Music with no composer.

What do you as a human think of this piece and indeed of the idea of computers producing original music?

Forum-point-cheat-farmer exposed:

Using only four notes, the AI is just randomly running up and down the scale created by those notes.

Well we certainly aren't ready to replace John Williams but do you think a computer will ever compose popular music?

There are lots of people with drum machines and synths who have no talent but still manage to create "popular" music. All this does is demonstrate there are people with good taste in music, people with bad taste in music and people with no taste in music at all.

While that is a subjective statement I don't suppose I disagree.

I've heard worse. It seems to work on a rudimentary musical level.

Based on that example, it is obviously possible. Given more notes, chords, instruments, music theory to work with, etc. a computer should be able to come up with something decent. Music is an inherently mathematical form of expression. A computer should be able to exploit that effectively.

Possible surely. Do you think a computer will ever compose music that makes people cry?

I don't know about music alone (I've never heard music without lyrics that made me cry) but I'm sure that a computer could eventually produce music combined with a human lyricist/singer that might do the trick.

What do you think?

I think you don't listen to enough classical music. That is pure music and can move people to tears. As for the computer making something that sublime we can only guess right now but it does seem to be moving that direction.

Just out of curiosity, have you ever been moved to tears listening to classical music? Do you personally know anyone who has? I've gotten goosebumps from listening to classical music but not tears. Listening to sad lyrics can turn on the waterworks though.

Yes I have. That is besides the point hiwever since getting goosebumps will do. Do you think a computer will ever compose music that gives you goose bumps?

it is likely that 'goose bump' music tends to have a particular distribution of intervals, discordant harmonies, dynamics and key changes etc.  One can imagine a computer being programmed with such rules and coming up with an effect piece of music, but with no knowledge that it was composing music; that is a parallel to a chess computer that plays at grand-master level but doesn't know it is playing chess.

The other sense of the question is whether a computer can manifest the internal subjective states (emotions?) of a human composer and thus feel the need to express itself through music. 

The difference is the difference between 'Artificial intelligence' and 'Artificial consciousness'.   To achieve the former today would only require a collabortion between an average musicologist and an average computer programmer - we have no idea how to even begin doing the latter.

I had not even considered a computer that knows what music is only one that can create it. I don't know if we can make conciousness. I'm not sure what conciousness even is.

Neither does anybody else!

Well that seems like rather a large stumbling block in the way of creating conciousness. To be honest I'm impressed with the idea of computers producing original music.