AI, Art & Neuroscience
By Aylin Altuntas; Founder @AA Executive Consulting, Board Member @Future Conferences
Technology continues to speed up, although sector leaders advise slowing down since humans cannot keep up with the pace. Recently Elon Musk’s brain-chip firm received approval from FDA to conduct its first tests on humans. Musk aims to treat Alzheimer’s and dementia, and spinal cord diseases and claims that visually disabled people will be able to see.
Denmark’s Prime Minister gave a speech at the Parliament prepared by ChatGPT last month. You may ask your chatbox to write you a poem about winter in the style of Shakespeare and the result is:
‘…..
Thou bringeth short days and long nights,
And blankets the earth and white
Thou doth make the landscape bright,
But also doth hinder sight
Yet despite thy bitter cold,
Thou art a thing of beauty
Thy snow-covered trees do unfold,
A wonder for all to see….’
Who would ever think AI would enter the world of art and literature? Chatbox about it: “Chat GPT is a program where users can type in a question or a task, and the software will come up with a response designed to mimic a human. It was trained using billions of examples of text across the Internet. One of the key features that sets it apart is that it can understand and generate natural language. This means that it can provide natural and conversational responses, making it a valuable tool for a wide range of applications.”
ChatGPT is an artificially intelligent chat robot that understands human language and forms human-like texts. Designers, storytellers, translators, researchers, or any other professional related to creativity have already started using it. You may ask AI to write you a poem, a novel, a letter, a column, or an academic paper and ask it to translate it. ChatGPT has read all of Wikipedia and, from beginning to end, what exists on the Internet until 2021. There is a language model with 175 billion probability and parametric statistics, which enables to process billions of words in one second… Ups, it may have raised the bar for us all!”
Although problems such as plagiarism, academic theft, and the poorness of legislation related to data collecting and use have not been adequately solved, the usage of AI apps is rapidly increasing, with Technology Companies dominating all other sectors. (Is it because the USA is the primary exporter of AI?)
On the people’s side, there is a leap in understanding how the human brain works under the latest developments in neuroscience. For Business Management, the more we learn about the brain, the more we favor developing Emotional Intelligence. A higher EQ with better self-consciousness and empathy leads to balanced decision-making and a more peaceful life. Art, not necessarily being an artist, is a way to develop Emotional Intelligence, which I also use as a tool in my coaching sessions with Managers and Senior Executives. By forming a unique training program for business people in The Wall Art Gallery in İstanbul this year, I am trying to embed art into my Managerial Skills Training to increase agility, emotional resilience, creativity, motivation, stress management and change adaptability.
Neuroscience News published a new study by Turku University from Finland investigating how visual art affects our emotions. The findings reveal how the aesthetic experience can impact the body’s emotional response. The research subjects viewed different artworks and described the feelings the art stimulated in their bodies.
The researchers recorded the subjects’ eye movements while they viewed the art. In addition, the subjects assessed what kind of emotions each piece of art evoked. Viewing the art evoked many different kinds of feelings and emotions in people. Even though many of the pieces handled sad or scary topics, the emotions that the people experienced were mainly positive.
“The bodily sensations evoked by art also contributed to the emotions: the stronger the body’s reaction was to the artwork, the stronger were the emotions experienced by the subject,” says Professor Lauri Nummenmaa from the Turku PET Centre at the University of Turku.
“The human emotions presented in art pieces can be absorbed by the viewer unnoticed, through so-called mirroring,” says Academician Riitta Hari from Aalto University.
Altogether 1,186 people from different countries participated in the study and they assessed the emotions evoked by over 300 artworks. The research was conducted with online surveys and eye movement recordings in the laboratory.
The results suggest that our bodies significantly affect the aesthetic experience. Bodily sensations can draw people to art: art evokes feelings in the body, and such stimulation of the body’s pleasure centers feels pleasant to the viewer. “This is why the emotions and bodily sensations evoked by art can be used, for example, in mental health rehabilitation and care,” Professor Nummenmaa recounts.
info@aaexecutiveconsulting.com
References:
1. ‘Can the New AI tool ChatGPT Replace Human Work?, Nisha Patel, CBC News
2.‘Chat GPT’ Emel Mizrahi, Şalom Magazine, March 2023
3. www.neurosciencenews.com, ‘Art Evokes Feelings in the Body’,
Turku University
