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Michael Crofts's avatar

I agree with your thesis that there are two types of creativity and the current iteration of AI is limited to type 1. But I am not complacent about this limit.

Suppose that it becomes possible to make a genuinely self-learning device. Now, give it sensors to mimic all human senses, inclinations to prefer certain sensations over others, locomotion together with freedom to explore, and time. Could such a device, exposed to real and direct experiences of the world, eventually develop some degree of consciousness? Might it possibly exhibit characteristics of human consciousness like self-reflection, meta-cognition (awareness of one's own knowledge, and lack of knowledge), and abstract reasoning? If so, I think it could produce type 2 creative work, if it wanted to.

I think the key phrase there is the last. A device that wants to do something novel of its own volition would almost certainly be capable of type 2 creativity.

If one looks at a new-born baby human it exhibits little more intelligence in its first hours of life than an insect. It is the combination of inherited instincts and abilities, environmental stimuli, the ability to learn, and the particular structure of the human brain that enable it to become a fully conscious and creative individual. If these factors could be incorporated into the structure and experience of a device it might eventually develop the characteristics of human consciousness, the last of which would enable such a device to create entirely novel work. It would have type 2 creativity.

Whether we ought to even try to do this is an ethical question. I don't expect the practitioners of AI to pay more than lip service to it.

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Foolish Ambition's avatar

Why does recombination of the things that are already there, does not create novelty?

I wonder, if you could do this argument for genetics as well. The genetic alphabet is pretty limited. However, it is the basic code for novelties since millions of years. Perhaps, in thinking about artifacts created with AI, we also need something like a genotype/phaenotype distinction?

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