James Intriligator My company: Glider Innovations
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James Intriligator

I'm a cognitive scientist and inventor, and a Professor of the Practice at Tufts University, where I started the IDEA Lab. I study how people see, I design new products and methods, and I like the problems that sit between fields. I also make light that moves with music.

  • PhD, Harvard
  • Professor of the Practice, Tufts
  • Founder, IDEA Lab
  • Six US patents
  • Founder, Glider Innovations

The light here is drawn live and is new for every visit.

The work

A sketch from the IDEA Lab: students from different fields working in mixed teamsTeaching and the IDEA LabCourses at Tufts, and a lab where hundreds of students have built new things. Diamond Gabors: a tiled image in yellow, red, blue, and green, built from the striped patches used in vision researchScienceAttention, motion, and two things to try on your own eyes. Figure 1 of US patent 6,163,323: sound events above, the visual events they drive belowInventionsSix US patents, from animation to space weather. The first page of the paper Persona Multiplication: A Method to Avoid Designed InjusticeWriting and talksArticles, papers, and talks, with their dates. Theory and methodsTransversal theory, gliding, and the methods I use. Rose Window: a circular generative image in pink, periwinkle, mint, and orchidArtLiquid Light, visuals for theater, and a field you can play.

Where the work comes from

The fields James Intriligator has worked across, by year Transversal theory, with Bryan Reynolds, from 1998; Gliding with language models, from 2023; Light, animation, and music, from 1993; Perception science, from 1990; Industry innovation, from 2000 to 2003; Consumer psychology, from 2003; Teaching and new programs, from 2003; Design and human factors, from 2003. One route crosses between them over time. Crossings marked: Animation patent, filed 1998; Visuals for Curie Curie, 2021; Persona Multiplication, 2023; Glider Innovations, now. 1990 2000 2010 2020 now Transversal theory, with Bryan Reynolds Gliding with language models Light, animation, and music Perception science Industry innovation Consumer psychology Teaching and new programs Design and human factors Animation patent, filed 1998 Visuals for Curie Curie, 2021 Persona Multiplication, 2023 Glider Innovations, now

Swipe the map sideways to read it.

Since 1990 I have worked across these fields, and I still work in most of them. The red line is my route between them, and the rings mark crossings that produced something. Across the page is time; the ridges have no other scale. Move your pointer over a field's name and it takes its own color.

Lately

  • Ongoing

    I sit on the board of Bubbles Not Bombs, the community interest company Paola Dyboski started after our Bubble-Dome.

  • Aug 3rd, 2025

    David Pearl, Matthew Murphy, and I posted Polymorphic Combinatorial Frameworks on arXiv, a framework for designing adaptive AI agents on a mathematical footing.

  • 2023

    A commentary, "Unlocking the doors of perception," in Physics of Life Reviews. Read it

  • In progress

    I am building Living Music World, a world that reads a whole piece of music and evolves with it.

A frame from Living Music World: white light trails and rings on a black ground
A test frame from Living Music World.

My company
Glider Innovations is my company. It helps organizations design new products, services, and processes, runs workshops and strategy days, and builds AI systems around an organization's own material.

My company: Glider Innovations

My Tufts title is given for biographical identification. Glider Innovations is independent of Tufts University: it is not the opinion of, and is not sponsored or endorsed by, Tufts.