Creepy ‘AI God’ art painted by humanoid robot could fetch up to $180,000 in ‘first of its kind’ auction
A HUMANOID robot that uses AI algorithms, cameras and metal arms to paint is having artwork sold by a world renowned auction house.
Ai-Da, as the robot is known, will be the first robot to have its artwork sold at Sotheby’s.
The auction for an abstract painting of Alan Turing, titled ‘AI God’, begins today, and is expected to fetch somewhere between $120,000 and $180,000.
The proceeds will go toward Ai-Da’s continued development.
“I am intrigued to see my art, AI God, at Sotheby’s,” Ai-Da said in a statement.
“My artwork uses a fractured and multilayered approach, and this shows the deeper emotional and intellectual layers of Alan Turing himself.”
Ai-Da was created by a team of scientists, led by Aidan Meller, at Oxford University in early 2019.
Artificial Intelligence explained
Here's what you need to know
- Artificial intelligence, also known as AI, is a type of computer software
- Typically, a computer will do what you tell it to do
- But artificial intelligence simulates the human mind, and can make its own deductions, inferences or decisions
- A simple computer might let you set an alarm to wake you up
- But an AI system might scan your emails, work out that you’ve got a meeting tomorrow, and then set an alarm and plan a journey for you
- AI tech is often “trained” – which means it observes something (potentially even a human) then learns about a task over time
- For instance, an AI system can be fed thousands of photos of human faces, then generate photos of human faces all on its own
- Some experts have raised concerns that humans will eventually lose control of super-intelligent AI
- But the tech world is still divided over whether or not AI tech will eventually kill us all in a Terminator-style apocalypse
The humanoid has painted numerous portraits over the years.
The abstract of Turing, signed ‘A’, was inspired by his role as the father of modern computer science, having cracked Nazi codes during World War Two.
However, in 1952, Turning was charged with “gross indecency” when he admitted to having a sexual relationship with a man.
He died two years later from what officials determined was a suicide.
“In the 1950s, Alan Turing raised concerns over the use of AI,” Meller said in a statement.
“Ai-Da’s portrait hauntingly evokes Alan Turing, using muted tones and broken facial planes, and a background with shadowy forms of the Bombe machine.
“The artwork seemingly suggests the struggles Turing warned we will face when it comes to managing AI.”
The Turing portrait is part of a five-panelled polyptych, which was displayed at a United Nations global summit on AI in Geneva earlier this year.
“All the greatest artists, if you look in the past, are those that really resonate with the changes and shifts in society and explore that through their artwork,” continued Meller.
“So what better way to do that than… to actually have a machine produce the artwork.”
One of the top concerns surrounding the tech is that instead of AI picking up laborious tasks and leaving the ‘fun stuff’ like art and music to humans, it could be the other way around.
AI art generators are becoming increasingly sophisticated, while Ai-Da’s first auction may spell the start of a worrying trend.
Meller, however, believes that art is a way of “discussing the incredible changes in society that are happening because of technology.”
He added: “[Robots] will eventually do all sorts of different tasks.”
What are the arguments against AI?
Artificial intelligence is a highly contested issue, and it seems everyone has a stance on it. Here are some common arguments against it:
Loss of jobs – Some industry experts argue that AI will create new niches in the job market, and as some roles are eliminated, others will appear. However, many artists and writers insist the argument is ethical, as generative AI tools are being trained on their work and wouldn’t function otherwise.
Ethics – When AI is trained on a dataset, much of the content is taken from the internet. This is almost always, if not exclusively, done without notifying the people whose work is being taken.
Privacy – Content from personal social media accounts may be fed to language models to train them. Concerns have cropped up as Meta unveils its AI assistants across platforms like Facebook and Instagram. There have been legal challenges to this: in 2016, legislation was created to protect personal data in the EU, and similar laws are in the works in the United States.
Misinformation – As AI tools pull information from the internet, they may take things out of context or suffer hallucinations that produce nonsensical answers. Tools like Copilot on Bing and Google’s generative AI in search are always at risk of getting things wrong. Some critics argue this could have lethal effects – such as AI prescribing the wrong health information.