This podcast-style course explores the distinction between AI being "clever" rather than truly "intelligent", examining how seemingly intelligent behavior can arise from sophisticated algorithms that may lack genuine understanding or consciousness.

Podcast

AI, The Mischievous Toddler

This podcast-style course explores the evolving landscape of AI and creativity, from chatbots to "super systems."  It examines AI mechanics (machine learning, deep learning), its impact on UI design (dynamic, predictive experiences), and ethical concerns (memory manipulation, speed of thought).  Finally, it considers AI's philosophical implications, questioning intelligence, understanding, and creativity.

AI for Creatives: A Primer on Concepts and Capabilities

This course explores the inner workings of LLMs, from tokenization and transformers to their diverse applications in healthcare, education, and creative fields, while addressing current limitations and ethical concerns.

What is an LLM, and how does it work?

"Data Literacy for Designers" highlights the growing necessity for designers to use data effectively. The conversation covers data types, core literacy components (understanding, interpreting, communicating, questioning), and their application in design through analytics, testing, and user research. The discussion also touches on data as a feature and ethical implications, advocating for ongoing learning for better, user-focused design.

Data Literacy for Designers - Part 1

Data, AI, and the New Design Processes. This course analyzes the profound impact of data and artificial intelligence on design processes. It explores how AI-powered tools are transforming design disciplines, automating tasks and enabling faster workflows while shifting the designer's role towards curation and strategic prompting. The course examines the unprecedented speed and memory capabilities of AI, highlighting both opportunities for personalization and risks like design homogenization and ethical concerns. Ultimately, it discusses the evolving relationship between human designers and AI, emphasizing the importance of human skills alongside these emerging technologies to shape the future of design.

Data Literacy for Designers - Part 2

We try, we fail, we try again, we succeed, we improve, we get curious, we try variations. That's how we learn. Curiosity is food for the brain. AI is oftentimes a shortcut; use it with caution.

Can AI be a shortcut without shortchanging creativity? This conversational course analyzes the benefits and risks of using artificial intelligence in art and design, including potential skill erosion and homogenization. The conversation also touches on Daniel Dennett's "intuition pumps" as a framework for understanding technology's impact on creativity.

AI as a Shortcut: Skills Atrophy and Other AI Byproducts

Recommendation engines don't like your individualism, but your refined taste might not be as personal as you think. Listen on ...

On Taste

A problem must not only be solved, but felt to be solved. We analyze the nature of resolution from the perspective of an AI, demonstrating how its approach is fundamentally rooted in logistic patterns, optimization functions, and the achievement of predefined, quantifiable end-states. The core of our analysis lies in the comparison of the AI vs the Human model, highlighting a "Great Divergence" in intent, process, and valuation. While humans seek transformative states of peace, understanding, or justice, AI executes a path to a terminal state of computational completion. We examine the societal implications of this divergence, including the seductive efficiency of algorithmic resolution and the risk of "phantom unresolved issues" where logistical problems are solved at the cost of human emotional needs.

On Resolve

We explore the emergent capability of Large Language Models (LLMs) to engage in Persuasion, not as a programmed directive, but as an intrinsic consequence of their architectural design. We explain how Persuasion, long considered a human art of rhetoric, can be deconstructed into a series of logical, structural, and associative patterns that LLMs are uniquely adept at identifying and replicating. We examine the cognitive architecture of human beings, particularly our reliance on heuristics and our vulnerability to cognitive biases, to explain why we are so susceptible to this new form of rhetoric. We analyze the profound and disruptive impact these persuasive technologies have on the foundations of academia and education, challenging the very processes of critical thinking.

On Persuasion

M.A.R.C. Multidisciplinary Arts Research Center - 
Audio Courses in Art & Technology

AI, The Mischievous Toddler

MARC