Here is a link to my internal review video from the review on Wednesday.
Here are some images from my research:
Coral PDF
Slime Mold PDF
Lichens:
Link to film for class:
Introducing a stockpile into a void creates a closed system. Where there was nothing now stands a set of entities, possibly simple or symbiotic that can survive from that resource and others use of that resource.
Depending on the complexity of the stockpile different simple forms of life can procreate. These allow for a large potential of tertiary organisms to inhabit the void. The void is a closed system through its own interactions but, there aren’t outer walls. The boundary created by the void of needed nutrients is permeable.
A system that takes advantage of a void in this manner requires a sort of input; a stockpile that won’t be depleted. Another manner of creation would be a beginning organism that created a void around itself. By consuming around itself it is no longer static. It goes from a limited and known object into a system that could be healthy. It has the potential to develop, and as long as long as there is little excess or squander we can consider it a healthy system.
As the initial organism develops an increased amount of tertiary systems the permeable membrane becomes important. Systems can come and go which means that energy in the void fluctuates, for either better or worse. That allows for the initial organism to become more complex and make use of other nutrients.
[The thing about I is, it only exists within a tenth-of-a-second of all its parts…when the neural architecture diffuses past some critical point and signals take just that much longer to pass from A to B— the system, well, decoheres…I shatters into we. It’s not just a human rule, or a mammal rule, or even an Earthly one. It’s a rule for any circuit that processes information, and it applies as much to the things we’ve yet to meet as it did to those we left behind.]
The Island, Peter Watts, page 14
Upon reading The Island by peter watts what really began to fascinate me is the idea of coherence and decoherence and the state at which one entity becomes two or vice versa. When is a complex system of parts a cohesive “I” and when it is a system of separate “I’s”? For example, if you take a system and spread it out, when does the communication time become long enough that one becomes two and what impact does this question have on the process of form-making?
According to the Merriam Webster dictionary, coherence has two distinct definitions. The first, as we normally think of coherence, is to hold together, firmly as parts of the same mass, becoming united in principles, relationships, or interests. The second definition relates to Quantum Coherence, which says that as long as all original possibilities of a system remain intact, the system is coherent, but when affected by an outside force, the system must choose which of the possibilities is true and therefore decoheres. The idea of “parts of the same mass” supports the question I brought up earlier “if you take a system and spread it out, when does the communication time become long enough that one becomes two?” but also triggered me to question what forms the cohesion in the first place, and does the amassing of parts have a limit? Can so many parts try to be of the same mass that it can no longer be one entity, but one mass that has two identities?
Focusing on the first definition, and the idea of massing and unmassing defining the coherency of an “I”, began to examine Elias Canetti’s Crowds and Power, and pulled some paragraphs for sketching ideas. The book focuses on crowds of people, but the rules and logics he pulls from the crowds of people could also apply to other material systems.
[2] “It is only in a crowd that man can become free of this fear of being touched. That is the only situation in which the fear changes into its opposite. The crowd he needs is the dense crowd, in which body is pressed to body; a crowd too whose psychical constitution is also dense, or compact, so that he no longer notices who it is that presses against him. As soon as a man has surrendered himself to the crowd, he ceases to fear its touch. Ideally, all are equal there; no distinctions count, not even that of sex. The man pressed against him is the same as himself. He feels him as he feels himself. Suddenly it is as though everything were happening in one and the same body.” –Elias Canetti, Crowds and Power
[3] “The crowd, suddenly there where there was nothing before, is a mysterious and universal phenomenon. A few people may have been standing together-five, ten, or twelve, not more; nothing has been announced, nothing is expected. Suddenly everywhere is black with people and more come streaming from all sides as though streets had only one direction. Most of them do not know what has happened and, if questioned, have no answer; but they hurry to be there where most other people are. There is determination in their movement which is quite different from the expression of ordinary curiosity. It seems as though movement of some of them transmits itself to the others. But that is not all; they have a goal which is there before they can find words for it. The goal is the blackest spot where people are gathered.” –Elias Canetti, Crowds and Power
[4] “For just as suddenly as it originates, the crowd disintegrates. In its spontaneous form is a sensitive thing. The openness which enables it to grow is, at the same time, its danger. A foreboding of threatening disintegration is always alive in the crowd. It seeks through rapid increase, to avoid this for as long as it can; it absorbs everyone, and, because it does, must ultimately fall to pieces.” –Elias Canetti, Crowds and Power
[6]” Only together can men free themselves from their burdens of distance; and this, precisely, is what happens in a crowd. During the discharge distinctions are thrown off and all fell equal. In that density where there is scarcely any space between, and body presses against body, each man is as near the other as he is to himself; and an immense feeling of relief ensues. It is for the sake of this blessed moment, when no-one is greater or better than another, that people become a crowd.” –Elias Canetti, Crowds and Power
The idea of the crowd in relation to architecture brings up the question of scale. I think it would be interesting to explore the idea of crowd accumulation at an architectural scale (how do many tiny pieces “crowd together” into a building?). It also brings up the idea of a larger, social/city scale, how do multiple organisms for one identity and create a city. How does this city spawn itself on a planetary scale or how does it become so dense that it splits into multiple “I’s”?
