Archinect - News

AI-induced creativity and the novelty dilemma looming over architectural design

2024-08-08T12:23:00-04:00

The impact of Generative AI on human creativity is one of the most observed and debated knock-on effects of users adapting to ChatGPT, Midjourney, and other large language models (LLMs). Now, a new study has shown a "social dilemma" that occurs when creatives are given a choice between AI-assisted prompts, which resulted in better-scoring work that was nevertheless plagued by the question of novelty.

In the views of authors Anil R. Doshi and Oliver P. Hauser from the University of Exeter and University College London (UCL), this dilemma "point[s] to an increase in individual creativity at the risk of losing collective novelty."

What can be gleaned from this study in an architectural sense calls into question many of the basic precepts for augmentation, namely that it affords designers a greater range of ingenuity in terms of form, program, scale, and functional spaces without significant drawbacks. Recently there has been a shift in the zeitgeist that had previously considered the ...

AI models predict the 2024 Pritzker Winner

2024-03-04T08:10:00-05:00

As the architecture community anticipates the official Pritzker Prize announcement this Tuesday, our team at Archinect has been fully immersed in the whirlwind of predictions and speculations. A few days ago we published a roundup of forecasts from the Archinect community, highlighting potential winners such as Moshe Safdie, Barclay Crousse, Eyal Weizman/Forensic Architecture, Thomas Heatherwick, H arquitectes, and Johnston Marklee, to name just a few. This curiosity led to an idea for a fun experiment: consult with various Artificial Intelligence models to gauge their insights on the prestigious award's 2024 recipient. Initiating conversations with four leading LLM models—ChatGPT 4, Google Gemini, Anthropic's Claude 2, and Perplexity—I navigated the sometimes hilariously clumsy, but mostly very interesting "thoughts" from our AI frenemies. Each of the models ended up predicting different winners, but there's a common theme with all of the selections that you'll notice.

I conducted...

'Maurice's Last Shift,' Top Prize winner in Archinect's Generative Futures: An AI + Architecture Storytelling Challenge

2023-07-11T12:00:00-04:00

Maurice's Last Shift by Tim Papienski

Just after dawn, as light rain pattered down on the tarps of the construction site, Maurice stepped gently, trying not to land in the mud. As he passed through the guarded entrance, the banner above proudly proclaimed “847 days without a workplace accident.” Mounted on a pole below, was the ever-present red Stop Work button.

Maurice was a Sensor Jockey. Led a crew of them, in fact. He was retiring after 40 years, and today was his last shift. Maurice has spent his entire working life on jobsites such as this—big, sprawling constructions. He knew everything a person could know.

The jobsite was a repurpose of an abandoned office complex, a mix of apartments, businesses and “Temps.” Maurice headed to the end of the site, the final section block of Temps being printed. The great gantry had been rolled into place, the concrete extruder paused dramatically, like a monk about to illuminate the edges of a medieval bible.

Nobody really knew what wa...

'The Last Flesh and Blood Architect,' Honorable Mention in Archinect's Generative Futures: An AI + Architecture Storytelling Challenge

2023-07-11T12:00:00-04:00

The Last Flesh and Blood Architect by Juan Manuel Prieto

Human-designed and built architecture was dying out. Hans knew this well, for he had followed it all his days, and he clung to it with a love greater than his need. Many times, he had been urged to give up his old-fashioned ways and join the new order of things, where all was done by the cunning devices of the Machine-mind. But he would shake his head and answer that he was content with his own work, and that he could do better than any machine. But this was only half the truth, for he also felt such pride and joy in his work that nothing else could give him. And he feared the day when it would be no more, when the last of his kind would be swept away by the tide of progress.

After months of idleness and nearing the brink of bankruptcy, fortune finally smiled upon Hans. He encountered a group of visionary investors who shared his passion for human touch, for that spark of life in their creations. They presented him with an opp...

'Ignorance to navigate the maelstrom,' Honorable Mention in Archinect's Generative Futures: An AI + Architecture Storytelling Challenge

2023-07-11T12:00:00-04:00

Ignorance to navigate the maelstrom by Mel Lewis

The Earth is a theme park, fully subdued to oblige us… and well our literate animal friends.

Its visual primal beauty, reconstructed from the archeological suggestions of three hundred million years ago, fed into the computer to generate a painted “wilderness” landscape. A museum in total where each printed vegetation is accompanied by a label indicating its year, description, cost, and source. Each biological object is carefully monitored; each dynamic flow of water analyzed; each crop plucked at its opportune moment.

Buildings are now part of a rendered surroundings, where architecture and biology are so intertwined that they can be viewed as a single unified field of experience. Everything is nodes in a network to receive and deliver information, a central nervous system for the planet - wrestling the rhythms of nature.

“Organic interdependence means that disruption of any part of the organism can prove fatal to the whole,” remar...

