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A X/Twitter screenshot that reads:
Pope Leo XIV @Pontifex: In this era of artificial intelligence, it is becoming urgent to distinguish human art from what machines produce. There is an ontological difference, even before an aesthetic one, between art and what a machine can generate through statistical calculation based on millions of images created by others. Algorithms lack the spark of humanity. For this reason, the Church wishes to renew an alliance with artists and cultural institutions to safeguard our humanity.
Spectro @Spectromachina: Pope, would you please shut the fuck up about matters you do not understand? You’re not an Ai influencer, no one elected you, and you have absolutely no weight in this debate and you’re being used as a mouthpiece to sway public opinion. how many local models do you run?
You can hate on the church for many things, but you can’t deny that they’ve been one of the art world’s biggest patrons for thousands of years.
Well that’s mainly because of all the satan statues they commission being too sexy—leading them to have to pay a new artist to tone it down. Except the new statue comes out even sexier, leading them to commission a new artist to…
To be fair, they patronized artists from tithes collected from the population. So it’s hard to say how much art didn’t happen because there was less free time available.
It’s like how Rockefeller got a plaza named after him for his philanthropy after being a monopolist. We see the help they did but what was lost is invisible.
No matter how much I abhor the bs that comes with it, I can still find myself in some awe in a grand cathedral. At least I can attribute that to something someone did with their hands, and not a raindrop in a cloud of staggering uncare spewing forth into the mouths of people who aren’t interested in tasting the slopfest
Makes sense as a lot of religious influence came from their ability to awe people and inspire deep emotions. It’s why for hundreds of years they had a monopoly on music being performed.