Generative Artificial Intelligence refers to AI models that generate new content in the form of written text, audio, images and video. They do this through training on internet data and then statistically predicting the next word in a sentence by looking for relationships in the data. Text is broken down into smaller, machine readable units called tokens, which are words or characters. They learn patterns in the text and generate text that follows those patterns.
In the same way, Generative Learners generate content in their minds eye for learning by imagining what it would look like. They see the senses as data collection instruments. Everyday we see, listen, feel, smell and taste things. These stimuli can be seen as data points that can be used to learn from the environment. By clumping these stimuli together we get experiences. The more experiences a learner has the better their ability to generate.
Generative learners use their past experiences to compare them to new information they encounter to look for similar relationships and patterns. For example, when reading text from a book they could generate images from the text in comparison to past similar experiences in order to create meaning.
Mental simulations can be generated both in the short and long-term. For example, a monkey jumping from branch to branch will need to assess before making its next jump, whether it can reach the branch in terms of distance and speed it is moving at. As it moves through the world it’s neocortex is generating a 3 dimensional world model from the data collected through the senses to predict the consequences of it’s actions in the short-term based on past experiences.
Mental simulations are used when we plan future behaviours to achieve a goal. We can imagine what the consequences of our actions will be if take certain actions in the present. To take it even further, when trying to solve a problem and planning in advance, generative learners can create rich mental simulations of a how a scenario could play out in the future (i.e how a scenario could unfold) and from those envisioned scenarios, choose the best option. Think of a footballer the night before a big game mentally rehearsing how he will kick a penalty if the gets the chance by responding to the expected goalkeeper’s cues and body language. The footballer could create thought experiments for free by imagining how his different actions could create different outcomes and why. When coming up against a different opponent, in their mind the footballer could switch the goalkeeper to one from another team and imagine how that goalie would react based on their style and approach to goalkeeping.
If a learner lacks experiences in order to generate images or meaning from new content they have not experienced first-hand as yet, the generative learner is able to use their imagination to imagine possible scenarios by generating images. By slipping inside the eye of their minds to imagine how situations could possibly play out they become creators. With humans being limited only by their imagination, the generative learner is limitless.
Imagination can be used to predict consequences of future actions by reasoning out their effects but also to reflect on past experiences in order to extend one’s existing memory of what happened and project new explanations and reasoning for the causes of things. Most people only imagine the consequences of actions but you can also imagine doing the actions themselves bit by bit as if you were taking physical actions in the first person allowing one to build more detailed skills by imagining the doing.
Think of how after catching the catfish, Somerai sits near the fire and reflects on catching the fish. While reflecting on her decision to cast near the overhanging branch, expecting that catfish would be in that area due to the possibility of fallen insects, she extends her reflection by imagining what she could not have experienced. She jumps into a “First Person Perspective” of the catfish mimicking the feeling of looking for food from the barbel’s view. She takes the catfish’s perspective of swimming underwater and imagines how it would have viewed the wriggling worm from below the surface of the water.