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Because familiarity is what we perceive as attractive.

And AI is an amalgam of what is familiar.

We stared into the uncanny valley and realised it was us who were uncanny.

Was gonna say the same thing a different way... The ai was trained to look for certain features, and then artificial faces are generated to have those things, so it makes sense in a way.

The uncanny man can.

I just assume everything is fake

That kind of makes sense. Artificial faces are designed to look as much like real faces as possible. Real faces can diverge from what is typically seen as a ‘real’ face

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If solipsism is philosophically naïve, then I'd contend that this take is, too.

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So do the artificial faces.

You can see the GAN faces they used at thispersondoesnotexist.com (unfortunately, you have to refresh each time to see a new one).

The real ones were taken from this dataset.

We also perceive attractive people as more trustworthy and comforting, even as babies.

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I would like to add a counterpoint: namely, that AI is not an amalgamation of what is familiar, because familiarity to humans is a result of a whole host of cognitive biases. An AI probably takes more factors/features into account than a human would if he were given the same task (to create a realistic face). But I don't know exactly how the model was trained, so it's all conjecture.

This is the first AI related headline to scare me

Yeah but when a GAN face diverges it is seen as a failure and the system learns from that. When a real face diverges it isn’t a failure it’s just a face

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I take it the uncanny valley hypothesis is dead now, and nobody noticed.

What's your source for how the researchers trained these models, specifically?

It’s just part of my general knowledge of how GANs work I don’t have a source, I could be wrong

In the article, they mention that they specifically selected faces that look as real as possible, without any visual errors, because they were interested in images that would likely be used in advertising and propaganda. It doesn't really test whether any randomly generated face would work, but whether one selected by a person for use in public messaging would. Seems like there's still plenty of room for error in the randomly generated faces though.

This could distortion our perception of real attractiveness and would worsen the beauty standards and expectations in, for example, online dating, which is already terrible for many. I think individual mental health crisis, especially among teens and youngs, will further deteriorate.

We...were uncanny, not "us...were uncanny."

I honestly think this is just about the stupidest thing these people could be working on.

Love that site. Discovered it a year or two back. It can give you some real Cronenberg's sometimes

Well if that’s the case it’s kind of obvious. Faces selected to be presented as real by a human are more likely to be perceived by a human as real

It will not be the last.

Here comes the AI fear mongering again

I don’t let myself buy into any of that kinda stuff, this is the first time where I’ve been legitimately spooked a bit though

Back in the early 1990s, if I remember correctly, there was a study published, which found that political cartoon drawings of politicians, say Bill Clinton, Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, & Gorbachev, were more readily identifiable by the public than actual photos. The exaggerated, trivial line drawings communicated more decisive information to prompt correct responses from average viewers.

Also see: Truth is stranger than fiction

I have Prosopagnosia. Try me, scientists!

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Yes. There's a LOT of implications this can have.

Though it is worth noting that they also studied people with diagnoses that can affect the results but that makes far less catchy of a headline.

"More human than human"

Reminds me of the short story, “The Real Thing”.

Solipsism is a pretty solid argument. It just doesn't mesh well with free will. We're all just dissolving chemicals perceiving the world through a single uniform experience. We just can't communicate we're the same because no matter what medium we try to communicate the message with, we affect part of the chemical now. No matter what, the message deviates into the environment and either vibrates into a disagreement or vibrates into a perfect hive mind. (Disagree with me, I dare you)

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It showed a picture of a little boy and all I could think was "where are the bruises, this is clearly fake". Grew up with 3 brothers and now 2 little boys of my own, they are never without bruises or marks of some kind. Boys are hellions.

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My favorite is http://thiscatdoesnotexist.com

Didn’t realise my English teacher was on Reddit

I see so many filters on social media, this makes a lot of sense.

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They really skip bush the elder

Banach-tarsky paradox

the tagline should be 'more real than real'

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So, “AI is better able to recognize things made by AI?” Kinda a no-brainer.

It’s sort of a short cut.