In a landscape saturated with hot takes on artificial intelligence, this piece stands out by refusing to ask whether AI art is "good" and instead asking why we instinctively recoil from it. Jimmy Alfonso Licon, a philosophy professor at Arizona State University, argues that our disdain isn't just about aesthetics; it's a collision between our evolutionary wiring and the metaphysical reality of what art actually is. He brings a rare dual-lens approach, merging evolutionary biology with metaphysics to explain why a perfect digital copy feels hollow compared to a human-made original.
The Evolutionary Handicap
Licon begins by dismantling the idea that we value art solely for its beauty. He posits that art is a "fitness display," a costly signal of intelligence and creativity that humans have used for millennia to attract mates and cooperation partners. "Artistic creation and appreciation are often costly in time, energy, material investment, and foregone opportunities," he writes, noting that evolution abhors waste. If art were just about the final image, we wouldn't care who made it. But we do.
The author draws a sharp parallel to the animal kingdom to illustrate this point. "The analogy to the bowerbird is deliberate: male bowerbirds construct elaborate and decorative structures to advertise their suitability as mates," Licon explains. The effort itself is the message. When we watch a live performance despite a movie being technically superior, we are reacting to the "handicap" of the live act. "With such little margin for error, the results are that much more impressive," he notes, quoting Simler and Hanson. This framing is powerful because it explains the irrationality of our preferences: we aren't just consumers of images; we are evaluators of human capacity.
The link between output and underlying human traits is weakened. The elaborate equivalence between difficulty and value collapses.
Here, Licon identifies the core threat of generative AI. When a machine can produce a masterpiece in seconds, the "cost" of creation drops to zero. If anyone can generate a sophisticated image, the image no longer signals the creator's intelligence or endurance. The signal is broken. Critics might argue that this view reduces art to a mere biological transaction, ignoring the genuine emotional resonance a viewer feels regardless of the creator. However, Licon's point is that the value we assign to the work, distinct from the feeling it evokes, is inextricably tied to the effort behind it.
The Metaphysics of Thickness
Moving beyond biology, Licon introduces "thickness theory," a metaphysical framework that argues an artwork's history is part of its identity. He challenges the notion that a perfect replica is equivalent to the original. "Suppose a perfect replica of the Mona Lisa could be produced, an atom for atom copy of the original," he writes. "If art were solely a matter of intrinsic, sensory properties, the replica would have the same value as the original." Yet, as he points out, people would still choose the ashes of the original over the perfect copy.
This preference reveals that art is not just a cluster of sensory data. "On the thick conception of art... the extrinsic properties of artworks constitute a significant part of their value," Licon argues. These properties include the specific causal chain that brought the work into being. The original Mona Lisa is valuable not just because it looks a certain way, but because it was painted by Leonardo da Vinci in a specific time and place. "Perfect replicas, no matter how exact, simply lack that history," he states. This is a crucial distinction: the value isn't just in the signal of the artist's skill, but in the physical and historical reality of the object itself.
Their inferiority is an metaphysical fact: they lack important extrinsic properties.
Licon suggests that intrinsic features like color and shape are easy to reproduce, which is why their marginal value diminishes quickly. In contrast, the extrinsic dimension—the story, the struggle, the specific moment of creation—remains scarce. This explains why the art world is so resistant to AI; it isn't just that AI makes art "easier," but that it severs the connection between the object and the human agent. A counterargument worth considering is whether digital art, which has no physical "original" in the traditional sense, can ever possess this thickness. Licon implies that even digital works derive value from the specific intent and history of their creation, but the ease of replication makes this history harder to verify and protect.
The Collapse of Agency
The synthesis of these two theories provides a coherent explanation for the current cultural anxiety. The signaling theory explains why we care about the creator's effort, while thickness theory explains what the artwork actually is. "The emergence of AI makes clear that they address different aspects of art appreciation," Licon writes. By collapsing the cost of generation, AI doesn't just flood the market with images; it fundamentally alters the metaphysics of art appreciation.
As the cost of generating art approaches zero, the ability to distinguish between a human agent and a machine algorithm vanishes. "When an impressive result no longer indicates time, training, or talent, those qualities cease to be reliably inferable from the artifact," he observes. This creates a crisis of trust. If we cannot tell the difference, or if we know the difference but the "signal" is cheapened, the entire ecosystem of art valuation shifts. The author concludes that this isn't just a technological disruption but a philosophical one that forces us to re-evaluate what we think we are buying when we buy art.
Bottom Line
Licon's strongest contribution is the integration of evolutionary signaling with metaphysical thickness, offering a robust defense of human artistry that goes beyond nostalgic complaints about "soulless" machines. His argument is vulnerable only in its potential dismissal of art that is purely conceptual or collaborative, where the "handicap" of individual effort is less relevant. The reader should watch for how institutions adapt to this new reality: if the signal of human effort is broken, the market will likely invent new, more expensive ways to verify authenticity, turning "human-made" into the ultimate luxury good.