AI and the future of music

Music is analyzable as mathematics.
 

yes.  But that does not refute the point that given sufficient processing power, any, and all arrangements of musical notes, in any possible time domain, can be computed, stored and then be used, in the absence of appropriate laws, for copyright lawsuit trolling.  It is the arrangement, and the similarities, between two works that subject the “artists” to copyright suits.

I've always wondered why people put the same tropes on AI as we have as humans. AI wont have to deal with emotions, greed and desires etc.  I'm on the fence weather its actually an issue or not as AI wont be greedy only the humans behind the AI's programing. So AI's primary issue is how humans program it to benefit them. So we are still dealing with Human issues just made simpler/faster/etc. 

Here's what I would be on board with: AI arranging proteins to simulate pork, beef, etc. so we can stop causing so much suffering.

I think for AI to make really meaningful music it'll need to actually comprehend and somehow feel the human experience. If we can make that happen, the we could end up with a real friend who is also amazingly brilliant. I don't think this is going to happen any time soon.

if it [AI] “creates” something pleasing: So what?

One thing I appreciate about music is that it came from another human person. They are communicating something to me.

Consider a world where one does not have actual friends; they have a robot that pleases them. They wind up "pleased" but do they wind up "human"?

I don’t think so. Not where I want to go.

Music is mathematics.

Music is analyzable as mathematics.

It’s also analyzable as physics. As emotion. As gesture. As language.

Reducing it to mathematics is one choice of how to deal with the phenomenon of music. But just one choice of many others.

And even if mathematics -- someone has to do the analyzing, write the algorithms, etc.

I’ve been watching AI generated videos. They’re freaky and hilarious. The AI obviously does not really understand what a face or a hand is, it just calculates statistically what it thinks these things should look like. As Daniel Dennet says, you can sometimes have competence without comprehension. I’m not sure how far this can go before some real comprehension is required. How will we get machines to have "real" comprehension? I guess we’ll have to get a better idea of what that is before we can get the machines to do it.

From what I’ve been reading about animal studies, it seems there has to be an innate expectation of the world pre-written into the mind. They say rats are dreaming about the world before they ever open their eyes and go out and experience it. When they see it, it’s what they’re expecting, with the specific details filled in. So to "comprehend" the situation, the AI needs to be able to look at a picture or video and make some comparison of what’s contained in that data to what it expects the real world to be like. I get the impression that this is extremely complicated. Those who want to reduce consciousness to a simple equation or written statement that can be put on a T-shirt I think are not being realistic. I'm supposing here that consciousness and comprehension of the world and self are closely related.

https://forum.audiogon.com/posts/2582616
 

@mahgister 

Either you missed my point, or more likely I just didn’t articulate it well.

Music, as played by the interpretation of the artist and the inference of the listener through their “world view”, ethics and values, is not what I was trying to describe with respect to creating an “arrangement.”

Just the arrangement of the notes, in any combination, with any set timing pattern, can absolutely be mathematically derived.  As such, given sufficient processing power, storage and time, the entire universe of those arrangements can be calculated and stored and the pattern used in a copyright attempt.  Which is what I find objectionable.
 

More interesting to me,

is it repeatable?

Or is "the best" rendering a moving target?

Interesting thanks..

I never doubt that A.I. will be anything than also a great tool.. Positive and negative...

lIke nuclear energy...

or virus research ...

The problem is our societal immaturity... Too much powerful for us now...

I started a thread on Lalal.ai a while back but it didn't get any traction. That said, it's an excellent example of what can be done with music via AI. It allows you to split vocals from the rest of a track, or turn any vocal track into an instrumental, etc, and allows you to download it in lossless format. It's near perfect, and through my use, I've had great experiences:

https://www.lalal.ai/

Music is and is not mathematic... Sorry for the paradox...

Music as a written or translation of sounds by marks is mathematic..

As a playing live event, it is not...

I will say it in a more deeper way :

Mathematic is music at the end , but music is never only mathematic to begin with ..

Music is linked to non commutative mathematic...And because of this as all musical qualities studied in psycho-acoustic and produced by musicians or by the speaker of any language, are not reducible to sounds in the Fourier meaning window, which is a linear commutative "country", music is related in the many culture and in Europe to ethical and esthetical FREE CHOICES that reflect and depict human evolution in a non linear Non Fourier way in a time dependant domain... ( mathematic is time independant )

History of music is anything but a meaningless history...Every choices in music reflect deep meanings at ALL LEVELS of thinking..

Then A. I. will be able to create and imitate any sounds existing, musical one included... But there will be there no ethical and no esthetical reflected choices... This history will disapear under "pleasurable meaningless imitated sounds "...

Most people are unable to read music as ethical and esthetical history... The Choices of Beethoven are meaningful even philosophically for the HUMAN RACE... not for a machine...

Imitation will kill creativity...

«Music is a NEW mathematic who wrote itself spontaneously through the gesturing producing and receptive body »-- Anonymus African musician dancing while playing Yoruba talking drum...

Music can be analyzed via mathematics, but it is not math.

Music is mathematics.

Anything based on mathematics of discrete values can be computed.

AI could, in theory, compute all possible values of arrangements of those discrete units (notes and their timing).
Of the “songs” created, some will be pleasing, most will probably be displeasing, and still others will be the computed duplicate of music already created.

Probably don’t even need AI, just a really good background in music theory and requisite skill with a chosen programming language. AI will just make it easier for the … less skilled, to be able to implement “copyright” monopoly and copyright litigation farming.

Though, if AI were creating movies, maybe it could be taught to NOT create so many duplicate, derivative, boring and bland “rewrites” or “reimagining” of past works that do nothing more than change the sex, gender or skin color of the characters.

great post thanks...

Just a word about Hinton : he is not a science fiction writer...

