Basho in the machine: Humans find attributes of beauty and discomfort in algorithmic haiku

The gap between human creativity and artificial intelligence seems to be narrowing. Previous studies have compared AI-generated versus human-written poems and whether people can distinguish between them.

Now, a study led by Yoshiyuki Ueda at Kyoto University Institute for the Future of Human and Society, has shown AI’s potential in creating literary art such as haiku — the shortest poetic form in the world — rivaling that of humans without human help.

Ueda’s team compared AI-generated haiku without human intervention, also known as human out of the loop, or HOTL, with a contrasting method known as human in the loop, or HITL.

The project involved 385 participants, each of whom evaluated 40 haiku poems — 20 each of HITL and HOTL — plus 40 composed entirely by professional haiku writers.

“It was interesting that the evaluators found it challenging to distinguish between the haiku penned by humans and those generated by AI,” remarks Ueda.

From the results, HITL haiku received the most praise for their poetic qualities, whereas HOTL and human-only verses had similar scores.

“In addition, a phenomenon called algorithm aversion was observed among our evaluators. They were supposed to be unbiased but instead became influenced by a kind of reverse psychology,” explains the author.

“In other words, they tended to unconsciously give lower scores to those they felt were AI-generated.”

Ueda points out that his research has put a spotlight on algorithm aversion as a new approach to AI art.

“Our results suggest that the ability of AI in the field of haiku creation has taken a leap forward, entering the realm of collaborating with humans to produce more creative works. Realizing the existence of algorithmic aversion will lead people to re-evaluate their appreciation of AI art.”

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Materials provided by Kyoto University. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.