Thirteenth International Conference on Design Principles & Practices

Abstract

Artificial intelligence (AI) researchers are investigating the use of AI for design, or computer co-creation with human users, in fields as diverse as typography, musical composition, video advertisements, and fashion. In popular design articles, writers dismiss the idea that current AI can replace designers, but advocate that designers learn to use AI-based tools. The dismissals are often vague, and fail to address what it is designers do that AI cannot. In a USA Today article published on February 9, 1996, then reigning world champion Garry Kasparov predicted that if a computer could beat him, “it would threaten the existence of human control in such areas as art, literature or music.”[5] The next day, IBM’s Deep Blue beat Kasparov, but ultimately lost the match. By May 1997, Kasparov lost his rematch to an upgraded Deep Blue. The same article touts “creativity, intuition and experience” as Kasparov’s potential advantages over Deep Blue’s artificial intelligence (AI). Multiple articles leading up to Kasparov’s ultimate defeat singled out human “creativity” as the factor that might give him an advantage[6,7,8]. However, even creativity researchers have trouble defining creativity.[9,10,11] Rather than discuss the issue of AI replacing human workers, this paper returns to Kasparov’s prediction that AI will become dominant in creative fields. We investigate existing AI approaches as conceptual tools to define creativity as it relates to design, and attempt to map the uniquely human (and potentially non-computable) areas of design from philosophical and social psychology perspectives.