The popular Lensa photo app has reignited the ethical debate over AI technology. Millions have downloaded the app, which uses artificial intelligence to create selfies and profile pictures based on work by actual human artists. Straight Arrow News contributor Jordan Reid tried out the app for herself. She says the ethical and privacy issues Lensa raises must be addressed.

How the app works is by collecting work from artists all over the internet, and learning their techniques – then applying them to facial recognition technology. Which naturally leads to the question: Do the app’s creators have the right to use real artists’ work to train their AI’s “eye,” and then sell that work for a tiny fraction of the price of a real commission? 

There’s a similar issue created by AI text generators, which have advanced to the point that they’re able to create output that’s impressive to the point of alarming many. A recent Atlantic article told the story of a UK professor who used OpenAI technology to generate an entire essay from a prompt…and would have given it a good grade. 

If students employ this technology, do they ever really learn the essential skill of writing? Writing is how we teach children to think critically, to develop arguments – and if they can input a prompt into a computer program, doesn’t that change the fundamental structure of…the entire educational system? It’s a mind-bending problem for sure, and absolutely suggests that the relationship between AI and human art in all forms needs to be addressed…but it’s also more layered than just “AI bad.” 

Take the argument of Virginia Heffernan. In the excellent book “Magic and Loss” – Heffernan holds that changes of this sort (to be clear, she wasn’t talking about AI specifically, or AI art), aren’t inherently “good” or “bad” – they’re just…what’s next. 

Emojis and emoticons are essentially now accepted as a sort of hieroglyphic form of written language. And remember how the early users of cameras feared that the technology was in a way stealing their souls? Who’s to say that the new AI technology won’t open doors for artistic expression and experience far beyond what we know today? 

Alternatively, who’s to say it won’t just take over the world, Terminator style?