Even more impressive, the AI revolution is now becoming creative. From artists to writers, these neural networks are starting to properly understand the complexity and fine detail that goes into creating a piece of artwork or writing a book.

As shown in the image above, AI-enthusiast Robbie Barrat has begun feeding machine learning software with examples of paintings in the hopes that the AI will be able to generate its own, unique paintings. Clearly, his work has been a major success. So much so that Barrat believes, "AI is going to be one of the larger art movements of this century. It just has really great untapped potential." (For other examples, check out CloudPainter.)

And then we have writing (my own profession). While I may find some discomfort in the idea that AI may take over my job someday, it's still fascinating to see it in action. Back in 2016, when an AI was tasked to help a team of humans write a short novel, it nearly won a Japanese literary contest. In fact, it was merely "one of 11 AI-authored submissions to the third-annual Hoshi Shinichi Literary Award."

They're not stopping there. Just last month, it was announced that a copyright-free children's book that was making its debut was actually co-written (and co-illustrated) by AI. Titled Emma on Atlantic, this book became the creative culmination of an AI being taught "basic grammar and cadence on the mechanics of writing using a corpus of 10,000 children’s books." The book is completely free and available to download here.

While there is still plenty of room within the liberal arts for humans to thrive in, it's pretty clear that this may not be true in the coming decades. Already, AI and robotics are beginning to take over several different professions within the liberal arts, making each profession far less human-reliant and far more accustomed to the future of proliferated automation.

How we might address such issues is still up for debate, but solutions are needed, and quickly. And if you seriously believe that your own profession isn't in danger of being taken over by AI, you might want to look at where AI is already taking over and ask those unemployed if they, too, believed they were safe. They weren't, and neither are you!

What do you think?