Dynamic Proprioception

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DYNAMIC PROPRIOCEPTION

by

Trevor Dykstra

A thesis in partial fulfillment of the require-ments for the degree

of Masters in Architecture

Montana State UniversityBozeman, MT

5_6.2005

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Of a thesis submitted by...

Trevor Dykstra

This thesis has been read by each member of the thesis commitee and has been found to be sat-isfactory regarding content, English usage, format, citations, bibliographic style, and consistency, and is ready for submission to the College of Arts and Archi-

tecture.

________________________________________________Micheal Everts, Commitee Chair/ Date

________________________________________________Bill Rea, Second Advisor/Date

________________________________________________Lori Ryker, Comittee Member/Date

________________________________________________Clark Llewellyn, Director/Date

_APPROVAL

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Statement of Permission of Use

In presenting this thesis in partial fulfillment of the requirements for a Master’s Degree

at Montana State University, I agree that the School of Architecture shall make it available

to borrowers.

If I have indicated my intention to copyright this thesis by including a copyright notice

page, copying is allowable only for scholarly purposes, consistent with “fair use” as pre-scribed in the U.S. Copyright Law. Requests

for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this thesis in whole or in parts may be granted only by the copyright holder.

____________________________________Trevor Dykstra / 5.06_2005

6a special thanks to those who have influenced my ideas.

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_Chapter.List

1. Standing on the Brink – Intro and statement - page 09

2. _construction.documentation - page 13

4. Thesis Statement - page 19

5. Hacking the Architectural Mainframe - page 22

6. _site.Introduction - page 33

7. _Interaction Technologies - page 48

8. _Object Experimentation - page 56

9. _program.Introduction - page 61

10. Robotics Research - page 75

11. _program.diagramming - page 83

12. paranoia and the techno-apocalypse - page 89

13. swarm intelligence - page 99

14. _conclusion - page 106

15. Bibliography - page 109

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What follows is a series of investigations and derivations.Some which lead me to the thesis statement, and some of which the thesis

inspired. Above is a diagram that shows the branching structure and interactions of the following essays, investigations, and precedents

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“The future is here. It’s just not widely distributed yet.”

William Gibson

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The architectural world has begun to dip its’ toes into the digital pool, testing the waters, preparing to dive in. How we uti-lize new technologies becomes an ever increasing and critical sub-ject. The fundamental intent of new wave blobitecture is no differ-ent then the architecture of the 20th or even the 5th century. These architectures are still non-interacting objects in the landscape even if that landscape is virtual and the dynamic architectures that have emerged recently reside only in a virtual space. The technology exists to create an architecture that interacts on a very direct level with humanity, however we have yet to implement this into the built realm. Moving away from using technology for the golly gee effect and towards a more critical improvement upon the world we inhabit can do this. The computer image no longer impresses at face value, generations (mine included) have grown up with the computer and it doesn’t excite just because it exists. I propose that architecture lead the charge in creating a meaningful techno-experience and not just an orgy of computational glory. In this new digital environ-ment we must strive to harness new technologies as extensions of our creative expression, if we as Architects, designers, etc. fail to do so, we reduce our formerly creative professions to a flock of skilled technicians which will lead to homogenous design on a global scale and destroying all cultural distinctions, emotions etc. In a world of extreme information overload and technical prowess the things that make us human become ever important. Our humanity can be improved and reinforced if we utilize new ideas and technolo-gies in a manner that supports the idea of progressive experiencial experimentation. An interactive dynamic architecture can teach us things about our environments and ourselves in ways never before possible.

While the rest of the world slams forward driving progress, archi-tecture assigns values to these innovations based on their relative use. That is to say that most things “technical” that architects utilize were designed with some other discipline in mind. AutoCAD the most ubiquitous program among firms was designed for engineers, rapid prototyping and computer controlled milling was designed

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for manufactuers, virtual reality and the internet was originally for the military, every major technological innovation in architecture was built for a different purpose and pioneer architects hacked that concept and transformed it into something they could use. Then the architectural community at large, seeing these new technologies and incorrectly guessing that the technology would make their designs better just by sheer virtue of utilizing it, jumped on board. Designs in schools and firms the world around have become increasingly ubiquitous, if we continue to design using the standard filters and routines of the design software we use we risk creating a generation of architecture that does nothing more than demonstrate how nice a photoshop lens flare looks. This is continuing to happen because most designers have approached these technologies in the same traditional ways which has only yielded architectures that function within those traditional values not within the landscape of the tech-nology they utilize, architecture needs a new way of thinking about its creation, instead of that of the realm of statics and that of the world of dynamic unpredictability. Neil Spiller put it much better than I could when he said:“Many architects still hide behind the computer, happily dressing up virtual images of their buildings in digital lipstick in the hope of se-ducing clients. Such practitioners are merely seeing the computer as a glorified air-brush. Weaker students are also prone to this critical error and do not recognize the potential of the technology at their fingertips. Even so, the technology still needs to evolve before the full importance of computers in the pursuance of architecture is fully understood by the profession. Advances in software interoperability and computer aided manufacture will leave only the most prehistoric architect untouched and like their prehistoric colleagues, liable to extinction.” How will architecture address the changing world of inter-active technologies, will we continue to remain stolid monoliths in a hyper kinetic world of techno-humanity, or will architecture rise up as it did in the past and drive innovation, design and philosophy? I

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propose an architecture of interactivity that mediates the envi-ronment and those things within the environment that are outside the range of human perception in a very dynamic way.

“Anyone wanting to produce architecture should discard the pre-concieved boundaries of the discipline and learn from architec-ture wherever it is found, whatever it is made of, whoever it is made by.”1

Trevor Dykstra11.08_04 + 4.21_2005

1. Hill, Jonathan. Actions of Architecture. Architects and Creative Uses. pg. 136

16_construction.documentation

Presentation DVD

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DVD Chapter List

CHAPTER LIST AND DVD TO BE HANDED OUT AT PRESENTATION

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coding of image tags

ex. 22._45

The 1st number is the page on which the image is found and the 2nd is where a similiar image can be found.

DVD Tagsex. DVD._Chapter #This links you to a specific chapter on the DVD

The goal of these tags is to provide a more interactive ex-perience from the book, allowing the user to get what they want out of it. There is a very large amount of information here and instead of overwhelming the audience with all of it at once I’ve provided a more restrained contact with that information. The DVD, hopefully should contain almost ev-erything I’ve created this year and the relative tags within

the book should help the audience to explore it.

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THESIS STATEMENT-

WHAT - We’ve always been surrounded by ecologies (systems and relationships of information) but up until recent advances in technology our greater understanding of the influences these ecologies have had on society and one another has been truncated. Now with computational advances, those ecologies and the connections between those ecologies are more apparent.

WHY - In understanding the ecologies around us, we are able to design for the system of the world, not just the state. Design is influenced and illustrates these systems and in turn allows us to change and control these systems.