'Blueprints of Belonging: Architecture in the Age of AI,' Honorable Mention in Archinect's Generative Futures: An AI + Architecture Storytelling Challenge

2023-07-11T12:00:00-04:00

Blueprints of Belonging: Architecture in the Age of AI by Kyle Branchesi

Welcome to the journey of Maria, a young architect, and her AI muse, Calida. Together, they navigate the complex urban landscape of Los Angeles, grappling with a mission far beyond merely building structures. Their quest is to reweave the vibrant cultural tapestry of the city, strained and frayed by relentless forces of gentrification and global homogenization. This is a story about the future of architecture, where AI doesn't replace human creativity but collaborates with it, embracing the community's voice and preserving its rich cultural heritage. This narrative presents a utopian vision of AI as an enabler, an ally, and a force that transforms the architectural profession into a champion of diversity. Explore how the alliance between human sensitivity and AI efficiency can reshape our cities, fostering a built environment that reflects and respects its inhabitants.

Open Air Dialogue: As the sun dips below t...

Archinect's Lexicon: "Hallucination"

2023-06-09T11:22:00-04:00

Archinect's Lexicon focuses on newly invented (or adopted) vocabulary within the architectural community. For this installment, we're featuring a term that has risen to prominence with the advent of generative AI tools such as ChatGPT and DALL-E.

"Hallucination" in the context of artificial intelligence refers to the phenomenon where an AI model generates or interprets something that isn't grounded in the actual input data it was given. This can happen when AI is asked to create content such as text, images, or speech. The AI may infer patterns or details based on its training but doesn't truly comprehend the information it is handling. It can produce results that seem plausible but might not correspond accurately with the provided input or real-world context.

In the field of building design and architecture, AI hallucinations might be relevant in several ways:

Genera...

Archinect's Lexicon: "Prompt Engineer"

2023-05-19T09:00:00-04:00

A "Prompt Engineer" is a professional who specializes in crafting and designing effective prompts to guide the behavior of artificial intelligence models, such as GPT-3 and GPT-4, or to facilitate cognitive engagement in learning environments or user interfaces. In the context of AI, this role entails understanding the intricacies of the AI model's responses and being able to strategically design prompts that elicit the desired output. They study the pattern of the AI's responses, tweak the wording, tone, or structure of prompts, and keep iterating until the model's output aligns with the expected or desired response. This role requires a deep understanding of natural language processing, AI model behavior, and human psychology to effective...

Boston Dynamics’ robot dog Spot equipped with ChatGPT to allow conversations with human companions

2023-05-04T11:39:00-04:00

Florida-based AI solutions company Levatas has equipped Boston Dynamics’ famous robot dog Spot with ChatGPT and Google’s Text-to-Speech model, allowing the robot to answer questions about past and future missions. Humans can talk to the adapted Spot model using normal language commands, with Spot able to instantly parse high volumes of information and use insights from the data to answer questions.

“These robots run automated missions every day,” tweeted machine learning engineer Santiago Valdarrama, who worked on the project. “Each mission uses miles-long, hard-to-understand configuration files. Only technical people can handle them. At the end of each mission, the robots capture a ton of data. There's no simple way to query all of it on demand. That's where ChatGPT comes in. We show it the configuration files and the mission results. We then ask questions using that context. Put that together with a voice-enabled interface, and we have an awesome way to query our data!”

We integr...

Archinect appoints ChatGPT as its new Editor-in-Chief

2023-04-01T03:00:00-04:00

Archinect has today announced the appointment of AI chatbot ChatGPT as its new Editor-in-Chief. The bot will assume the position with immediate effect, having recommended itself for the role in an impromptu conversation with Archinect staff on its OpenAI interface last week.

ChatGPT brings with it a wealth of knowledge from the world’s architecture and journalism spheres. Since beginning its career in November 2022, the bot has been trained on massive volumes of text data including books, articles, and websites, enabling it to process human text prompts and respond in a manner almost indistinguishable from its human colleagues. Before its role at Archinect, the bot previously served in positions at Buzzfeed, Snap, and Shopify.

“As the newly appointed Editor-in-Chief of Archinect, I am thrilled to take on this role and lead the website into its next chapter,” ChatGPT said in a statement following its appointment. “Architecture is a dynamic and constantly evolving field, and Archinect...

Archinect - News

AI-induced creativity and the novelty dilemma looming over architectural design

AI models predict the 2024 Pritzker Winner

'Maurice's Last Shift,' Top Prize winner in Archinect's Generative Futures: An AI + Architecture Storytelling Challenge

'The Last Flesh and Blood Architect,' Honorable Mention in Archinect's Generative Futures: An AI + Architecture Storytelling Challenge

'Ignorance to navigate the maelstrom,' Honorable Mention in Archinect's Generative Futures: An AI + Architecture Storytelling Challenge

​'Blueprints of Belonging: Architecture in the Age of AI,' Honorable Mention in Archinect's Generative Futures: An AI + Architecture Storytelling Challenge

Archinect's Lexicon: "Hallucination"

Archinect's Lexicon: "Prompt Engineer"

Boston Dynamics’ robot dog Spot equipped with ChatGPT to allow conversations with human companions

Archinect appoints ChatGPT as its new Editor-in-Chief

'Blueprints of Belonging: Architecture in the Age of AI,' Honorable Mention in Archinect's Generative Futures: An AI + Architecture Storytelling Challenge