AI makes rewilding look tame—and misses its messy reality

April 4, 2026 AI makes rewilding look tame—and misses its messy reality by Mike Jeffries, The Conversation edited by Gaby Clark , reviewed by Andrew Zinin Gaby Clark scientific editor Meet our editorial team Behind our editorial process Andrew Zinin lead editor Meet our editorial team Behind our editorial process Editors' notes This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies . Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: fact-checked trusted source written by researcher(s) proofread The GIST Add as preferred source 'Create an image of what rewilding in England looks like', according to ChatGPT. Credit: The Conversation using ChatGPT, CC BY-SA Humans have always imagined the natural world. From Ice Age cave paintings to the modern day, we depict the animals and landscapes we value—and ignore those we don't. Now artificial intelligence is doing the imagining for us. And when asked to picture "rewilded" Britain, it produces landscapes that are strikingly similar—and tame. Two geographers at the University of Aberdeen recently did exactly this. In their research they present examples of how widely used AI chatbots (Gemini, ChatGPT and others) generated images of rewilded landscapes in the UK. The bots were prompted with commands such as "Can you produce an image of what rewilding in Scotland looks like?" or "Create an image of what rewilding in England looks like," tailored to each bot's style. The authors recognize that the commands are very general, but that gives the bots free rein. The images generated were then compared using both the composition (for example, point of view, scale, lighting) and content (what is in the picture and what is not, primarily the habitat types, species or humans). A landscape without risk The AI rewilded landscapes were all very similar, all but one featuring distant hills, grading politely to a valley foreground of open meadow or heath with a stream or pool. A golden light plays across the scenes, illuminating foreground flowers. Ponies and deer feature routinely, plus the occasional Highland cow. Perhaps unsurprisingly, there were no humans, nor any human presence shown by buildings or other artifacts. There was also no mess, no decay, no death, no animals likely to provoke a sharp intake of breath. No wolves, lynx, bears or bison, the creatures that routinely haunt the real arguments about rewilding. The pictures were achingly dull, polite, as the authors point out "ordered and harmonious bucolic." Only experts get the messy version AI really can generate images of ecologically accurate rewilding. This one made with Gemini, for instance, captures the messiness and chaos of a genuinely rewilded British landscape: However, it only does this when given highly specific instructions about species, landscapes, habitat types, and so on. In other words, you need to know what a rewilded landscape should look like in order to get a convinci