HOW - We can easily “look” at these ecologies on graphs and charts, (at first staticly, and now in real time.) but simply looking at these ecologies does not give us any truly meaning-ful understanding. I looked to my generations tool of view-ing data and computationally processed information, the videogame, when playing a video game users step into an environment and occupy it totally within there minds. This state of transposing the “limbs” of the body, outside of the human form is called proprioception. Using our natural ability of proprioception we can occupy these ecologies that have been displayed using computational technologies. Unfortunately, with videogames there is a disjoint from reality, we stop our natural activity to view images on a screen there for it is not enough just to inact proprioception. Architecture can take these ideas of the game world and place them into our natural environments, putting the human body in a constant state of proprioception. In this way we(humanity) are always living in the flow, we see and control ecologies we previously only viewed as changing numbers in a column or changing lines on a graph. Now humanity is poised to draw new con-nections between ecologies, children may experience the shift-ing economics of the globe and understand the consequences of actions.

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HACKING the ARCHITECTURAL Mainframe.

Main Entry: 1hack Pronunciation: 'hak Function: verb

4 a : to write computer programs for enjoyment b : to gain access to

a computer illegally

A slang term for a computer enthusiast, i.e., a person who enjoys learning programming languages and computer systems and can often be considered an expert on the subject(s). Among professional programmers, depend-ing on how it used, the term can be either complimentary or derogatory, although it is developing an increasingly derogatory connotation. The pejorative sense of hacker is becoming more prominent largely because the popu-lar press has co-opted the term to refer to individuals who gain unauthorized access to computer systems for the purpose of stealing and corrupting data. Hackers, themselves, maintain that the proper term for such indi-

viduals is cracker.1

“Playfully doing something difficult, whether useful or not, that is hacking.”

Richard Stallman

Is an architect a hacker? A hacker quickly and expertly analyzes an existing sys-tem with the goal of either understanding it or to create a new use for that existing sys-tem. An architect has to quickly and expertly analyze their clients and their programs for the purpose of creating a new space within an existing framework be it property line, ur-ban context etc. Hackers are able to see the “space” of a system in a completely different way than was intended perhaps even in a way that system should be seen, they’re able to burrow within the system to discover the hidden 1 http:/www.webopedia.com

hacking the architectural mainframe

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pathways and systems that reside within that space. The architectural mainframe can also be called SITE+ in that it describes something beyond the geographic location. SITE+ can include political sites, data sites, radiation zones, emotional landscapes, or any other perceivable or unperceivable element. In or-der to discover and analyze SITE+, the archi-tect must learn from the actions of the hacker as every site will be different and present a completely different set of relationships. This is in contrast to a simply geographic site which may occur more than once in nature, but with SITE+ each site presents an individual chal-

lenge and unique identity.

Research into the field of reflexive archi-tecture has been ongoing for several years, but the products of this research have mostly been in the virtual realm. There’s nothing wrong with architectural investigations into the virtual, but when will these ideas be ex-tended into the school down the street or to the home next door? The argument has been that things such as occupancy and accessi-bility aren’t conducive to a full investigation of the reflexive. But if the Code is defined instead by the constraints of the life-safety risks of a particular SITE+ then it becomes a design tool and generator rather than a bar-

rier to progressive experimentation.

Reflexivity 1 a : directed or turned back on itself b : marked by or capable of reflection : REFLECTIVE 2 : of, relating to, characterized by, or being a relation that exists between an entity and itself <the relation "is


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equal to" is reflexive but the relation "is the father of" is not> 3 : of, relating to, or constituting an action (as in "he per-jured himself") directed back on the agent or the gram-

matical subject2

“Many of the operations, vectors and machine-augmented processes of the city are seldom seen as ecologies. Such agglomerations of matter and events contribute to the palimpsest of the city. These palimpsests, which are human culture’s largest artifacts, are the prima mate-

ria of architectures of reflexivity.”3

SITE+ brings the palimpsests of Neil Spiller’s essay to the surface of perception be looking

within itself.

The word palimpsest refers to a parchment that has been reused, usually the original text was erased or washed out and then the parchment was reused, this usually happened in monaster-ies where new parchment was scarce and ex-pensive to prepare. There is a subtle underlying strata to this parchment, the upper and visible area contains a religious document, but below that exists a part of a book written by Archime-des that’s was thought to be missing for the last several centuries. For years this document was viewed in a certain way, perhaps never utilizing its full potential; now due to a deconstruction and careful invasion of that document a whole new realm is opened. The underlying elements now take on the same or more value than the overlay; perhaps, the things that go on beyond perception are those that must become the most important to an architecture which illustrates these palimpsests to the individual. Futurist Bruce

2. Merriam Webster Online. http://www.m-w.com

3. Spiller, Neil ed. Reflexive Architecture. Architectural Design, May 2002 page 21


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Sterling, recently stated in an interview that “If the invisible were made visable it would have a profoundly transformative effect on human behavior and our attitudes towards the world around us.”4 These things can tell us more about

ourselves and our environments.

Architectural Interactivity

We live in a world of prosthesis’s, objects which we interact with in a manner such that they become an extension of our being. This ex-tension beyond the form is called propriocep-tion which is defined as the reception of stimuli produced within the organism. In Hypersurface Architecture, Lars Spuybroek makes the case for an architecture that taps into this concept, “With practice and training, the movements of the prosthesis can become second nature, and regardless of whether it is of flesh, wood or – a little more complex – of metal, as in the case of a car. That is the secret of the anima-tion principle: the body’s inner phantom has an irrepressible tendency to expand, to integrate every sufficiently responsive prosthesis into its motor system, its repertoire of movements, and make it run smoothly. That is why the car is not an instrument or a piece of equipment that you simply sit in, but something you merge with.”5 The car has become a major interactive and en-hancing element of our lives allowing the body to extend itself beyond the boundaries of its

form.

We are already becoming coded for

4. Sterling, Bruce. 2003. Futurist and Social Critic. [Interview: CIUT Radio] Dec. 2nd5. Toy, Maggie ed. Hypersurface Architecture. Architectural Design, May 1998 page 49


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thinking outside of our simple perceptions; vid-eo games of recent history have taught us that we can think within a virtual realm through an avatar. In the game Mario Brothers, a gamer no longer sees a moving image on a television screen, that gamer “sees” through the charac-ters eyes functioning within the characters world and time. Gamers learn to time their jumps and actions to the simulated gravity of the game space. Another game, Half-Life, one of the most popular computer games ever made, places the gamer in the first-person perspec-tive of star Gordon Freeman. As Dr. Freeman the gamer must navigate a world inhabited by alien monsters and mutated human beings us-ing a variety of weapons not constrained by traditional physics and science. A successful gamer uses the command structure of the game to explore and react to the elements on screen. In this way, the avatar, Gordon Freeman, is a prosthetic of the gamer. In golf one key to a good swing is thinking of the club as an exten-sion of the arm, a good golfer doesn’t just use an instrument he becomes part of that instru-ment. As Ty Webb says in Caddyshack, “Just be the ball, be the ball, be the ball.” Perhaps the most interesting thing about preprioception is the simple fact that it’s something only humans and not machines can do, a computer program

can reason no farther than its inputs. Architecture can also move beyond a simple form for occupation and on to an exten-sion of the human consciousness. The way in which we code the interaction with this architec-tural appendage becomes another part of the architect’s role. There is no standard for this interface, no QWERTY keyboard, no mouse or


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trackball. Much like any interface device there will be a learning curve, but architects as the designers of this system can play a role in allevi-ating this curve. If the interface device becomes ergonomic beyond the traditional theories of the form and into the realm of ergonomic to human perception and brain-structure, the interface be-comes intuitive instead of learned. This interface then in turn acts upon the architecture and allows the architecture to act upon the user. This inter-face can extend beyond the human pilot and to the influence of the surrounding environment and in turn allow the architecture to become the interface between the human and the environ-ment. This allows for entirely new experiences, like experiencing the life of a water molecule for instance. Nox Architecture and Oosterhuis.nl collaborated on the Fresh Water and Salt Wa-ter pavilions for the FreshH2O eXPO. The final creation was two joined buildings both with a

focus on interactivity within the architecture.