“We may die rich, we may die poor. But we certainly shall not die of boredom.” (Prince Roy Bates, of the Principality of Sealand)
When the Bates family took over the WWII anti-aircraft platform called Roughs Tower in the 1960s it was still outside of the British territorial waters. Since its conception, both sides of the argument have been debated for: is Sealand a sovereign state, or does it belong to the UK. (Because it does not show up on a Google Earth search it must not be real, right?).
Bates’s initial interest in creating his own country stemmed from his resistance to the control of the established and governed state—and having his own country with his own rules was convenient for his pirate radio broadcasting.
Bates’s resistance to authority paired well with the vision of young entrepreneurs Sean Hastings and Ryan Lackey, who had a “cypherpunk” vision, believing in a government-free vision of the internet that would promise unfettered speech to the people while pissing off authority and the fight for censorship around the world.
Here in this age of the digital we see an unbreakable tie between technology and the government: Internet laws have grown and developed since the 70s, when countries saw the need to enforce strict privacy standards on stored information due to concerns for large databases of personal information, and companies sought to relocate their computers and storage media to countries with looser laws.
Lackey and Hastings’ data haven company called HavenCo took advantage of the immunities a place like Sealand had, as a nation established with many of the same principles as their own company. The Bates family admitted that Lackey and Hastings were the “first that seemed to be really suited to what we are”.
HavenCo failed in a short amount of time, partially because of poor business planning and partially because of poor relations with the Sealand royal family.
Plans are already surfacing for various companies who have desires to locate organizations in the ocean, designed for data havens, tax evasion, response to immigration policies and even as a mean to experiment with new governing and political techniques. A unit that responds to the political needs, digital needs and tangible space as an integrated system, and not perpetual resistance, could be the key to success for organizations like these.
Overtime humanity has alerted the landscape to better fit their needs, to provide shelter, and comfort from the elements. Over time these structures evolved, and so did their building material point to the point that they began to dominate the natural landscape. Recently though, architecture has to tried to reconnect with the natural landscape, using form and materials to reestablish a connection to the roots of architecture using natural forms. Looking down the road new questions begin arise, especially the question of how do we get off earth. Freeman Dyson has approached this question, talking about how we need to grow spaceships, not build them. He goes on to explain the only two things holding us back right now is a way to get there, and a destination. Growing may quiet accurately be the best way to describe the solution, as bacteria has become a new building material.
Bacteria has already been thought about it various projects, such as Magnus Larrson’s Greenwall in Africa, which uses bascillus pasterurii to solidify sand, and produce shelter. Another mind studying this new material is Enricho Dini, who is working with the European Space Agency to grow a base on the moon. Bacteria is a prime building material due to its ability to rapidly reproduce, and adaptability, making it cheaper and faster than conventional building methods. This methodology of building has a wide range of potential, simply from growing a facade for a building, to turning a barren lands ape into a potential habitable city, to possibly even growing a planet.
A constant in history is the displacement and the movement of populations across the planet. Whether it is because of famine, drought, war, disease, and even environment disasters, humans have been traversing the face of the planet since the beginning. Most recently because of civil warfare in Syria that began in March 2011 the number of refugee has just exceeded 2 million people. However, environmental degradation has become one of the largest causes of refugees in the world. Coupled with poverty, inequity, and war the number of people who have been displaced is immense. The International Organization for Migration has determined in their World Migration Report 2010 that the “number of migrants has grown to 214 million, and the figure could rise to 405 million by 2050.”
“It is apparent that environment degradation and resource depletion may play a contributing role in affecting population movement, often filtered through contexts of poverty and inequity.” – Steve Lonergan
What I find extremely interesting is the immense numbers of people that are being displaced or the ones that already are. The potential for architectural intervention is incredible. Rem Koolhaas has said that “not only has architecture, as we traditionally conceive it, become too slow to keep up with development, in the end, it’s often unnecessary.” However, in the context of refugees, architecture has a much more temporary life span. The ability to innovate and to adapt to new climates and environment stimuli as people get displaced begins to shape and drive design. The constant construction and deconstruction of work allows for architecture and built design to begin evolve at a quicker pace and to begin to generate increasing novel work. However, the speed in which design needs to evolve coupled with the enormous and constantly growing population of the displaced creates incredibly opportunities for architecture.
With the exponentially growing process of technologies it is no longer absurd to say that everyone will have a device in their home that can 3d print. I would go even further and say that 3d printing technologies will become so common that every person on the planet, even the ones that are financially troubled, will have a 3d printer that can process the resources in its vicinity into building blocks for a temporary structure. However, an argument must be made that the technology needed to have such an advanced 3d printing system would also have geo-engineering technologies that can address the problem of environmental degradation as well. Migration is a global constant. People move willingly and unwillingly based on a multitude of reasons. Many are migrant workers that stay temporarily for a job opportunity and for others war and famine may force a population to relocate.
