ECAI'06 workshop MT2
Riva del Garda, Italy, August 28th-29th

Programme

Monday 28th August
8:30 - 9:00 Welcome and Registration
Session 1 - Visual Creativity
9:00 - 9:25 J.Reis Agents with style - multi-agent visual composition with shape grammars
9:25 - 9:50 Garcia, Gervas,
Hervas,
Perez y Perez
Applying the E-R Computational Creativity Model to Image Interpretation
9:50 - 10:00 Discussion
10:00 - 10:30 Coffee
Session 2 - Musical Creativity #1
10:30 - 10:55 O. Bown The extended importance of the social creation of value in evolutionary processes: a proposed model
10:55 - 11:20 T. Chan
G.Wiggins
More evidence for a computational memetics approach to music information and new interpretations of an aesthetic fitness measure
11:20 - 11:45 D. Moffat
M. Kelly
An investigation into people's bias against computational creativity in music composition
11:45 - 12:30 Discussion
12:30 - 14:00 Lunch
Session 3 - Musical Creativity #2
14:00 - 14:25 B.Duggan
Z. Cui
P. Cunningham
MATT - a system for modelling creativity in traditional Irish flute playing
14:25 - 14:50 J. Haenen
S. Rauchas
Investigating artificial creativity by generating melodies, using connectionist knowledge representation
14:50 - 15:15 R. Keller,
D. Morrison, S. Jones,
B.Thom, A. Wolin
A computational framework enhancing jazz creativity
15:15 - 15:30 Discussion
15:30 - 16:00 Coffee
Session 4 - Demonstrations #1
16:00 - 17:30 Schedule to be announced
 
Tuesday 29th August
Session 5 - Frameworks
9:00 - 9:25 J. Bird, D. Stokes Evolving minimally creative robots
9:25 - 9:50 A. Cross The single curious agent: an alternative perspective
9:50 - 10:00 Discussion
10:00 - 10:30 Coffee
Session 6 - Linguistic Creativity #1
10:30 - 10:55 C. Butnariu, T. Veale Lexical Combinatorial Creativity with "Gastronaut"
10:55 - 11:20 Q. Yu, T. Veale Creative puzzle generation from factual content
11:20 - 11:45 R. Hervas, F. Pereira
P. Gervas, A. Cardoso
Cross-Domain analogy in automated text generation
11:45 - 12:30 Discussion
12:30 - 14:00 Lunch
Session 7 - Linguistic Creativity #2
14:00 - 14:25 Y. Hao, T. Veale A fluid category structure for metaphor processing
14:25 - 14:50 T. Veale, S. Chen Unlocking the latent creativity of orthographic structure
14:50 - 15:15 T. Veale, C. Butnariu Exploring linguistic creativity via predictive lexicology
15:15 - 15:30 Discussion
15:30 - 16:00 Coffee
Session 8 - Demonstrations #2
16:00 - 17:30 Schedule to be announced

Workshop aims

The aim of the workshop is to facilitate the exchange of ideas on the topic of computational creativity. We aim to bring together people from AI, Cognitive Science and related areas such as Psychology, Philosophy and the Arts who research questions related to the notion of creativity with respect to computers. The workshop will address issues such as how we assess creativity in computers, how computers can be used to enhance human creativity, and how we can write creative software. We aim for papers on various frameworks for computational creativity to be presented at the workshop, and for the applications of computational creativity to the sciences, creative industries and arts to be showcased. In addition, we will organise a "show and tell" session, which will be devoted to demonstrations of systems exhibiting behaviour which would be deemed creative in humans.

Image courtesy of John Collomosse
© Copyright 2006

Motivation

Do you think of your AI work more in terms of generating artefacts of aesthetic and utilitarian value (such as poems, theorems, melodies, jokes, designs, harmonisations, ...) rather than thinking of your work in terms of problem solving? Do you worry more about the value of the artefacts your system produces rather than the speed at which it produces them? Has a program you have written ever surprised you with the quality and novelty of its output? If you answer 'yes' to any of the above questions, then you may be interested in the field of computational creativity.

We study the question of what creativity means with respect to computers, by comparing and contrasting implemented systems which undertake tasks that require creativity in humans. This continues in a rich vein of research from philosophy, psychology, cognitive science and AI. We focus our research within the AI paradigm of artefact generation, where there are multiple (sometimes conflicting) cognitively plausible aesthetic and utilitarian considerations associated with the output of the programs, rather than within the paradigm of problem solving, where the considerations are usually efficiency and optimality of solutions.