The designer describes the experience like this:The continuous surface of the interior is covered with different sensing devices. Imagine walking or running up the central slope towards a wire-frame projection on the floor. In the course of this you activate a series of light sensors and step right into the projection, where you are cov-ered in a grid of light. The waves begin activat-ing more sensors and creating more waves…The vertigo of the motor system is inextricably linked to sensory hallucination. At the same time, the pulse of light is going through the sp(L)ine – a line of numerous blue lamps – is speeded up


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6. Toy, Maggie ed. Hypersurface Architecture. Architectural Design, May 1998 page 49


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by the crowd sensor, ripples suddenly shoot out from you feet: circular decaying waves in the wire-frame projection. Somebody else jumps on to the second sensor, a few metres away from you. Ripples then shoot out from their feet too, interfer-ing with your ripples halfway. As you both begin to jump up and down you are pushing away the sound and activating the light running along the sp(L)ine: suddenly a high level of blue light splits in two and slowly fades away. Further on, a sphere is projected in wireframe on a steep slope be-tween handles that are gently operated by four people. Their action causes the sphere to deform in as many directions, while at the same time ‘pulls the sound’ from the Well. With their hardest pull-ing action, the light on the sp(L)ine is frozen in the

last position.6

The nOX pavilion includes static and dynamic ar-chitectural pieces, the static are built and the dy-namic are projections, although this is a quick way of creating a dynamic element that does indeed interface with existing technology, it doesn’t allow for any topographical change. The detail of a projection, while it does change the space of the object, is rather hollow, if it were possible to make the floor surface ripple the third dimensional spa-tial change could have a much greater impact on

the perceptions of interaction.

Precedent_SITE+: The Fall. Lebbeus Woods

“While the space of the fall isn’t for everyone, it is part of an emerging reality few will be able to avoid or escape. It is an experimental domain where limits of all kinds are tested for those will-ing to take risks and embrace changes. It may be a foretaste of what is to come for a society

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that cares more for progress than security and values liberty above certainty. It may also be a glimpse into what architecture might become if it invests its creative capital less in the struggle against gravity and more in seeing what might

happen when we let go.” -Lebbeus Woods7

With the installation piece, The Fall, Leb-beus Woods set his architecture within the land-scapes/trajectories of the trauma surrounding a fallen building, the political aftermath of such an event and within the physics of the moment of the fall. The Fall was presented in the Cartier Foundation Building and although it is build to physically fit within this realm the architecture also critically addresses the other parts of the site that it resides within. This is a great ex-ample of utilizing a site that is much more than a geographic location and takes architecture into

other realms of societal effect.

The SITE+ can and will be occupied by human-ity, but only when we have a architecture which allows us to truly interact/percieve the palimp-

sests that make up that landscape.


7. Virilio, Paul. Unknown Quantity. Thames and Hudson. New York, New York. 2002. page 156

32The Archimedes Palimpsest

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Pablo Picasso“The Bullfighter”

Light Drawing


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Operating RoomPriyapat, UkraineZones of Exclusion


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Half-Life 2Valve Entertainment

PC27.35


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Super Mario BrothersNintendo Entertainment System

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Model of “The Fall”Lebbeus Woods

Installation 200229


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_SITE.Introduction

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40_SITE.introduction

History:

On April 25th -26th, 1986 the World’s worst industrial accident occurred at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) in the southeast of what was then the USSR (now Ukraine) about 80 miles north of Kiev. The nuclear power plant had 4 reac-tors and while testing reactor number 4, the main reactor, numerous safety proce-dures were disregarded. At 1:23AM, the stability of the reactor shifted out of con-trol as dispersed fuel came in contact with water in the reactor, causing 2 separate explosions and a fireball which blew off the reactor’s heavy steel and concrete lid.

REACTOR 4 MAIN CONTROL ROOM

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1. http://www.chernobyl.co.uk

SIDE BAR

THE NAMES OF CHERNOBYL AND PRIPIAT CAN BE TRANSLATED SEV-ERAL WAYS ALL OF WHICH MAY BE USED IN THE FOLLOWING PAGES.

PRIPJAT

PRYPJAT

PRIPIAT

PRIPYAT

CHERNOBYL

CHORNOBYL

TSCHERNOBYL

2. http://library.thinkquest.org/3426/data/disaster/timeline.html

The resultant fire fueled by the graphite from the nuclear core, burned for days while fire-fighters battled the blaze, the interior of the reactor, as described by videographers that were sent over the blaze to assess the situation for the government, was like a small volcano the graphite burned so hot

The Chernobyl accident killed more than 30 people immediately, and as a result of the high radiation levels in the surrounding 20-mile ra-dius, 135,00 people had to be evacuated.1

Since that time, it has been estimated that 400,000 people have died from radiation poisoning from the accident. The events at the Chernobyl plant quickly had a global impact as winds carried radiation away from the U.S.S.R and over Europe and beyond. See continental map The town of Pripyat became a ghost town in less than 48 hours, the buildings remain as a monument to the old soviet ways, slowly decaying. Building number 4 was entombed in a lead and concrete “sarcoughagus” to prevent the highly radioactive material within from spreading radiation outward, this casing was hastily built and as a result is beginning to decay very rapidly. The United Nations has undertaken steps recently to build a new shelter over Reactor 4 which should hopefully stand up for a longer amount of time. Reactors 2 and 3 remained in use until 1999 when they were decommissioned and powered down for the last time.

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Timeline of eventsApril 25

Day 1 1:00 am The reactor was running at full power with normal operation. Steam power was directed to both turbines of the power generators. Slowly the operators began to reduce power for the test. The purpose of the test was to observe the dynamics of the RMBK reactor with limited power flow.

1:05 pm Twelve hours after power reduction was initiated the reactor reached 50% power. Now only one turbine was needed to take in the decreased amount of steam caused by the power decrease and turbine #2 was switched off.

2:00 pm Under the normal procedures of the test the reactor would have been reduced to 30% power, but the Soviet electricity authorities refused to allow this because of an apparent need for electricity elsewhere, so the reactor remained at 50% power for another 9 hours.

April 26Day 2

12:28 am The Chernobyl staff received permission to resume the reac-tor power reduction. One of the operators made a mistake. Instead of keeping power at 30%, he forgot to reset a controller which caused the power to plum-met to 1% because of water which was now filling the core, and xenon (a neutron absorber) which was building up in the reactor. This amount of power was too low for the test. The water added to the reactor is heated by the neuclear reaction and turned into steam to turn the turbines of the generator.