“…environment degradation is likely to produce “waves of environmental refugees that spill across border with destabilizing effects” on domestic order and international relations.” –Steve Lonergan
Lonergan breaks down environmental refugees into categories. There are those who are temporarily displace due to “environmental stresses such as an earthquake, or cyclone” and will eventually move back to their original location and there are those that are forced to relocate because their current environment cannot sustain their way of life or those who wish for an improved lifestyle. The architecture that I am aiming to pursue targets both of these types of refugees. The temporality of these structures lends itself to the question of what happens after they are used. Furthermore, I begin to ask the question of how can the temporalities of the structures address the destabilizing effects of both large scale environmental degradation concerns such as desertification and rising ocean levels as well as the ruins of warfare and natural disasters. The movie Code 46 envisions a future earth that is mostly desert with most life within cities.
To find inspiration on this thesis, I turned to the fashion industry and works of science fiction. The fashion industry deals with incredibly fast changing markets and tastes. The production of clothing, the shipping, the maintenance, the labor and the time spent designing each article creates an extremely wasteful and unsustainable practice. What happens to clothing after it comes out of style? In what ways can clothing be improved to become more sustainable? Timo Rissanen states that the “current disposability of clothing is problematic. While clothes are seemingly durable goods, they are often marketed as fast changing fashions” which in the greater scheme of things go hand in hand with designing for the displaced.
These thoughts can be easily broken down into 3 scales of approach. The largest scale would be migratory patterns of the future. Areas that have a higher risk of environmental degradation or even areas that are high in resources, which will be areas of conflict, will have higher chances of displacement. Locating these areas and using historical evidence to predict and the map out the areas in which the displacement will reach is vital to understanding how to begin to handle the second scale of approach. The second scale deals with the problem at the scale of a human. A structure for the displaced must be easy to deploy, easy to deconstruct and must be able to remediate the land post use. Shigeru Ban’s work with paper tubing is a one example of cost-effective, sustainable building techniques. The final scale is at the scale of building blocks. What tools are needed to embed information into the structures so that when they do decompose or get deconstructed they are able to remediate the land? What information should be embedded? Rogue Farm by Charles Stross hints at certain “hacks” that can begin to change genetic information in soil and the environment around the site in order to suit the demands. After watching Elysium the idea of drones that can be deployed to “print” and build new structures for displaced persons. Even existing technologies will be able to begin to inform me. Building construction methods such as Loam can be embedded with information.
The previous weeks for me have been spent on research into migration and displacement and the existing methods in handling these situations. Moving forward I want to begin to look into what technologies and methods I want to use in order to produce my mid-scale shelters that embody my small scale information. Ideas such as personal 3d printers, nano-machines that can produce building blocks from the environment, and the methods to get these technologies to the people in need are what I want to begin to look into. Most importantly I am researching the end result of the remediation and the process in which is gets there. What materials are easily degradable that can also carry with it certain materials that when in contact with air will change form. I have already begun making diagrams for studies on displacement.
The earth is in constant reconstruction. Organisms constantly collect and stockpile resources. Naturally waves, wind, even the moving earth are all effects that are prone to organize and move resources. Almost every action has an effect of stockpiling. By this definition all actions can be looked at as an organism. Biologically by consuming, certain elements are kept while others are condensed and discarded. This action is a form of grouping, redistribution.
There are many types of energies; kinetic, potential, chemical, and biological. These energies can be stored in a variety of different ways. Often in our lives we look for ways to compress, for efficient storing. This is a static form of storage, a simple stockpile. The effect of creating stockpiles also implies there to be a void left behind. This void, free space prompts a larger architectural question as to what is to fill in the void. Dispersed storage allows for a different type of interaction. The system for storing energy is permeable, able to be used by multiple parties.
Efficiencies for each type of consideration must be taken into account. Loss of energy as it changes forms and spreads to a different system. Sometimes reversible but also can be non-reversible. Is the storage system accumulating or decreasing? Is there a demand for the item in storage and how fast can it be consumed. A combustibility of sorts.
“excess and squander doesn’t begin until growth slows or stops.”
What do organisms do, are they restricted to completing tasks or can they just coexist. What possibilities are opened by looking at effects as organisms. A wave traveling along the ocean is a group of molecules that are interacting and spreading their influence as they go. Any action on the earth is an organism of a sense; some die young while others keep interacting for elongated periods of time.
How far can the planet be terraformed? Can organisms be created for our own purposes? Architecture can be the force that does this. Architecture can create effects on the landscape surrounding itself; maybe as a method of self-cooling or to create energy to support itself. The island creates waves around itself that break on the surrounding rocks drawing larger fish to eat the confused baitfish. The “green” trend has been working on making buildings that don’t have any negative effects on the environment. Why not create architecture that HAS possibly large effects on the known environment.
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