Tony McCaffrey

By Tony McCaffrey

In order to maximize creative behavior, humans and computers need to collaborate in a manner that will leverage the strengths of both. A 2017 mathematical proof shows two limits to how innovative a computer can be. Humans can help counteract these demonstrated limits. Humans possess many mental blind spots to innovating (e.g., functional fixedness, design fixation, analogy blindness, etc.), and particular algorithms can help counteract these shortcomings. Further, since humans produce the corpora used by AI technology, human blind spots to innovation are implicit within the text processed by AI technology. Known algorithms that query humans in particular ways can effectively counter these text-based blind spots. Working together, a human-computer partnership can achieve higher degrees of innovation than either working alone. To become an effective partnership, however, a special interface is needed that is both human- and computer-friendly. This interface called BrainSwarming possesses a linguistic component, which is a formal grammar that is also natural for humans to use and a visual component that is easily represented by standard data structures. Further, the interface breaks down innovative problem solving into its essential components: a goal, sub-goals, resources, features, interactions, and effects. The resulting human-AI synergy has the potential to achieve innovative breakthroughs that either partner working alone may never achieve.

Part of the book: Artificial Intelligence