1:00-1:20 am The operator forced the reactor up to 7% power by removing all but 6 of the control rods. This was a violation of porcedure and the reactor was never built to operate at such low power. The RBMK reactor is unstable when its core is filled with water. The operator tried to take over the flow of the water which was returning from the turbine manually which is very difficult because small temperature changes can cause large power fluctuations. The operator was not succesful in getting the flow of water corrected and the reactor was getting increasingly unstable. The operator disabled emergency shutdown procedures because a shutdown would abort the test.

1:22 am By 01:22, when the operators thought they had the most stable conditions, they decided to start the test. The operator blocked automatic shut-down on low water level and the loss of both turbines because of a fear that a shutdown would abort the test and they would have to repeat tests.

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1:23 am(The test begins) The remaining turbine was shut down1:23:40 am Power in the reactor began to gradually rise because of the reduction in water flow caused by the turbine shutdown which lead to an increase in boiling. The operator initiated manual shut down which lead to a quick power increase due to the control rod design.

1:23:44 am Disaster Point- The reactor reached 120 times its full power. All the radioactive fuel disintegrated, and pressure from all of the excess steam which was supposed to go to the turbines broke every one of the pressure tubes and blew off the entire top shield of the reactor.

1:30 am. Fire fighting crews respond and attempt to extinguish the fire that was in danger of spreading to the roof of building 3.

2:10 am the first 29 causalties arrive at the pripiat hospital

5:00am All fires but the graphite fire in the core extinguished

11:00am Emergency teams fly to kiev from moscow

9:00pm after unsucessfully trying to cool the fire by using existing reactor pumps the emergency teams decide two things: to contain the accident at the source by covering the shaft with heat-absorbent and filtering materials; or to allow the combustion process in the reactor to come to an end on their own accord. They chose to go with the first strategy and attempt to quell the fire in the reactor with heat-absorbent materials. As the initial plume missed pripiat evacuations still had not taken place and at this time the committee decided to evacuate the city in a different direction than intialing planned.

April 27Day 3

1:13am Unit number 1 shut down

2:13am Unit number 2 shut down, staff finds radioactive contamination in all 3 other reactor buildings,caused by ventilation system which transported debris.

2:00pm evacutation of pripiat officially announced,.

4:45pm 45,000 people evacuated by this point, mass exodus took approx. 2 hours and 45 minutes.3

3. Mould, Richard. Chernobyl: The Real Story. Pergamon Press, New York, New York. Pg.s 18-19

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After the evacuation, Soviet officials kept all mention of the Chernobyl incident out of the press until May 7th. Images, video, maps and other information was subsequently buried from outside interests.3 As a result of this existing site information about Chernobyl isn’t easily attainable even in today’s post-Soviet world. Areas of the city are still too contami-nated to enter, buildings that faced the reactor with open windows trapped radiation within the walls and now are hotspots of radioactive material. The soil around the zone contains, in many cases, extremely high amounts of radio-activity. The Pripyat river occasionally floods the plains around the Chernobyl lake and flushes radioactive silt down the river into to Kiev reservoir which supplies drinking water to the city of Kiev. As a result extensive construc-tion efforts have been undertaken along the banks of the river and lake to prevent radio-active silt from being washed into the drinking supply.

The site isn’t a complete loss though, as the buildings and man-made elements begin to decay, nature has begun to retake the site. In fact the eco-system has become suprisingly vi-brant, in 2000’s Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry reported:During recent visits to Chernobyl, we experienced numerous sightings of moose (Alces alces), roe deer (Capreol capreolus), Russian wild boar (Sus scrofa), foxes (Vulpes vulpes), river otter (Lutra canadensis), and rabbits (Lepus europaeus) within the 10-km exclusion zone. We observed none of those taxa except for a single rabbit outside the 30-km zone, although the time and extent of search in each region is comparable. The

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top carnivores, wolves and eagles, as well as the endan-gered black stork are more abundant in the 30-km zone than outside the area. Trapping of small rodents in the most radioactive area within the 10-km zone has yielded greater success rates than in uncontaminated areas [7]. Diversity of flowers and other plants in the highly radio-active regions is impressive and equals that observed in protected habitats outside the zone 4

With this nature preserve-like setting, the need for a controlled human environment in which to observe this area becomes more important. While the buildings may eventually disappear the mark of man will not disappear for sev-eral centuries. The subtely shifting landscapes lends itself to an architecture that can take this changing information and allow humanity to oc-cupy/interact with it.

4. Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, Vol.19, No.5, pp.1231-1232, 2000

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Chernobyl, UkraineSatellite Image

image courtesy of NASA2_1.39.42

_SITE.introduction


Overhead View of Pripiat, Ukraine, looking east towards

Chernobyl NPP2_2.40.43


Ukraine Road Map2_3.39.44

PRIPYAT


Building survey of Pripiat and surrounding area.Ukraine Geological Ministry

1:25,000 excerpt2_4.36.45

site


Radiation Map2_5.35.46

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Sarcoughagus40.73

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53interaction technologies

Interaction w/Technologies

Almost every man-made object in the world today contains some sort of interactive proper-ties, these interactions create a space around our lives. Around these technologies entirely new social dynamics and worlds have sprung up, entire languages have been crafted out of the precepts of these technologies. Recently on an episode of Jeporody! someone bid 1337 dollars, which to the average individual might seem like a completely random number but to those in the know the contestant had written a word in Leet (or elite) speak. The language emerged from online computer gaming due to the place-ment of the hands. In a typical PC game one hand resides on the letters of the average keyboard the other on either the mouse or more common in the past, on the number pad. One way to communicate without having to break gam-ing posture, was to use as little of the letters as possible and use number substitutes, hence 1337 would be L-E-E-T short for elite. This type of language set isn’t constricted to the gaming community though, Palm invented an entirely new language for its’ palm pilot handheld computer called graffiti, this language is a kind of written shorthand that takes the basic motions of writing a letter and makes that the letter itself. Due to new types of technology new types of interactions are being created, with these new interactions different cultural behavior emerges, and if architecture is designed around cultural examples, then new types of architecture emerge due to technologi-cal innovation. Flash mobs have sprung up sur-rounding the ability to quickly send a message to a very large group and the ability to relay that message to others (i.e. IM, text-messaging, email, cell-phones etc.). These mobs comprise a new style of spatial interaction, one not only driven by very specific time and place but also

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by the actions of others and they are created and defined by the amorphous network of tech-nology that distributed them.

The Institute of Illegal Architects“The illegal architect questions and subverts the established codes and conventions of architec-tural practice, and acknowledges that architec-ture is made by use and design.”1 Jonathan Hill postulates that in order for architecture to be-come more critical, architects must recognize that users will come up with other creative uses for the spaces we create. Dubbing those who came up with these ideas, illegal architects because those inventors had no legal right to the title architect. The assertion was that some of the major ideas to influence architecture come from outside the field of architecture. The uses of space by those other than the designer create a dialog, this dialog takes place between the user, the designer and the space, architecture can then be designed with this dialog in mind.

