My Rhetorical Action Plan

Making the Gameplan: How to Put The "Art" in "Artificial Intelligence"

In this blog post, I will cover three primary areas of my argument's rhetorical situation: its audience, its genre, and its potential effects on the audience. I will detail my responses to provided questions about each of these aspects of rhetorical situation, and thus construct a solid foundation to base my writing of my public argument off of.

R, Greenhill, H. Elias, Shadow Robot Company "The Shadow Robot Hand System" 9 January 2007 via wikipedia.org.
Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-SA 3.0) License.

Audience

• My audience should have a basic level of understanding of what artificial intelligence means (a technology that will lead to intelligent computer systems/robotics capable of carrying out what we consider higher cognitive tasks) and that there is a controversy over the technology's development. Additionally, my audience should, but may not have to, be aware of what the debates for and against AI development have been focusing on: practical applications to fields and industries, control of the technology, its effects on economies. My audience likely will have gained this knowledge from common science websites and magazines like Slate, Wired, Livescience, Discover, and other general information websites than appeal to scientifically-interested audiences. My audience likely will not have considered AI as an artistic medium and will thus not have assessed its artistic value, or may not even consider artistic values much at all. While some of my audience may actually be artists looking into the AI controversy (so they would be the opposite case of the audience stated above), these artists may not have considered AI as a medium for art either, so ultimately I will need to specify how AI could become an art form and present evidence that artists can adapt to new technologies.
• I believe my scientifically-inclined audience will believe that the AI controversy is important and that it is an issue that needs to be discussed today before the development of the technology has progressed too far to change. They may also cling to the regular points of debate of AI - economic impact, feasibility, control - and thus they might believe that AI could be good or bad for those things, and will be fairly new if not totally new to my perspective.
• I think that, given how my argument will be foreign in a sense due to its focus on the art brought forth by a technology, I would do well to include current evidence of artists embracing new technologies to create art. Communicating that video games and robotics have become legitimate forms of art may appeal well to my audience by demonstrating to them that artists are accepting of new technologies and are even eager to work with them to create masterpieces.
• Again, given that my argument will focus on art, I think presenting concrete evidence of current, technologically up-to-date art will show my audience that artists really are using new technologies for their artwork. Additionally, if I could find statistics on artists' usage of digital media versus conventional media, my audience could gain a firm understanding of how new technologies introduce new art media. Lastly, if I could find some visually attractive or vibrant images of artists' renditions of AI, that could serve useful to provide images of the future medium for my audience.
• My audience will be reading my argument for an assessment of current arguments in the AI controversy, followed by my own unique argument about the art that may come from AI technology. Thus, my audience is reading to understand a fresh viewpoint on the issue, and my purpose in arguing to them will be to challenge standing beliefs or perspectives on AI by arguing outside the typical realms of the AI debate. I think my argument could motivate readers who were not reached by the approaches of other arguments on the topic, and if nothing else, will at least provide my audience with a new outlook to ponder.

Genre

• One genre I'm considering writing in for my public debate is an informative opinion article for Future Tense: A Cititzen's Guide to The Future at slate.com. These types of articles have the explicit mission statement of describing how technologies in our current day could impact our futures in meaningful ways, and thus I would be discussing how art might change with the creation of AI technology.
• Here are two examples of this genre:
• Cecilia Tilli's "Striking the Balance on Artificial Intelligence"
• Rhett Larson's article on Mars' newly-found liquid water and how it might be distributed in the future in Martian colonies.
• This genre is designed to increase awareness in readers about how today's technologies will create lasting impacts on our futures, as well as to encourage critical long-term thinking about how our histories will shape over the next few decades. I think this could work well for my argument since I will be discussing how a technology that is estimated to be three decades away will influence the art our world's cultures produce.
• This genre will appear specifically in the Future Tense project between Slate, New America, and Arizona State University, online.
• I don't believe I command enough authority or expertise on the topic to employ many ethos appeals aside from demonstrating my artistic knowledge of new-media artworks. I also could effectively appeal to emotion by discussing the power of art that uses new technologies to inspire, excite, or sadden, which I believe everyone can relate to. Additionally I believe I could explain, through hyperlinks and references to examples, how artists have embraced new technologies and will likely do the same with AI.
• This genre employs few visual elements, as the focus is on the text. The text is organized into medium-length, palpable paragraphs that are not often accompanied by images. The articles do begin with large titles and an image, however. I may also consider including my picture or some by-line element at the end of my article.
• Articles in this genre carry an air of conversation, but generally remain somewhat formal. References to the self are certainly allowed, and are used to illustrate a point, thus creating the conversational feel. However, the articles are not informal in that anecdotes or slang are used, really, and thus the genre consists of a formal, conversational style.

