During the lab in class on Tuesday, my group asked different LLMs to write poems in the style of Shel Silverstein. When I first prompted Gemini by saying, “Write a poem in the style of Shel Silverstein.” At first, Gemini just gave me a poem written by Silverstein himself, which seemed to go against copyright in my brain.

Later in the experiment, I prompted Gemini to “Write a poem similar to Silverstein’s poem Rain.” Gemini gave me back this poem:

The Cloud’s Big Sneeze

I opened my mouth to catch a drop, And prayed the sky would never stop. It tickled my chin and it wet my nose, And soaked the socks inside my shoes (and toes).

My umbrella turned inside out like a cup, To catch all the sprinkles that didn’t stay up. The worms are out dancing, the grass is a lake, And I’m shivering here for goodness’ sake!

The sky caught a cold, or so it would please, To give us a giant, wet, watery sneeze. So I’ll sit in this puddle and wait for the sun, ‘Til the clouds are all empty and raining is done.

This poem is by no means creative. While I understand that the definition includes novelty and usefulness, it is extremely sparse and does not offer limitations; it does suggest that for something to be considered creative, it must be new. I partly agree with this idea. I think the most creative solutions consider differing perspectives and look at the world in ways that the traditional problem solver might not. Some may say that “all great artists steal,” that there are no longer any unique ideas, and that the idea of creativity has changed as we have all just become proficient thieves. In this regard, Gemini’s poem would be creative, but there is a difference between being inspired by another person and just changing their words, while keeping the idea the same. I believe that because the LLM did not produce a new idea but just reworked someone else’s poem, it is not creative.

Based on the output that Gemini gave me, I have changed the way that I would use AI in the creative process. I often use AI as a brainstorming or an idea-hatching ground. I give the LLM where I want to go, and ask it to create different launching grounds. Now that I know that LLMs do not create new ideas or even suggest unique ones, but rather, they just spit out another person’s ideas worded differently. Now that I know this, I know that I need to change my ideas to further stray away from any launch pad that AI may create for me,

“The Artifact Isn’t the Art: Rethinking Creativity in the Age of Ai.” Freethink, 7 Apr. 2025, www.freethink.com/opinion/studio-ghibli-chatgpt-creativity?utm_source=tldrai.

I think creativity can be defined as something that is novel, useful, interesting, and meaningful. I generally agree with Bhatia’s definition (from the Ghibli article), which describes creativity as novel and useful, but I would expand it to include interest and meaning. I include “interesting” because when people describe something as creative, they are usually also describing it as engaging or intriguing. I add “meaningful” because as the article emphasizes, there is an important shift from focusing on what is created to why it is created, especially in an era where AI can easily generate content. For something to be truly creative, it must matter both to the creator and to others. Ultimately, creativity is not just about producing something new or useful, but about the story, intention, and purpose behind it which are qualities that AI does not possess.

With this in mind, the LLM’s response to our prompt (to write a poem in the style of Shel Silverstein) was the following:

The 9-to-5-a-saurus has a tie around its neck,
It lives on bitter coffee and a monthly little check.
It doesn’t have a tail, but it has a rolling chair,
And a very frantic look beneath its thinning, grayish hair.

For me, it is difficult to find this poem interesting, although I recognize that my judgment may be biased because I know it was generated by AI. The poem does include rhyme and a funny concept (“9-to-5-a-saurus”), but these elements are derived from patterns found in existing poems. As we learned in class, LLMs generate text by predicting likely word sequences rather than creating from lived experience. It is also not genuinely novel since it is built from existing material, and it is not meaningful in the human sense. AI lacks emotions, experiences, and personal perspectives that give creative work its depth and significance. As the Bhatia article highlights, creativity depends heavily on the “why” behind a work. In this case, there is no underlying intention or lived motivation, but only statistical pattern generation. Without emotions, experiences, etc. the output lacks true meaning.

This experiment made me reflect more deeply on what it means for something to be creative. While creativity remains somewhat subjective, the rapid development of AI has clarified its essential qualities. Creativity involves not only novelty and usefulness, but also meaning and genuine interest which are qualities that stem from human experience. While the invention of AI and LLMs themselves can be considered creative achievements, the outputs they generate do not embody creativity in the same way because they lack the human context that gives creative work its purpose and significance.