BIOFEEDBACK

Wild Divine is a new type of computer game in which the actions within the game are controlled by the thoughts of the user. Wearing three finger sensors that track your body’s heart rate variabil-ity and skin conductance, you move through en-chanting and mystical landscapes using the power of your thoughts, feelings, breath and awareness.

Wise mentors guide you throughout the realm, empowering you with yoga, breathing and medi-tation skills needed to complete over 40 biofeed-back ‘energy’ events.

1. Hill, Jonathan. Actions of Architecture. Architecture and Creative Uses. pg. 135

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Build stairways with your breath, open doors with meditation, juggle balls with your laugh-ter, and so much more. The Journey makes biofeedback, a popular method of alternative healthcare, easily accessible and empowers you to take mind-body wellness, literally, into your own hands.2 The program utilizes what has been refered to as biofeedback, a network of sen-sors which feed into a computer program that translates the heartrate, skin conductance etc. into elements the game can understand. This illustrates a precedent for control outside of the standard conditions.

The unpredictability of interaction.

“When design aims only at enabling a desired stability--social, economic, psychological--the goals are determined in advance. A space is deemed ‘functional,’ if it can be used in the way the designer prescribed and, presumably, the client or anticipated users intended. But when, as is often the case today, the goal is to enable unpredictability, to give people a high degree of freedom in how and why they need or use designed space, it is no longer possible to think of function, or purpose, or meaning as we have before. Mere ‘flexibility,’ in the old sense of adapting a form designed for one purpose to another purpose or the same form to a variety of purposes, misses the point. What we need are entirely new ways of thinking and working. The fall instructs us as to what these need to be.”3 An interactual space derives from a prescribed system of the SITE+. In the case of this thesis, the system comes from the topologies of radia-tion, landscape, politics and kinetics.

2. http://www.wilddivine.com3. Virilio, Paul. Unknown Quantity. pg. 159


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Precedent_Interaction:Oosterhuis.NL MUSCLE + MUSCLE reConfigured

“For the exhibition Non-Standard Architecture ONL realizes a working prototype of the Trans-ports project, called the MUSCLE · Program-mable buildings can reconfigure themselves mentally and physically, probably without considering to completely displace themselves like the Walking City as poposed by Archigram in 1964 · Programmable buildings change shape by contracting and relaxing industrial muscles · The MUSCLE is a pressurized soft volume wrapped in a mesh of tensile Festo muscles, which can change their own length · Orchestrated motions of the individual muscles change the length, the height, the width and thus the overall shape of the MUSCLE prototype by varying the pressure pumped into the 94 swarming muscles · The balanced pressure-tension combination bends and tapers in all directions ·

Out of control

The public connects to the MUSCLE by sensors, and by input through sliders on the computer screen · The sensors are attached to the refer-ence points of the construction · Coming closer to the sensors triggers a reaction of the MUSCLE as a whole · The public will discover within some minutes how the MUSCLE reacts on their actions, and soon the public starts to find a goal in the play · Another way to communicate with the

MUSCLE is to operate the sliders on the computer screen · Bringing the slider to the right probably means that the selected area moves to right · But meanwhile ONL has programmed the MUSCLE to have a will of its own · The MUSCLE may not want to go there, and may try to crawl back · Then a true interaction starts, and the outcome of the transaction process may be unpredictable · The MUSCLE is the prototype for an environment that is slightly out of control · A prototype for a building which is pro-active rather than responsive and obedient to the user · Communication first starts when there are two pro-active parties involved · The utimate goal is to develop an individual character for the MUSCLE

during its 3 month performance at the Centre Pompidou ·”4

The interaction takes on a more meaningful, or at least more thought out interaction in the case of the MUSCLE projects, instead of an architec-ture that is completely autonomous or an archi-tecture that is completely relient on humanity, Oosterhuis creates something that flirts with that boundary. In this case the elements of MUSCLE’s


4. http://www.oosterhuis.nl/quickstart/in-dex.php?id=11

57interaction technologies

“intelligence” or “will” have been specifically programmed but the architect still does not have complete control of the final shape as it is determined by an amalgamation of random dynamic inputs.

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Promotional Image for The Journey to Wild Divinehttp://www.wilddivine.com

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“cuishicle”Archigram 1966

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_object.experimentation

61_object.experimentation

_ObJECT eXPERIMENTATION

Utilizing the contruction of architectural objects to investigate design principles.

_ROCKING.h0rse v.1

This rocking horse became an investiga-tion into creating an experiencial pros-thesis. The _horse is set within the site of a simple lighting system and functions as a prosthetic operator/occupier of that system. The system was build to recog-nize the human scale and experience of being placed with the network. The light-ing becomes almost a background system while the sites of human emotions such as fear are cultivated to a greater degree. By situating the architecture within the system in such a manner that areas that trigger emotion must be used in order to fully control/view that system. The weight is off centered so it becomes easier to shift in one direction and more difficult in the other, in this case rocking forward (relative to the direction the user is facing) is increasingly easy while rocking back-ward becomes more and more scary as the speed and height of rotation increase. The light bulbs are controlled by a simple gravity type sensor, a pvc tube filled with ball-bearings that travel along the path as the _horse rocks. The motion sensors also recieve enough outside light to be trigger by motion outside of the tube in certain instances this creates a non-ratio-nal type of output, that is to say, instead of the lights lighting up in a row, the turn on and off in a much more random way. The wiring and conduit inside the object is left exposed to show the logic of the sys-tem, this allows users to understand and create new goals for the object.


On December 9th, this object will be put on public display, this is when architecture of the object becomes apparent. In the con-stant interaction with the interface, a spatial reasoning appears.


Successes and Failures:

Successes:

The project successfully hooks those who come within its territory, setting the object in a hallway its style and kinetic dynamic drew people close to it, trying to examine what it was exactly and what it does.

Failures:

I don’t think the project investigated the idea of a prosthetic interaction with an existing system. As the project was de-signed without a specific system in mind. I feel the next version could be much more successful with a more critical investigation of the site/system in which the object resides.

Lessons Learned:

The kinetic and mechanical complexity of the object seemed to draw people into the object, that and the appear-ance of something that resembles a seat. With simple wiring techniques it becomes fairly easy to create systems which may have complex interactions but are actual of a somewhat minimal design.

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_PROGRAM.introduction

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Pripyat Expeditionary Unit_1

-intent: Create a facility that will allow researchers to inves-tigate the effects of post-nuclear catastrophe and experiment with the realities of dwelling in an extreme habitat of unknown quantity. The facility, (referred to as the Terminal) occupies the landscape of Pripyat in a way that goes beyond human per-ception, the unperceivable qualities of the site such as radiation make up a very critical and important landscape that must be build with respect to, or risk human life. This project will serve as a stepping stone to research and development into the habi-tation of the zone which up to this point has been assumed to be off-limits, for the rest of the forseeable future. The facility will function as a node for the swarm of _POD’s that explore the area. _POD’s are lab structures in the same vein as the space shuttle or the international space station, these structures have been designed to the specifications of each group that is conducting research within the zone, some may be autono-mous and some may be manned. The terminal allows research-ers to process the raw data being mined in the exterior areas by the _POD network. At the same time the project illustrates the ability for architecture to function as prosthesis to human perception, allowing mankind to occupy the realm of the man-made/natural blur. This also should serve as a prototype for

occupation of other extreme environments.

