I feel like generative AI is much like the mechanical bird in the story The Nightingale by HC Andersen.
I grew up with Andersen's fairytales and many of them has made a permanent home in my heart. The nightingale (or nattergalen, as is the original title) has always been amongst my favourites.
It is the tale of how the emperor of China learns that a great bird exists in his empire and he asks it to come and sing for him. The song deeply touches him and all the people at the palace, and the little bird is celebrated for his voice and song.
One day, a box is sent to the emperor, and within is it a golden mechanical bird, an artificial imitation of the real nightingale. They are asked to sing side by side, but it doesn't work well. The nightingale improvises and goes with his mood, while the mechanical bird can merely repeat how it has been programmed.
Still, hearing the mechanical birds makes the crowd ooh and ahh, and it can sing without mistakes and much more often than a real bird. It is wound up again and again for the amusement of the emperor and the people. The real nightingale leaves discouraged.
But as the time goes on, the mechanical bird starts to break down, and eventually, it doesn't work anymore at all. When the emperor becomes deadly ill, the soft song from a nightingale is all that can save him, but his little wind-up toy cannot help him.
The real nightingale comes back and saves the emperor's life, for it had been so touched when it first sang for the emperor and it made him shed tears. It remembers that first touch of something oh, so special as sharing its voice. The emperor learns the error of his ways.
Gen AI can only ever be an imitation of the real thing. It is stuck in the same grooves as a mechanical bird. It can do it "perfect" and faster than humanly possible, but it is and always will be an imitation that cannot stand on its own. It might be enough to impress but it is not sustainable.
Only with the real music, art and writing can what is special be perserved. It must be created by living beings. We are able to adapt and change and create stuff outside of set parameters. But it is very understandable that it is highly discouraging to see gen AI spit out music, art or writing that to the untrained, or uncaring, eye is praised.
I reckon that the well will dry up eventually, whether it will be a crash, or behind a high paywall, and everyone who grew accustomed to it will cry out in despair. The mechanical bird is broken. Death will come and sweet song is not there anymore.
The nightingale flew home and continued with his life. He kept singing to the forest, but in another version of the tale, maybe he had stopped singing. It would have been a tragedy for both himself and all the people who eventually realised their folly in depending on a mechanical bird over the real thing.
So keep creating. Keep making music. Keep making art. Keep writing. Gen AI is imitating us, and it is arguably trying to replace our works, but it is not as good as the real thing and it cannot last.
