COMING TO TOWN APRIL 2027 - MARCH 2028

tep through the curtain and you will experience the greatest show this side of the Susquehanna! 
A world where thinking is fun and free! 
A world where computation will give you chills! 
A world where the wonders of the human imagination are the main attraction! 

As artificial intelligence reshapes how we interpret information, remember experiences, and understand loss, the meaning of “intelligence” is up for grabs. It’s time for the humans to step right up and ask questions about what intelligence is, about how and why it is made, by whom and for whom. This is a time for reflexivity, to think about thinking, to experience our experience of intelligence, to talk together about those experiences, and to take our intelligence more seriously than we have done. 

Part research site, part laboratory, all carnival, the Carnival of Intelligence will offer interactive booths, attractions, shows, and rides that engage participants in the question of what we mean when we talk about intelligence, and the stakes involved in the computational capture of human ways of knowing. 

Operating at community scale, the project answers a critical gap: face-to-face spaces for engaging
complex ideas that are being deprioritized just when we need them most. While AI narratives are shaped by a small few, the Carnival of Intelligence welcomes people of every age, background, and education to sit with friends and strangers and explore the question of what intelligence is, together.

Brought to you by the Institute of the Mechanical Surround & Modern Art, with support from the John Templeton Foundation.