-Specific Site Notes: The site I’ve chosen lies on the axis of the two main transit connections to the site, the river and the railroad. They intersect just northeast of the Chernobyl NPP and at this intersection the building will situate itself.

sq. footage: appx 13500 sq.ft

Programmatic Requirements:

- NO Hard Lab spaces (chemical, technical) are required as they will appear in the roving _POD labs.

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- “Lab” Areas consist of a proprioceptive interaction with the data acquired by the _PODs- Temporary Living Space for up to 6 residents/crew- Kitchen- 1 Toilet Facility- 1 Shower Facility- Operations (Building/Train/Dock) Center- Towers with connections to a shifting variety of information- Wall Structure with connections to internal social dynamics- Floor Structure with connections to external social dynam-ics or other information set.- Ceiling Structure that translates the “health” of the build-ing elements into architectural form.- Moveable Dock, shifts with changing river heights.

CODE and SITE+I could design this building to the specifications of the code but that would yield a building that is completely unsafe for the site conditions. Therefore a new code for buildings has to be written, as each SITE+ is entirely different each building requires a unique code in order to pre-serve the safety of the occupants. The major dangers of this SITE come from radiation and severely degrading buildings, while dead loads, ac-cessibility standards, etc. are still extremely important they do not drive

the design.

MATERIALS

Radiation – Radiation is the most important “material” on this site, ev-ery part of the zone has been immersed in a radioactive environment for a large period of time (over 18 years) and will continue to be for at least 25,000 years.

A Quick Primer – Radiation is caused by unstable isotope of molecules (more neutrons than protons) when these molecules throw off particles (bonded neutrons and protons) to become stable it is described as de-cay. The rate at which these atoms decay is very unpredictable in small quantities but in large quantities it becomes extremely predictable. In a situation where a large amount of decaying molecules is present, the time it takes for half of those molecules to decay to the point of being stable is referred to as the half-life.

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There are three different types of decay which in turn produce 4 different types of rays.

Types of decay – Alpha decay- Beta Decay- Spontaneous Fission

Types of Radioactive Rays Produced - Alpha Ray- Beta Ray- Gamma Ray- Neutron Ray1

Each type of ray has a different wavelength which translates into the depth it can penetrate into a material and the density of material required to stop it.2

Measurement – Curies or Cu– amount of radioactivity that one gram of Radium release.

Radioactive elements –Main radioactive elements releasedCaesium-137 half-life 30 years – gamma emittersIodine-131 half-life 8 days – gamma emitterUranium-235 – half-life 713,000,000 years – alpha emitter Strontium-90 – half-life 29 years -beta emitter3

Other elements released in smaller quantitiesPlutonium – Half-life 24000 years – alpha and very low-level gamma emitter

Interesting side note – as radiation is absorbed by a material it heats up.4

High-Density Polyethylene

Information- specific properties of the material can be found on the DVD

Pros – Stands up to alpha and beta particles particularly well. Can be precision molded or milled. Recyclable. Cheap.5Cons - 1KG of HDPE is relative to creation of 1 3/4 kg of Oil Raw material and energy.

_program .intro

DVD._

1. http://science.howstuffworks.com/nuclear.htm2. http://www.clavius.org/envradintro.html3. http://www.chernobyl.info/index.php?userhash=725970&navID=220&lID=24 . http://www.tpub.com/content/doe/h1017v2/css/h1017v2_79.htm5 . http://www.designinsite.dk

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Steel – By using a wall made of two pieces of steel sand wiching a section of water, a very effec-tive shield can be made against gamma and neutron radiation (The bigboys)Pros - protects against radiation, good strength to weight ratioCons - absorbs radiation over time

Water Shields against neutron rays not at all against gamma radiation.

Other Materials – In order to create a receptive environment, some responsive or “smart” materials could be used, ex amples are as follows: Smart Metal Alloys - Shape-Memory Alloys are metals that, after being strained, at a certain temperature revert back to their original shape. A change in their crystal structure above their trans formation temperature causes them to return to their original shape.7

Polymer Gels - polymer gels consist of a cross- linked polymer network inflated with a solvent such as water. They have the ability to reversibly swell or shrink (up to 1000 times in volume) due to small changes in their environment (pH, temperature, elec tric field). Micro sized gel fibers contract in milliseconds, while thick polymers layers require minutes to react (up to 2 hours or even days). They have high strength and can deliver sizeable stress (approximately equal to that of hu-man muscles). The most common are polyvinyl alcohol (PVA), polyacryl-icacid (PAA) and polyacrylonitrile (PAN). Many potential applications (e.g. artificial muscles, robot actuators, absorb-ers of toxic chemicals), but presently, few of them have a commercial diffusion.8

_program .intro

7. Ibid.8. http://www.designinsite.dk

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Movement Materials:

Festo Muscleshttp://www.festo.comThese flexible hydraulic piston/muscles can preform in areas and situation that demand a more organic form and direction.

These are just a few examples of materials that have proper-ties that would be condusive to this type of design. Most interesting of all, I think, would be the high-density polyeth-ylene as it allows translucentcy but blocks out most radiation. As the common misnomer about radiation has been the need for very thick and heavy barriers a material like HDPE makes for a more light mobile design.

_program .intro

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SITE MAP

BUILDING TYPOLOGY MAP

RADIATION ZONE MAP

ACCESS POINTS

GROUNDWATER

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THE FLIP SHIPA RESEARCH FACILITY PRECEDENT.

IN 1969 THE UNITED STATES NAVY BUILT A RESEARCH VES-SEL CAPABLE OF REMAINING COMPLETLY STABLE IN HIGH SEAS AND INCREDIBLY SILENT. THIS WAS NECESSARY TO FACILITATE RESEARCH CONDUCTED ON BOARD ABOUT SOUND AND THE OCEAN. THE EXPERIMENTS REQUIRE THAT THERE BE ABSOLUTE SILENCE AND THAT THEY HAVE ACCESS TO THE SURFACE, BECAUSE WAVES CAUSE PLENTY OF NOISE OFF OF THE HULL A SUBMARINE OR TRADITIONAL CRAFT WERE NOT VIABLE. WHAT THE NAVY DID WAS CREATE THE WORLDS LARGEST BOUY, WHICH CAN ROTATE 90 DEGREES BY SHIFTING BALLAST, IT IS DONE IN SUCH A SMOOTH WAY THAT ALL EQUIPMENT INSIDE REMAINS UN-DISTURBED. BECAUSE THE SHIP HAS TO PERFORM IN TWO DIFFERENT PLANES (HORIZONTAL AND VERTICAL) SOME HARD EQUIPMENT IS DOUBLED (I.E. ONE HORIZONTAL SINK AND ONE VERTICAL ONE.) AND SOME EQUIPMENT SIMPLY FLIPS, LIKE THE REFRIDGERATOR.