I thought the 60 minutes AI segment was very good. The science fiction crowd will focus in on the destruction on mankind, while the science crowd will cheer the ability to perform 1 billion PHD man hours of research in a week.

Exactly right because apart from the spiritual stakes in this game, there is a power stakes, and we know what big corporations annihilated  freedom in the last three years...

Imagine now they control A. I. ?

do you trust the like of Bill Gates ?

I dont think so... As i say i am optimistic... Criminal corparations will cease to exist in thirty years... If not we will all die..

The sad reality is that the criminal element will always exploit any advancement in technology to their advantage and our detriment. The future will be different but that doesn’t always mean better?

Do you think Geoffrey Hinton quit his job at  Google for fun ? Hinton was the genius , the man who designed this neural networks thirty years ago as they are now , do you think he quit his job and speak that A. I. is a danger for us all for  the thrill of making the news ; do you think he think as you  : " i am good with that, because A. I. was invented by people" ?

😊

Just because AI can create music or other art does not necessarily mean it will be good or popular. But if some of it is, I’m good with that; after all, AI was invented by people.

I thought the 60 minutes AI segment was very good.  The science fiction crowd will focus in on the destruction on mankind, while the science crowd will cheer the ability to perform 1 billion PHD man hours of research in a week.  This morning I was reading of some lawsuits launched against Meta and Google for copywrite infringement  as material has been absorbed, incorporated and copied by the AI learning process.  Interesting arguments.  The sad reality is that the criminal element will always exploit any advancement in technology to their advantage and our detriment.  The future will be different but that doesn't always mean better?

Just because AI can create music or other art does not necessarily mean it will be good or popular. But if some of it is, I'm good with that; after all, AI was invented by people. 

I meant as a consumer of music, the origin of the music doesn’t much matter from an enjoyment of the sound.

But the rest of the post was my critique of AI from an ethical, and practical, standpoint.

Very interesting posts...Thanks ...

The most important line:

That would destroy any the ability of any human to create and copyright their own music.

But you forgot to say that in music , apart of being a manufactured product, than in spite of what you said :

if it “creates” something pleasing: So what?

Classical music history reflect ethical values choices not only esthetical one, in an history where is revealed human consciousness history through choices and meanings.. Indian music, persian music, african music , european music, jazz music etc ... it is called education through music...

People wil be transformed tomorrow in pleasurable seeker of sound manufactured soft or hard hearing orgasm WITH NO MEANINGS out of a stimulis set ..

"meaning is history "--- a Goethe disciple know or Collingwood disciple..

Machine had no "history" save thermodynamical and algorythmical timing and implemented design progress...

Shrug.

if it “creates” something pleasing: So what?

However, no AI generated music should be copyrightable.

I wouldn’t take an AI too long, relatively speaking, to create music scores that cover every way to put notes together in a “song”.

That would destroy any the ability of any human to create and copyright their own music.

”AI, create 3 minute audio tracks, different from each other, that covers every permutation of arranging notes within each file”.

AI, remove all 3 minute files with more than an 80% match to existing copyrighted music files (reference allmusic or some such) “

AI — send all remaining files to US copyright office under {this name}.

AI —build list, and update list, from copyrights granted from US Copyright office.

AI — monitor all released music tracks, compare against granted copyright list.

AI — forward all matches from last statement to {my troll lawyer firm} and send out the standard form to {new music author} informing them of copyright breach.

profit.

And actually, those copyrights could be sought in any country… or all countries, then suit brought in whichever country I could pay to grant the copyrights…

bah.. change the logic a little..

AI — md5 hash all copyrighted music files referenced by one or more places like allmusic.. or just copyright offices.

then do the build files, but drop any that match the hashes from the step above.

It is a fork path in the road for us all ...

Humanity is not socially mature and cannot use these tools without self destruction..

Any other perespective is driven by money and power hubris..

The musical creative context problem is secondary...Human want to be machine now, not male one or female one , only the perfect machine one ...

The corporate monsters controlling people want it because they will "control" it for their own interests...big pharma and big A. I. companies , military industrial complex are all driven by only one money pocket with three names , one is Blackrock.. It is not conspiracy "theory",it is trivial fact... Russia and China said no, thanks... it is not good or evil, it is stupid against more wise...

Average dude is unable to understand the maths behind A.I. and even his creators as Hinton, who know the math, underestimated human creativity and spiritual power completely ...Most engineers confuse spirit with I.Q. and confuse "soul" with "brain"... Even our brain dont work as a mere neural network... See Penrose and Hameroff..

Machine access all the internet in second, we can acess universal memory field but we must learn it before we let our body on the floor .. Machine cannot link to universal memory... ( the skelton schematics of the universal memory is hidden behind the prime numbers distribution dynamic music see Alain Connes " the music of shape " conference a the genius founder of non commutative geometry )

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z52ZAPrRbqE&t=479s

Contrary to what engineers falsely claim , we are immortal spirit and any machine will die in a finite amount of time : one thousand years or one million years, it is the same...A short life indeed...  😊

For musicians who sell music for a living for films, youtube, or for companies, they will loose their jobs as my translator friend loose it long time ago for mechanical translation...

Transhumanism is a religion and growing faster than traditional religion but mainly among ignorant crowds and among low level scientists workers ..

i am optimist for the next century, not fo the next 30 years... As any old grumpy man because they always miss half of the story to tell... After all, i am one now at 72... 😁

«Any machine or any man is a borrowed spirit with no soul said my divorced wife»-- Groucho Marx 🤓

«Our mother know better, they birth us»--Chico Marx anthopologist 😎

«Is there out in space a mother civilization ?»-- Harpo Marx reading comic books😎

«Why not a twin or a wife or a husband civilization to ours ? » Gummo Marx reading the same comic book🙃