Computers are instruments like anything else.
Except when in the rare instance of actually recording to tape, even the rawest rock and roll band nowadays is going to use computers in the the mixing, recording, and mastering stages.
So computers are instruments. They take skill and learning to operate. I don't think that really gets to what most people in the debate are really meaning to say.
There is a huge difference between mixing/recording/mastering music with a computer and generating the music itself with a computer. A computer can't swing, or for that matter rock. Those algorithms have not been written, nor will they be.
Many people have no problem with that. That's OK. People will like what they like, it has ever been thus. The more a computer is involved in the actual generation of the music and rhythm itself, however, the less I tend to like it. This is not confined to the specific technology of computers, the same negative effect can be produced by analog post-production methods that wring every last bit of imperfection and humanity out of a performance.
But that's just me.
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