1. http://aquarium.ucsd.edu/learning/learning_res/voyager/flip/

DVD._

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“I’m not a robot like you. I don’t like having disks crammed into me... unless they’re Oreos, and

then only in the mouth.”

Phillip J. Fry_Futurama

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Robotics Research

Everyday, new building materials are be-coming actuated by robotic and computer-ized mechanics. The concept of haptics is now being considered the next frontier of interaction with information and mechanics. The idea of an ambient information flow that can be sensed through a non-display function has become the most popular form of research within the field of robotics. By 2007 the United Nations estimates that over 600,000 robots will be in use in households around the world and in industrial circles the number stands at somewhere near 1 million as of today. As of 2004 the production of most robotics has shifted from japan to Europe and the United States, this shift has caused the entire idea of robotic technol-ogy to become global. A common misnomer about robotics would be the assertion that there are more robotic workers than human ones, that’s not even close to being true, between 50 and 80 per 10,000 workers, and although the number is rising it’s not expected to overtake the amount of work-ers anytime soon. The car industry on the other hand the average is one robot per ten workers. For the past ten years the price of a single robot unit has fallen by 43% while the speed, capacity, capabilities etc have all risen by more than 100% each. As each unit becomes cheaper and more powerful they become more ubiquitous.1 Included is a list of robots in use around the world today, notice there is no heading for architecture.1 My own investigations into robotics led to a LEGO set called Mindstorms which

robotics research

1 United Nations Economic Commission for Europe: Report on worldwide robotic invest-ments. United Nations. 2004

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allows the user to program without having to do all of the electrical engineering. So far its been my understanding that intelligence isn’t something you can just tell a machine to have, instead it’s a care-ful set of instructions that react in a way to appear to be intelligent. A robot runs on a series of loops, also called if then statements, if “a” happens then do this, if not then repeat untill “a” happens. While the possibility of an intelligent machine is growing, we are more likely to see an machine utilize human cognizance to embody its intelligence before we see a truly sentient machine. The appeal or fascina-tion with robots has more or less stemmed from the fascination of the mechanic represented in a human-ised image. When we look at robot or robotics in general we see ourselves creating our own likeness in the availiable technologies of the day.

Therefore, perhaps the more relevant prec-edent would be a prosthetic. There’s a plethora of examples of prosthetic in the world today, as mentioned earlier, the car is a major prosthesis in most Americans, if not all of humanities’ lives. With a prosthetic the appeal of the robot, the mechanic personification, is driven by the attachment of the mechanic to the human. Prosthesis also avoids the apocalyptic visions of the previous chapter, by firmly placing humanity within the equation as an intrinsic part of it.

robotics research

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RoombaRobotic Vacuum

iRobot CorporationBurlington, MA

copyright 200479

robotics research

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Bionic Armhttp://mediatheek.thinkquest.nl/~ll106/Ap-

plications/Medical/bionic.jpg80

robotics research

84robotics research

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85robotics research

Production Image “The Iron Giant”

Warner Brothers 1999Dir. Brad Bird

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_diagrammatic programming

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Life_Safety Analysis.Pripyat Expedition Unit 1

Pripyat, UkraineChernobyl NPP Exclusion/Restricted Zone

REFERENCES + RESOURCESA. IBC 2003B. Uniform Fire Code 2003C. Radiation ResearchD. Ukraine Ministry of EnergyE. United Nations Monitoring Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC)

SITE+ CONTEXT

The Project is to be restricted from moving flex space into hot zones.-Hot Zones to be defined as areas of greater than 100 curies per hour and larger than 4 sq. feet

Usage-the facility is to be used to research post-nuclear events and liv-ing conditions in extreme habitats

Height Restrictions-all buildings within the town of Pripyat must be shorter than 10 stories the existing maximum height

Existing Buildings -No structure built pre 1986 may be demolished without first verifying the Resultant debris will not be radioactive

OCCUPANTS NEEDS

Occupancy Groups Applicable IBC Use Groups - H5 and R2 -Pod/Bunker_H5

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-Flexible Transitional Space_R3 -Research/Lab Zones_ -Living Area_ SeparationAny connection with a safety pod/zone must be airtight and impen-etrable to low-level radiation

BUILDING NEEDS

Structural Design CriteriaA. Radiation Loads

Mechanical SystemsA. Power SourceB. VentilationC. Motor/Kinetic

Electrical/Computational Systems

The Building shall adhere to the Uniform Fire Code-Excerpts from NFPA National Fire Code

4.1.1 Goals – The goals of this Code shall be to provide a reasonable level of safety, property protection and public welfare from the hazards created by fire, explosion and other hazardous conditions

4.1.3 Safety. This Code shall provide for life safety by reducing the probability of injury or death from fire, explosions or events involving hazardous materials.

4.1.3.1.1 Safety-from-fire Goals. The fire safety goals of the Code shall be as follows:1. To provide an environment for the occupants in a building or facility and for the public near a building or facility that is reasonably safe from fire and similar emergencies.

2. To protect fire fighters and emergency responders.

2.2.2.2.2 Safety-from-Hazardous-Materials Objectives.2.2.2.2.2.1 The storage, use, or handling of a hazardous material in a building or facility shall be accomplished in a manner that provides a reasonable level of safety for occupants and for those adjacent to a building or a facility from illness, injury, or death due to the following conditions:1. An unplanned release of the hazardous material2. A fire impinging upon the hazardous material or involvement of the

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material in a fire3. The application of an external force on the hazardous material that is likely to result in an unsafe condition.

Safeguards During Building Construction, Alteration, and Demolition Opera-tions

1.1 General Requirements.

1.1.1 Structures undergoing construction, alteration, or demolition opera-tions, including those in underground locations, shall comply with NFPA 241, Standard for Safeguarding Construction, Alteration, and Demolition Opera-tions, and this chapter.

4.4 Fundamental Requirements

4.4.1.1 The Design of every building or structure intended for human oc-cupancy shall be such that reliance for property protection and safety to life does not depend solely on any single safeguard.

Construction Requirements

A. Type IA Construction IBCRequirements for Type 1A Construction

GROUP MAX HEIGHT/AREAA-1 ULA-2 ULA-3 ULA-4 ULA-5 ULB ULE ULF-1 ULF-2 ULH-1 1/21,000H-2 UL/21,000H-3 ULH-4 ULH-5 3/ULI-1 ULI-2 ULI-3 ULI-4 ULM ULR-1 ULR-2 ULR-3 ULR-4 ULS-1 ULS-2 UL


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U UL

Max Allowable Height 110 ft/ 10 StoriesC. Area per floor?D. Sprinkler System/Computational ControlE. Fire Resistance Ratings1. Load Bearing Walls2. non-Loadbearing Walls3. Structure4. Horizontal Surfaces5. Fire Walls6. Separation Types

DANGER/LIFE SAFETY REQUIREMENTS

Accessibility/Egress Requirements

Life Safety/ExitingAny buiding that architecture interfaces with must be mapped for life safety exiting. (referring to _POD system)

Life Safety Exiting defined as:2 Paths of exit neither of which can pass through a radiation “hot” area.Zoning DiagramD. Toilets1. At least 1 toilet per safe area.


