通用人工智能视野下著作权法的逻辑回归——从“工具论”到“贡献论”

以ChatGPT为代表的生成式人工智能的崛起,标志着通用人工智能时代已经悄然而至。学界主流的观点是形式主义的“工具论”,即在AIGC的著作权问题上否认人工智能的主体地位,将其视为人类创作的辅助工具。从功能主义的角度来看,生成式人工智能的著作权问题理应回归至著作权法的规范逻辑。现行著作权法以“独创性表达”这一法律形式构建逻辑严密的理论体系,究竟是谁(人类抑或人工智能)对AIGC的“独创性表达”作出主要贡献,是判断其可版权性及权利归属的关键。在人工智能对AIGC的“独创性表达”作出主要贡献的情况下,如果现有法律或者市场上存在的激励机制足以确保AIGC的持续生成,则法律没有必要对算法所有者、算法设计者以及算法使用者等各环节主体赋予额外的激励机制。通用人工智能时代AIGC应承担的社会功能是,以人机协作的方式,激励人类积极参与作品的创作,并促进作品的利用和传播,从而服务于著作权法改善公共福祉的最终目的。

The rise of generative artificial intelligence,epitomized by ChatGPT,signifies that the era of general artificial intelligence has quietly arrived.The mainstream academic view subscribes to the formalist"instrumentalism theory",which denies the subjective status of AI and regards it as an auxiliary tool for human creativity in the copyright issue of AI-Generated Content(AIGC).From the perspective of functionalism,the copyright issue of generative AI should be anchored in the normative logic of copyright law.The current copyright law develops a logical and coherent theoretical system with the concept of"original expression",and who(human or AI)makes the main contribution to the"original expression"of AIGC is the key to determining its copyrightability and the attribution of rights.In the case that AI makes the main contribution to the"original expression"of AIGC,provided the existing law or the incentives in the market are sufficient to ensure the continuous generation of AIGC,the law doesn't need to provide additional incentives for the algorithm owners,algorithm designers,and algorithm users.The social function that AIGC in the era of general artificial intelligence should assume is to motivate human beings to actively participate in the creation of works using human-computer collaboration,and to promote the utilization and dissemination of works,thus serving the ultimate purpose of copyright law to improve public welfare.