• roscoe@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    6 months ago

    I’m not balking at communicating what I think the line is, either by trying to define it or by listing some things on one side and some on the other, because it’s hard, although it is. I’m not doing it for two main reasons, no one else should give a damn what my line is and I wouldn’t want to list a book that I thought was shallow fun when someone else could have related to it in a profound way. I don’t want to shit on someone else’s experiences.

    I think your being dishonest and pretentious when you say the line doesn’t exist. Plenty of books I’ve read lately, and enjoyed enough I’m looking forward to the next things from those authors, are not in the same league as things I would consider art. This is true for all forms of art/media. Jerry Springer is not art like (insert what you think is the best expression of art on the small screen here). Battlefield Earth is not art like (insert whatever you think fits here). Are you seriously going to try and pull some smug insufferable “everything is art” bullshit here?

    I never said there is anything wrong with a good translation even though it obviously can’t be perfect and something is almost certainly lost. My French is never going to be good enough to read Camus, so I have to settle for a translation.

    But that’s not how this started. Before you started your “the line doesn’t exist”, “Shakespeare is overrated”, “aren’t I just so smart” auto-fellatio session, you defended butchering art with ai in the name of allowing ESL students to read it.

    No one who wants anything more than an entertaining read should use this, ESL or otherwise. If you’re going to read something with the hope that it’s more than just entertainment, you should try to avoid any further opinions or analysis on it, avoid TV or movie adaptions, not read the Cliff’s notes, and not use this fucking app. If you’re going to use the app, use it for something you don’t expect to get anything more than a bit of fun out of. And if you think you’ll never have the necessary level of mastery, or just don’t want to wait, find a good translation.

    Using this app on anything you would consider art is indefensible. I have a hard time believing this is anything more than you being bored and feeling contrary.

    • Captain Aggravated
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      6 months ago

      Are you seriously going to try and pull some smug insufferable “everything is art” bullshit here?

      No, I’m more saying that “art” has no useful or stable definition especially as you are trying to use the word, to contrast “just entertainment” from “real art.” I don’t believe a line can be meaningfully drawn between those because lots of creative works have found themselves on both sides of that line depending on when they are in time.

      Using Shakespeare as an example, he and his actors thought they were making plays that would be enjoyed by the few hundred or maybe few thousand people who would show up to the Globe theatre during the few weeks they were performing a particular play, and then never again. They weren’t setting out to make immortal classics for the ages and none of them lived to see that take place. When did Shakespeare’s plays become “real art?”

      I don’t think JRR Tolkien intended people to take The Hobbit as seriously as they do today.

      George Lucas didn’t think he was making a century-defining masterpiece on the set of Star Wars.

      There is nothing preventing a future where massively anachronistic misinterpretations of the shooting scripts for eight episodes of Two And A Half Men become required reading for all teenagers 200 years from now as time transcending, culture defining classics.

      On the other hand, what brilliant works are forgotten because they failed to find an audience in their time, or they became a meme and burned out?

      The only honest criteria you could present to me for what makes “real art” different from “just entertainment” is the court of public opinion, which is subject to change over time. I live in a world where huge budget movies are based on stories and characters that originated in pulp magazines and penny dreadfuls.

      I’m not interested in trying to draw a line between “this is just entertainment, feel free to view this in whatever abridged format you like” and “This is real art, so I demand you undergo whatever effort is necessary to experience it in what I consider to be the original and correct format, I don’t care what your priorities are or how much time and effort you can budget to this project.” I don’t see a functional difference between an individual reading a version of a classic book that has been abridged by AI and watching the relevant episode of Wishbone. There’s someone alive today who only knows The Tempest or Cyrano De Bergerac as the version with a Jack Russell terrier in it. Who are you to say “No that’s not good enough”?

      As long as the original works continue to be available I have no problem with any method of abridging them, and I don’t believe any work is above consuming in abridged format for whatever reason especially on accessibility grounds.