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Why can’t artificial intelligence—AI for short—draw hands, even though it seems capable of depicting everything else? There are various theories on this, some of which are controversial.
Why Can’t AI Draw Hands
For artists, drawing hands is the biggest challenge. So why should it be any different for artificial intelligence (AI)?
- The reason for this is thecomplexity of the anatomyof hands and feet. In every position, there are different creases on the knuckles, and the shading also varies. Therefore, there is no standard set of shapes and lines for the geometry of a hand.
- Added to this is the great diversity of hands and fingers. Geometrically speaking, hands are even more unique than a face, as they contain 30 geometric differences, making it difficult for AI to identify a general rule.
- The AI must compare many hands each time and generates an image based on the characteristics of the compared limbs. That’s why this image might sometimes have 6 fingers and generally looks unrealistic, since the hands were compared in a wide variety of positions.
Conspiracy Theories and Controversies—What If It Can Do It After All?
But there are also crazy theories that range from controversial to downright conspiratorial.
- For example, that by not rendering hands correctly, AI is trying to allay people’s fears that it doesn’t want to take over the world . In other words, it’s just pretending it can’t draw hands.
- Another theory suggests that there aren’t that many images of hands on the internet . This assumption is supported by drawing lessons for beginners, in which people’s hands are usually kept in their pockets because they’re difficult to draw.
- Human perception is said to be responsible for the sensitivity surrounding this topic, because it is precisely with hands that we seem to notice incorrect depictions. With faces, on the other hand, there may be errors that escape our notice.
