Many people see creativity as a mysterious and defining feature of the human mind. From famous artworks to brilliant scientific breakthroughs, our history is built on the foundation of creativity. But what if we’re not the only ones capable of creative intelligence?

In this course, Cambridge philosopher and project leader at the Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence, Marta Halina will explore the definition of creativity and its potential for artificial intelligence. She divides the idea of creativity into two, distinct actions - exploration and employment – and investigates whether animals, machines and even human babies demonstrate this technique. By examining everything from the behaviour of crows to the differences between Chess and Go, Halina attempts to determine whether creativity can be programmed after all.

By the end of the course, you will have learned:

• How our definition of creativity has changed in the last few centuries.
• The difference between the AI Chess champion, Deep Blue and the AI Go champion, AlphaGo.
• Examples of exploration and employment.
• The difference between exploration algorithms such as the Epsilon-Greedy algorithm and the Monte Carlo Tree Search.
• How small children’s creativity differs from adults’.
• The definition of a creative behavioural sequence.

As part of the course there are in-video quiz questions to consolidate your learning and discussion boards to have your say.

IAI Academy courses are designed to be challenging but accessible to the interested student. No specialist knowledge is required.

Marta Halina

Marta Halina works at the University of Cambridge, lecturing in the Philosophy of Cognitive Sciences. Her research focuses on nonhuman animal cognition, mechanistic explanation, and artificial intelligence. She is also the Programme Director at the Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence and a Fellow of Selwyn College. The Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence explores the nature of intelligence through integrating the study of machines, humans and other animals. Marta Halina's recent publications include 'The Limits of Machine Intelligence' and 'The Animal-AI Olympics'.

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• Dennett, D. C., From Bacteria to Bach and Back: The Evolution of Minds, (London: Penguin, 2017).
• Florida, R., The Rise of the Creative Class, (New York: Basic Books, 2002).
• Mitchell, M., Artificial Intelligence: A Guide for Thinking Humans, (London: Pelican, 2019).
• Russell, S., and Norvig, P., Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach, 4th ed., (Hoboken: Pearson, 2020).
• Runco, M. A., and Jaeger, G. J., “The Standard Definition of Creativity,” Creativity Research Journal, 24(1), 92–96 (2012).
• Sawyer, R. K., Explaining Creativity: The Science of Human Innovation, 2nd ed., (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012).