Source: The artifact isn’t the art: Rethinking creativity in the age of AI

For my group, we chose to look up our prompt on chatGPT. Here we used the prompt please make me a poem in the style writing of Shakespeare. In response to our prompt, chat gave us a very similar writing style to what Shakespeare actually would have wrote like. Our example that is gave us is attached:

Good morrow, sun, thou golden ball so bright,​
That peeks above the hills with merry cheer;​
I greet thee now with laughter and delight,​
And chase my dreams as thou dost draw me near.​

Mine wooden sword, a kingly blade I claim,​
I battle beasts no grown-up eye can see;​
A cardboard crown doth grant me noble name,​
And in my yard I rule a realm most free.​

When lessons call, I sigh yet still obey,​
For wisdom grows as seeds in fertile ground;​
Yet soon enough I’m loosed again to play,​
Where joys untold in simple things are found.​

So let me dream ‘fore sleep doth close mine eyes,​
A child today, tomorrow wondrous wise.

I would first like to say that I think being creative it different with anything and anyone. It comes from either how something is programed or how someone may see the world. Everything and everyone is different. Going to my prompt, I would like to argue that even though chat didn’t copyright any one of Shakespeares poems, chat did write something very similar to some of his writings. I think that chat did make a very creative pieces from what I told it to do. I think that in doing this experiment it did shift my opine on Ai creativity and see that Ai can be creative in what you tell it to do. I think that chat can definitely help me in the future now knowing the creative side of Ai use.

Honestly, I would not say that any AIs do have any sort of creativity. I think creativity does not just about Meaningfulness and novelty, but also the willingness to express. I think one example from the activity on Tuesday shows this. I used this prompt: “Good morning Chat, Please write a poem in the style of Allen Poe, including his writing skills such as figure of speech, metaphor, symbolism, and narration. Take the Raven by Allen Poe as an example.”

And Chatgpt gave me this:

The Lantern and the Tide

Upon a midnight waning, when the stars were dimly straying,
And the wind spoke low and hollow through the ribs of rotting pine,
I sat in silence keeping, though I knew no gentle sleeping
Would descend upon a spirit so entangled yet as mine—
For a thought, long dead yet breathing, pressed its weight upon my spine,
Whispering, “You are mine.”

From the hearth no flame was turning, only ash in quiet yearning
Gave a dull and ashen glimmer, like an eye that would not close;
And the walls, with shadows bending, seemed to breathe a slow pretending,
As if memory itself had learned the art of silent throes—
As if time, with careful fingers, stitched its grief in hidden rows,
Where no daylight ever goes.

Then—there came a sound uncertain, like a hand upon a curtain,
Softly drawn yet filled with meaning none could ever dare define;
Not a knock of mortal making, nor a timber’s weary breaking,
But a pulse—alive, insistent—beating somewhere out of line.
“Who now walks,” I whispered faintly, “through the ruins of my mind?”
Came the answer: “Only thine.”

To the door I turned, unsteady; all the air grew thick and heavy,
And the lantern by my table flickered thrice, then guttered low;
When I opened—there was nothing but the dark, complete and muffling,
Save a tide of distant murmurs from a sea I did not know.
Yet within that void unbroken, something stirred, and seemed to grow—
Not of flesh, nor shade, nor woe.

Back I stepped, my breath retreating, heart and hollow rhythm meeting,
Till the chamber shrank to nothing but a stage for dread alone;
And upon the rafters leaning, where the blackest dark lay screening,
Sat a shape no light could capture, carved in silence, cold as stone.
Eyes like wells without a bottom fixed themselves upon my own—
And it spoke in monotone:

“Do you seek what once was taken? Do you walk though you are shaken?
Do you bind yourself to echoes that no dawn shall ever free?”
Thus it uttered, never lifting, never faltering nor drifting,
Like a verdict etched in iron, cast beyond eternity.
And I, though weak with knowing, asked the thing that haunted me:
“Shall there yet be mercy?”

Then the lantern died completely, and the dark grew far too neatly
Round the corners of my reason, folding thought in endless night;
Still the voice, unspent, unbroken, left no comfort in its token—
Only this, in endless echo, stripped of hope and stripped of light:
Not a cry, nor curse, nor pleading—only cold, unyielding rite:

“Evermore—despite.”

