Institute for Creativity and AI

Bringing both these themes of creativity and new tech together is the job of the newly inaugurated Institute for Creativity and AI (ICAI), based at City & St George's, University of London.

Working collaboratively across all the specialisms of the university's six schools - The City Law School, School of Health & Psychological Sciences, Bayes Business School, the School of Communication & Creativity; the School of Science & Technology; and the School of Policy & Global Affairs - ICAI has three main goals:

1. Understand current creative work challenges in presence of AI technologies
2. Research and develop new co-creative AI tools to augment work in different professions
3. Investigate how AI will impact these professions and their organisations

"If thinking happens when we're writing,

and we get rid of the writing -

what happens to the thinking?"

Dr Richard Banks, Principal Design Manager, Microsoft Research UK

At the launch event for the Institute, Microsoft's Dr Richard Banks, discussed thinking as an intrinsic activity for human cognition. "If thinking happens when we're writing, and we get rid of the writing - what happens to the thinking?" he asked, as part of his demonstration into the types of activities that he and his team are working on at Microsoft to develop apps that support human creative thinking.

The Director of the new Institute, Professor Neil Maiden said that the ICAI will provide a space to collaborate, where academics, researchers and businesses can exchange ideas, and explore challenges and opportunities.

In addition, working across the breadth of the university enables the development of more ambitious interdisciplinary research proposals, that can attract increased grant funding. And, in turn, this ambitious research should be able to deliver impact in the important field of creative work via AI, both nationally and internationally.

"How we grasp the immense potential of artificial intelligence across key sectors, and negotiate the tests it puts forward" Maiden said, "will determine how we create then innovate to improve business growth, education, healthcare, journalism, law and many other sectors for generations to come".

Read more about the launch of the Institute here

Visit the homepage of the Institute for Creativity and AI

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