Should artificial intelligence be allowed to create and profit from art without human consent?

AI can now write songs, paint images, and mimic the styles of artists who never gave permission—and it can profit from that work at massive scale.

So here’s the provocation: Is this innovation, or legalized artistic theft?
If art is built on human experience, can a machine claim authorship—or earnings—without consent from the creators it learns from? And when creativity becomes automated, who owns culture: the artist, the algorithm, or the company behind it?

At what point does progress stop inspiring art and start replacing the artist?