And the tide, though never nearing, I could hear it—ever searing,
Washing names from every surface, wearing time itself away;
While the figure, ever keeping watch above my spirit’s weeping,
Cast no shadow, claimed no substance, yet refused to fade or stray.
Thus I sit, with thought unending, where the night outlives the day—
And the tide will have its way.

You can see that the poem itself is great, but when we dig into the actual meaning of it: barely anything. AIs do not have any actual ideas and things to produce but to make something that seems to be right. The article from Freethink say that “AI doesn’t feel tension. It doesn’t labor through ambiguity. It doesn’t explore.” which I think is absolutely correct. AI does not create, but to gather old information together and form a “seems like a new” one.

This activity kind of motivates me to think more and write more with my own hands (and keyboard), but AI is still a great tool to develop ideas when stuck.

Bhatia, Ashish. “The Artifact Isn’t the Art: Rethinking Creativity in the Age of AI.” Freethink, April 4, 2025. https://www.freethink.com/opinion/studio-ghibli-chatgpt-creativity.

Within our search to try to replicate Edgar Allan Poe’s style and creativity, I realized that ChatGPT did demonstrate creativity in the way that it made its own unique story, but it was not effective in the way that we asked it to be. A short example is:

“We glide ‘twixt sheets of moldered silk,  ​

Where living lovers spurn our ilk,  ​

Our touch—a frost they crave, then flee,  ​

Yet still we croo our siren plea:”

In comparison to:

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—

    While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,

As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.

“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door—

            Only this and nothing more.”

It was not able to be as creative as Edgar Allan Poe, or match up to the level of wit that he used within his writing. This coincides with our reading where we explain how although AI may spit out a multitude of answers, it will not be able to replicate the ability to be as creative as the original person that sat down and struggled through their thought processes. As a creative individual, I would envision using genAI to assist my creativity only when I am at blocks where I am having trouble making my own ideas or thoughts. The benefits to this is that it can get the ball rolling initially and allow me to build on it, but of course the disadvantage to this is that it can become a crutch and completely take away my will and desire My definition of creativity would be someone’s ability to identify and use their own unique thoughts and interests and combine them into a certain thing or idea. Overall, our experiments this week allowed me to further think about how I am using AI to brainstorm instead of allowing myself to grow by thinking myself. Thinking for myself will allow me to become a more independent and whole individual and thinker.

In our Tuesday readings, we explored a traditional definition for creativity, and Bhatia furthers this by arguing that while AI can produce “artifacts,” it lacks the human capacity for synthesis To me, creativity isn’t just about generating a new sequence of words; it’s about the emotional intent behind them. If there is no “why” behind the work, is it truly creative, or just a sophisticated calculation?

I asked the AI to maintain Silverstein’s iconic rhythm and tone but shift the setting to a sunny day under a shaded tree. Here is the excerpt it produced:

“Today, while lying in the shade, Beneath the tent the branches made, Some Whatifs skipped across the grass And wouldn’t let the quiet pass… Whatif a beetle climbs my knee? Whatif a branch falls off the tree? Whatif the grass begins to prickle? Whatif I sprout a giant pickle?”

On the surface, the output is mediocre at best, as it followed the rhythm instructions perfectly. other than that it looks like it took another shell silverstein poem and swapped a couple of words. Essentially it took a picture of his homework and changed a couple things.

When Silverstein writes about “poison in my cup” or his parents getting divorced, he is tapping into the real anxieties of childhood. The AI, conversely has no experiences to tap into, It’s choosing words that rhyme (prickle/pickle) without any underlying emotional logic. As Bhatia (2025) notes, “AI doesn’t feel tension. It doesn’t labor through ambiguity.” The machine isn’t worried about the future, only predicting the next most likely token in a sequence.

Going into this week, I viewed AI as a powerful collaborator and a way to “reduce processing resources” (UT Aspire) for my technical writing. But this experiment shifted my perspective on the creative side. While I can use a “Physics Professor” persona to fix a lab report, I can’t prompt an AI to have a childhood or feel anxiety.

It has solidified my view that genAI is a calculator for language, not a source of art. It can augment my process by helping me brainstorm structures, but it can never replace the elements that make things human and real that make a poem actually resonate.

Reference: Bhatia, Ashish. “The Artifact Isn’t the Art: Rethinking Creativity in the Age of AI.” Freethink, April 4, 2025. https://www.freethink.com/opinion/studio-ghibli-chatgpt-creativity.