• The other genre I'm thinking about writing in is what I have dubbed "the slideshow article." This genre is essentially a series of images that are accompanied by sections of what reads as an article, but function as captions that speak to a larger story in addition to the image its associated with. I primarily would like to try this genre to organize my argument visually and in easy-to-digest parts, as I could accompany the different elements of my argument with images that match as I ultimately cover how art could change with the introduction accessible AI technology to everyday life.
• Included are two examples of this genre:
• Here is an example of an article that is broken into sections via images that are clicked through about Jason deCaires Taylor's underwater sculptures that act as artificial coral reefs in the Caribbean area.
• Provided here is an article in a series of image captions and pictures that are about biological artwork, which was adapted from a book.
• The genre is designed to inform, visually and through text, the reader/viewer about something going on in the world or a current movement, for instance (see second example provided). As I stated above, I chose this genre for the organizational strength it carries and because it may help convey my art argument visually, which is suiting.
• While I found the examples of this genre on Discover Magazine's online website, which does employ the use of powerful and eye-catching images, I could see this genre appearing in less formal yet informative websites, such as news hubs or the like, which organize articles or images through articles that synthesize different sources to some extent.
• Again, I think I lack proper expertise on the topic and thus cannot appeal to character very much, but I could potentially flex my artistic knowledge to gain credibility with my audience. I think I could also appeal to emotions through deliberate choice of images and including captions that detail the emotional power of art. Lastly, I could potentially include pictures of statistics to appeal to logic but that may ruin the thematic consistency of the images I use, and thus I should limit myself to logical appeals by providing evidence that artists do in fact use and embrace new media.
• As stated above, this genre utilizes large amounts and focus upon images, with the text being more marginal (literally) and the conventions of a typical article being much less present.
• The "slideshow-article" does maintain a formal style that is also academic, but I suppose that could be bent to some degree as the format already is unusual and would lend itself to a more dialogue-oriented argument that carries between captions.

Positive Reactions

Positive reactions I'd like to see emerge from reading my argument:

• An excitement in my audience for AI development and accessibility to the public
• An adoption of artistic thinking when performing critical analyses of new technologies, effectively diversifying views and considerations on the controversy AI, which typically revolves around discussions of responsibility, control, economy, and industry.
• An appreciation in my audience for technologies', both current and futuristic, abilities to provide fresh and powerful artistic options, as well as an awareness of how artists have made various media work for their artistic purposes already 

Negative Rebuttals

Here are negative reactions that could come from reading my argument, and how I might deal with them:

• A claim that energy in contemplating AI technology is misplaced in artistic thinking and not more practical uses
• I could stress that my argument focuses more on what great things people could accomplish with AI and that art is an industry in itself and is not to be ignored or downplayed
• A refutation that art is a legitimate consideration when talking about science and technology
• I would need to adequately display how already artists have taken to new technologies and media to create masterpieces that matter
• A claim that art, although important, doesn't measure up to industrial and economic concerns over AI
• Again, I could stress that art has become a profitable industry made possible by media such as computer and console gaming, electronic sound-boarding for music, etc. to demonstrate that art's direction influences not only culture but economy
• A claim that the art I mention is too far away to discuss
• I could illustrate that scientists think strong AI is only three decades away, which I could relate to the 80s and now to show how new technologies have undeniably shaped our lives today (mobile music devices, bluetooth cars, streaming services, etc.)