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AI Trends

skip.knox

toujours gai, archie
Moderator
Again, I will not go down the Accuracy rabbit hole, not after luminaries like Derrida lie in wait there.

Rather than worry about accuracy, as a teacher I look to what I'm trying to communicate. If I describe the baptism of Pomerani pagans in a series of bullet points, that's one method. If I use the words of Herbordus and deliver an extended quote, that's another approach. If I use the illustration, which is abstract and is about a different mission altogether, then I'm sliding over into analogy.

If I use a vivid image constructed by AI, that accords well with the source material, then I count that as the best of the alternatives.

There is, without doubt, an impact on human illustrators, who have just lost a job (not much of one, in this case, but a gig's a gig). I could be disingenuous and say no human would ever get such a job because it'd cost too much and us poor historians ain't got that kind of dough. But on someone else's other hand, it's equally disingenuous to pretend that somehow all illustrations would be hand-drawn, with paper and ink or analogues thereof, and every illlustrator would be fully employed. We might as well wish to bring back puppeteers and FX specialists to Hollywood to hand-craft our movies for us.

More than the tech, though, what catches my interest is the question of learning. Looking merely at the four choices above, can I say more is learned via one method than another? Or, even more interesting, can we say that there is different learning that happens? And if the whole of the curriculum follows one path rather than another, do we then produce a different kind of historian?
 

Demesnedenoir

Myth Weaver
You both took historical accuracy too literally... unless AI can time travel. Hmmmm. Wouldn't medieval man be impressed by a naked Arnold with a glowing red eye? Historically plausible? Historically-realistic-enough? Whatever. For AI to convincingly portray the villages of different cultures would be impressive.

Everyone having 5 fingers, angles making sense, and not having weird shit protruding from people's heads might be considered "historically accurate" heh heh.

Pomeranian village... I imagine anthropomorphized dogs running amok... the smith with his singed fur...
 

pmmg

Myth Weaver
Honestly, I responded to that a little hastily, and should have read more.

I regret posting in another AI thread. It feels helping the robots win.
 

skip.knox

toujours gai, archie
Moderator
>Pomeranian village... I imagine anthropomorphized dogs running amok.
yeah, it's funny, but that's going to be my chief challenge. I have a good story to tell, but Bishop Otto had the misfortune of preaching to the tribes of Pomerania. So I know damn well my audience is going to keep thinking of puffy dogs that yap. (if it fits in the lap, it's going to yap, so the old wisdom has it).

I'll speak when possible of the Pomerani, which will help a bit. And refer to people of specific towns, like Wolgast or Stettin, and in generall do my best to dance around any occurrence of the word Pomeranian. Image searches have been a bit of a challenge, too. <g>
 
So it’s taken me this long to delve into Dune by Frank Herbert, prompted by watching the new film, which I think is exquisite. Upon starting the book, surprised by its carrying me along the narrative even though I proclaim not being that much into sci-fi, I came across some poignant words that feel so eerily relevant today with regards to AI.

“Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.”

“Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a man’s mind.”

“Thou shalt not make a machine to counterfeit a human mind.”



[I can’t change any of the text at the moment don’t know if that is a bug that needs to be fixed]
 
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