Comment by conartist6
4 days ago
I don't really understand. You think these great minds of writing lacked same level of linguistic capability as a model?
The authors were language models! If you want to simulate what they could have done with a model, just train a model on the text that was around when they were alive. Then you can generate as much text as you want that's "the same text they would have generated if they could have" which for me is just as good, since either way the product is the model's words not the artist's. What you lost that fascinates you is the author's brain and human perspective!
No, quite the opposite, apologies if I was unclear.
I think that LLMs are a tool, and a tool that is still in the process of being iterated on.
I think that how this new tool could be applied and iterated on by humans who were, I think, uniquely talented and innovative with language is a useful question to ask oneself.
It’s a rhetorical device, essentially, to push back against the idea that the sanctity of ‘the novel’ (or other traditional, non-technological, word-based art forms) would somehow be punctured if innovative artists were / are given access to new tools. I feel that idea devalues both the human artist (who has agency to choose which tools to use, how to use them, and how to iterate on those tools) and the form itself.
I don’t believe that anyone who really adores ‘the novel’ for its formal strengths can also believe that ‘the novel’ won’t withstand [insert latest technology, cinema, VHS, internet, LLMs, etc].