Magazine

The Creativity Issue

May/June 2025

Defining creativity in the Age of AI: Meet the artists, musicians, composers, and architects exploring productive ways to collaborate with the now ubiquitous technology. Plus: Debunking the myth of creativity, asteroid-deflecting nukes, bitcoin-powered hot tubs, and a new way to detect bird flu.

Read the issue

Letter from the editor

Seeing AI as a collaborator, not a creator

Tom Humberstone

Features

Categorized in Artificial intelligence
How AI can help supercharge creativity
Forget one-click creativity. These artists and musicians are finding new ways to make art using AI, by injecting friction, challenge, and serendipity into the process.
Categorized in Q&A
How creativity became the reigning value of our time
In "The Cult of Creativity," Samuel Franklin excavates the surprisingly recent history of an idea, an ideal, and an ideology.
Categorized in Artificial intelligence
AI is coming for music, too
New diffusion AI models that make songs from scratch are complicating our definitions of authorship and human creativity.
Categorized in Space
Meet the researchers testing the “Armageddon” approach to asteroid defense
A nuclear explosion might eventually be Earth’s only way to protect itself from a dangerous asteroid. But preparing for that without launching nukes into space means getting creative.
Categorized in Artificial intelligence
AI is pushing the limits of the physical world
Artificial intelligence is painting pictures, writing novels, making videos, and composing symphonies. Can it change what we build?

Also in this issue
- A new biosensor can detect bird flu in five minutes
  The device may help prevent future outbreaks of the disease.
  
  Categorized in Biotechnology and health
- This spa’s water is heated by bitcoin mining
  Bitcoin enthusiasts are using a side effect of mining’s immense computational load to heat hot tubs, office buildings, and homes.
  
  Categorized in Computing
- Why we still need AM radio
  The most reliable way to keep us informed in times of disaster is being threatened.
  
  Categorized in Culture
- NASA has made an air traffic control system for drones
  As more drones begin flying, a traffic management system developed at NASA aims to keep the airspace safe.
  
  Categorized in Space
- 3 Things Caiwei Chen is into right now
  MIT Technology Review’s China reporter shares what she’s thinking about lately.
  
  Categorized in Culture
- The quest to build islands with ocean currents in the Maldives
  An alternative to dredging aims to capture moving sand to protect the archipelago from erosion and rising seas.
  
  Categorized in Climate change and energy
- This architect wants to build cities out of lava
  Awed by a volcanic eruption she witnessed as a child, Arnhildur Pálmadóttir now aims to help architects re-imagine what’s possible.
  
  Categorized in Profile
- How a 1980s toy robot arm inspired modern robotics
  The tasks taken on by the Armatron aren’t so different from the ones AI is tackling today.
  
  Categorized in Computing
- How the federal government is tracking changes in the supply of street drugs
  The National Institute of Standards and Technology’s new harm reduction initiative is helping prevent needless deaths.
  
  Categorized in Policy
- Generative AI is reshaping South Korea’s webcomics industry
  Some graphic artists, like the legendary Lee Hyun-se, see AI as a path to immortality; others wonder if it’s a threat to their own creativity.
  
  Categorized in Artificial intelligence
- How AI is interacting with our creative human processes
  Three books examine what we gain and lose when we let machines create.
  
  Categorized in Book Review
- Love or immortality: A short story
  She wants to live life to the fullest; he wants to live forever.
  
  Categorized in Fiction
- The AI Hype Index: DeepSeek mania, Israel’s spying tool, and cheating at chess
  MIT Technology Review’s highly subjective take on the latest buzz about AI.
  
  Categorized in Artificial intelligence

Updated

Magazine

The Creativity Issue

Letter from the editor

Features

How AI can help supercharge creativity

How creativity became the reigning value of our time

AI is coming for music, too

Meet the researchers testing the “Armageddon” approach to asteroid defense

AI is pushing the limits of the physical world

A new biosensor can detect bird flu in five minutes

This spa’s water is heated by bitcoin mining

Why we still need AM radio

NASA has made an air traffic control system for drones

3 Things Caiwei Chen is into right now

The quest to build islands with ocean currents in the Maldives

This architect wants to build cities out of lava

How a 1980s toy robot arm inspired modern robotics

How the federal government is tracking changes in the supply of street drugs

Generative AI is reshaping South Korea’s webcomics industry

How AI is interacting with our creative human processes

Love or immortality: A short story

The AI Hype Index: DeepSeek mania, Israel’s spying tool, and cheating at chess

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