The Creativity Code (2019) landed at a pivotal moment—just before the explosion of generative AI tools like ChatGPT and MidJourney, making its insights feel both prescient and slightly outdated. Marcus du Sautoy explores whether AI can truly be creative or if it’s just remixing patterns, arguing that machines act more like "sparring partners" than replacements for human ingenuity. His examples—from AI-generated music to DeepMind’s AlphaGo—felt cutting-edge at the time but now read as a foundation for today’s AI revolution. One key takeaway? Creativity isn’t about pure originality, but about bending and breaking patterns—something AI is rapidly mastering. A sharp, thought-provoking read that predicted the creative AI boom before it took off.
Oxford Mathematics Public Lecture (2019) with Marcus du Sautoy, discussing how AI is learning to write, paint, and think, and what this means for human creativity.
