Computer Aided Ideation, CAI

Most post-modern architecture, arguably, couldn’t have been designed or built without the computer. But computing goes beyond the purely technical aspects of design. As exemplified by Guggenheim Bilbao, the computer was harnessed to create a "stirring emotional experience". What does this mean for producing inspirational and transformational ideas? Will computers in the future by-pass the human creative process of ideation?

If ideation can be seen as a form of human dialogue, then the challenge for ideation by computer is revealed in the difference between "stateless" and "stateful" conversation, as found in research on artificial intelligence and cognitive science.

In a "stateless" conversation, each question and answer is self-contained, providing its own context and responding only to the immediately previous remark.

In contrast, human conversation is generally in the "stateful" mode, where each remark and reply builds on the last, creating an accumulation of context in which later remarks gain additional shades of meaning (without this context, an eavesdropper would find the conversation difficult to understand).

However, humans don't always converse in the stateful mode, and bot programmers (who write software applications that run automated tasks over the Internet) explicitly try to steer the conversation towards the mathematically simpler stateless forms of dialogue.

Brian Christian*, a researcher in the field, describes how he found the chatbots' deliberate attempts to simplify language reminiscent of human conversation at its most lacklustre. Hardly then the mode of conversation that helped create Guggenheim Bilbao.

Christian, B. 2011. The Most Human Human: A Defence of Humanity In The Age Of The Computer. Viking

Why ideation skills matter

In a globalised design industry there's a shift from the maker and the craftsman to the market strategist and the innovator. Designers, then, will have to work as a team with other professionals. But above all, what designers truly get paid for is their creativity and ability to generate ideas. Ideation skills, then, become crucial in order for the team to produce creative solutions for their clients.

Style is substance

Dyson industries, of vacuum cleaner fame, have some 500 mechanical engineers, industrial and product designers working together under one roof where ideas come thick and fast. Yet while Dyson's staff are openly encouraged to pitch ideas, ideation has to be focused, and ideas kept on track.

As a result Dyson's engineers are said to be more interested in how things work than how they look, and claim they never launched anything that doesn't work. Yet while the company admits it has launched some ugly products, Dyson believes that this quest for perfection over style has been crucial to the success of the company.

True, style isn't everything and substance counts for lot. But Dyson could learn from design-driven companies such as Apple that style itself has become a kind of substance.

Ideation for action

Ideation is essentially a reflective activity. After the Eureka! moment, there's is slowing down,
questioning, humbling oneself, constructing, deconstructing, constructing again, patiently
building knowledge and applying it ...