[ISEA96] Panel: Gerd Döben-Henish – Artificial Consciousness: Will Art replace the Artist?

Panel Statement

Panel: Kunstliche Kunst

When someone creates a computer program which shows in its behavior some similaritiy with humans, and the creator asks the auditorium, whether this shows that the program is like a human or, vice versa, that therefore a human person is not more than a kind of a computerprogram, we will get the known discussions without clear results. When humans start to make the most adequate descriptions from themselves including feelings, whishes, ways of thinking etc. and they construct a computer program based on this self description, things are by far more difficult: in the ideal case such a program would show everything a human knows about (him/her)self. This is the case of an artificial consciousness. The creation of such an artificial consciousness has to do with art; it is an art to construct such an object and the object itself is an artobject. The artobject will not need any longer the artist. What does this tell us about the artist? Is the time of human artists gone? Or, is there something more in the story which only has not yet being revealed to us in the course of the game of life so far?

  • Gerd Döben-Henisch, Germany, Philosopher and Cognitive Scientist, Institut fuer Neue Medien, Frankfurt.  doeben-henisch.de

Full text p.153-154