touched by music spun out from the constantly churning studio conveyor belts, it is no small leap that people will feel the same regarding AI-generated music. 

So how would I feel about an affectionate song dedicated to me, composed by a neural network? Honestly, I don’t get a choice in the matter.