The domains in which computers are beginning to produce artefacts of real value include mathematics, art and design, physical sciences, literature and music. By studying the use of AI techniques such as case-based reasoning, evolutionary algorithms and machine learning within such artefact generation systems, we are making progress towards formalising frameworks for the generation of artefacts. In parallel, we are investigating frameworks for the assessment of the artefacts themselves and for assessing the creativity of the systems which produce them.

Call for papers

Original contributions are solicited in all areas related to computational creativity, including but not limited to:

  • Computational models of creativity
  • Cognitive models of creativity
  • Metrics, frameworks and formalizations for the evaluation of creativity in computational systems
  • Computational tools for supporting creativity (i.e., machine-enhanced creativity)
  • Specific applications to music, language and the arts, to architecture and design, to scientific discovery, to education and to entertainment
  • Philosophical discussions of computational creativity
  • Detailed system descriptions of creative systems, including engineering difficulties faced, example sessions and artefacts produced, and applications of the system


Image courtesy of Penousal Machado
@ Copyright 2006

Submission details

Authors should produce their papers according to the ECAI'06 submission guidelines, which are described in this PDF document: ECAI'06 paper guidelines. LaTex users can find the style files in this zip file: ECAI'06 LaTeX style files.

Papers should be no longer than six sides. All submissions will be reviewed in terms of quality, impact and relevance to the area of computational creativity. Papers should be sent to Simon Colton (sgc@doc.ic.ac.uk) by the deadline of April 24th.

Important dates

Submission deadline: April 24, 2006
Notification of Acceptance: May 10, 2006
Camera Ready Copy: May 24, 2006
Workshop Dates:August 28-29, 2006

Show and tell session

The fact that we now have implemented systems which exhibit creative behaviour and produce artefacts of value sets the computational creativity field apart from other domains which investigate notions of creativity. To emphasise this, we plan to hold an inaugural "show and tell" session, where implemented systems are demonstrated. There will be no set format, but we hope each presentation will cover topics such as: (a) implementation details, (b) how to run the system, (c) how to use and interpret the artefacts created by the system, (d) engineering innovations which have been required in order to implement the system. For each system, we will encourage the presenter to demonstrate the program at work and to supply a 'gallery' of the most appealing artefacts generated over the years by the system.

Participation in the show and tell session is at the discretion of the symposium organisers. Please email Simon Colton if you would like to show your system and tell us about it at the workshop.

Previous events

This workshop is the latest in a growing list of events that have, since 1997, solidified and added rigour to the computational treatment of creative processes. These events have been symposia and workshops associated with AISB 99, AISB 00, ICCBR 01, AISB 01, ECAI 02, AISB 02, IJCAI 03, AISB 03, LREC 04, ECCBR 04 and IJCAI 05. In particular, this workshop is the third in the series of Joint Workshops on Computational Creativity:

First joint workshop on computational creativity
Second joint workshop on computational creativity

Conference Details

The workshop is part of the European Conference on Artificial Intelligence, the website for which is here: ECAI 2006.

Organisers

Simon Colton (Imperial College, UK)
Alison Pease (University of Edinburgh, UK)

Programme Committee:

John Barnden (University of Birmingham, UK)
David Brown (Worcester Polytechnic Institute, USA)
Amílcar Cardoso (University of Coimbra, Portugal)
Key-Sun Choi (KAIST, Yuseong Daejeon, Korea)
Simon Colton (Imperial College London, UK)
John Collomosse (University of Bath, UK)
Pablo Gervás (Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain)
Paulo Gomes (University of Coimbra, Portugal)
João Leite (New University of Lisbon, Portugal)
Jesùs Lòpez (University of Southern Queensland, Australia)
Penousal Machado (University of Coimbra, Portugal)
Lorenzo Magnani (University of Pavia, Italy)
Diarmuid O'Donoghue (National University of Ireland, Maynooth, Ireland)
Marcus Pearce (City University London, UK)
Alison Pease (University of Edinburgh, UK)
Francisco C. Pereira (University of Coimbra, Portugal)
Graeme Ritchie(University of Aberdeen, UK)
Rob Saunders (City University, UK)
Oliviero Stock (Istituto per la Ricerca Scientifica e Tecnologica, Trento, Italy)
Tony Veale (University College Dublin, Ireland)
Gerhard Widmer (University of Linz, Austria)
Geraint A. Wiggins (Goldsmiths College, London, UK)