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92“It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity. “

Albert Einstein

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cryptotechnophobiathe secret belief that technology is more of a menace than a boon.

from Generation X: Tales for an accelerated culture

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Paranoia and the Techno_Apocalypse

Man has had a love-hate relationship with tech-nology since day one; he has feared it’s eventual dominance over himself. Better technology for your enemies meant better weapons and better technology for yourself meant leaving traditions behind and leaving old beliefs with them. The apocalypse of the technological ideal has been a popular subject of science fiction for years, everytime man creates something that reaches beyond the boundaries of his own abilities the world collapses on itself in complete chaos. In The Matrix men create machines that make more machines which eventually leads to a dystopian future where the machines walk the surface of the earth and the human are forced far below ground.

When people think of A.I or robotics these are the images that come to their heads, a mechani-cal likeness of a man embodying all that man fears and desires. The United States military has been experiment-ing with unmanned aircraft and has recently deployed these vehicles in the war in Iraq. The plane has even been responsible for actual strikes against enemy forces. After one success-ful mission, Bob Martinage, defense analyst for the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assess-ments in Washington was quoted as saying: “The Predator, I think you can view it as a stepping stone to a future battlefield where unmanned systems figure more and more”.1 So control over our most powerful weapons will be handed more

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and more in the future over to machine guid-ance. The Air Force has stated that all UAV (unmanned arial vehicles) are to be guided by remote control, but already basic tasks have been handed over to the computer rather than having an operator pilot the aircraft for the length of the mission. The military has gone out of it’s way to set up a complex command structure for these planes, that command and control structure allows for various situation and deployments always keeping control in the hands of humanity. It’s easy to see how the logical next step would be to give the Predator autonomity as presently the craft requires a line of sight to the controlling sta-tion severly limiting deployment. If the craft is given self-control, the role of ethics comes into play. A program has no more ethics than a block of wood, the idea of turning loose a program with control of a more powerful or more intelligent structure than a humans is akin to setting a running circular saw on the ground and hoping the cut gets made. The program is not evil, nor does it bear malice, it merely exists in the path of humans, so how does it keep from harming human life in multi-varying situations? Bruce Sterling discussed this very dilemma in WIRED 12.05, “Who will be held morally accountable for an unmanned war crime? Are machines permitted to give or-ders? In a world of networked minefields and even smarter-bombs, are we blundering into mechanized killing fields we would have never have built by choice?”2 Isaac Asimov wrote about this issue as well, in I, Robot he described the three laws of robot-ics which he developed with his editor John

2 Sterling, Bruce. “Robots and the Rest of Us” WIRED 12.05 page 116

1 http://www.underreported.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=508


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Campbell, those laws were three logic statements that Asimov presumed would prevent a robot from causing harm to humanity.

These rules were critical in the book because they retained a logic loop in which it should be theoreti-cal for humanity to exist without harm. The later goes on to show that method may not actually work, I believe to avoid any of the dystopian situ-ations described that designers must understand the nature of the technology they are designing with and for. Utilizing critical thinking may pre-vent any of the nightmarish horrors of automation. Because machines cannot truly think, we must think harder. While the ideas of science fiction have bearing on today’s designs, the science of today has found ways to keep an ethical front in robot-ics. The ethical mechanics of today are defined by the designer and not through any written coding. Research into swarm intelligence has shown that the express intentions of the system do not have to be programed, just defined by the constraints. To summarize, the man-technology situation falls onto a curve. On the left you have the lud-dite-like position stating that there should be abso-lutely no technology and all humanity; on the other hand we have the ultimate end-game of technology where the machines of man no longer need their creators. In this situation we find something that is very bad for humanity and good for technology, in the middle of the curve we see the mix of humanity and humanities’ creations which provides an exten-sion into an entire new plane of existence though this is not to be confused with a religious experi-ence, I’m merely referring to the best possible situa-tion using todays and tomorrow’s innovations.

3 Asimov, Isaac. I, Robot New York: Spectra. 1950


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Scenes from “Brazil”Director: Terry Gilliam

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Scenes from “The Animatrix”Directors: Andy and Larry Wachowski

Warner Brothers 200293


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RQ-1 Predator MAE UAVDRONE AIRCRAFT

United States Air Force94.95


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still from Blade RunnerDirector: Ridley Scott

Warner Brothers 198294


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CONCEPTUAL DIAGRAMMING

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109swarm intelligence

Swarm Intelligence

In the movie, Beautiful Mind, Russell Crowe’s character, John Forbes Nash stands at a window observing the birds in the courtyard below attempting to extrapolate an algo-rithm for their movements. What at that time might have seemed like insanity; defining the actions of flocking creatures by mathemati-cal algorithm, may not be as far fetched as it once was. Lately, there has been much ado about the impact of insect social behavior on the field of computers and robotics; it seems ants are “programmed” very simply which is much easier for roboticist. Other research has been ongoing into termite mounds, a termite mound is an emmense architectural structure in relation to it’s builders and not out of a grand design but out of simple constraints. Each termite has a simple program/goal: add on to this area here, avoid this object, etc. that results in a structure that is a very organic growing form. I’m not supporting an architec-ture without an architect, rather an architec-ture that may become more than the just the sum of it parts. In a swarm the ideas of the greater hive/group are driven by the majority of the parts. The collected reactions of the many represent the actions of the one. In this way various autonomous pieces of the architecture can be derived from varied elements, and change in relation to those elements.

A swarm is always in motion, extending it’s col-lective edges outward. This sets up a strategy for an architecture that is constantly exploring

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it’s own environment. In order to truly respond to the SITE+ , the swarm constantly re/evalu-ates the parameters that make up SITE+. The advantages of a swarm in artificial intel-ligence are two-fold, programming becomes much simpler but outline becomes more im-portant, and the chances of success increase with the increase in units. To quote Lebbeus Woods: “Pre-determined design goals are combined with spontaneous invention accord-ing to new types of rules for the shaping of space activated in the course of the instal-lation process. The architect is no longer the planner who determines the shape of space in advance, but one who sets up the limits—the rule structure of materials and how they are shaped—then steps back and lets collabora-tors do the work.”1 The goals and even the shape become apparent in the installation of the fall but not necessarily in the design phase. This is not to say that the designer did not have some idea of the general look of the space just not the exacting qualities. The actions of the architectural parts create the shape and space of the whole rather than the shape and space of the whole defining the actions of the pieces.Precedent_Swarm:VLA (Very Large Array) Radio TelescopeThe costs of building a enormous radio tele-scope made the National Radio Astronomy Observatory consider other means of reading a very large area. The solution was to build several smaller dishes and join the collected visions of each to create a very large range, once again taking inspiration from the insect world much like a fly’s eyes. The elements of this architecture work in tandem to create the

1 Virilio, Paul. Unknown Quantity. Thames and Hudson. New York, New York. 2002. pg.156

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larger whole, each element acting on it’s own with it own determinations in such a way that the overall action of the final architecture is less determinate from the outset. This demonstrates a connection between large built elements but not between their physical interaction. Due to the fact that each object is the same the interac-tions can only be taken to a certain level, while the interactions of several objects becomes much more complicated and harder to predict.

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VLA (Very Large Array)Radio Telescope ArraySorroco, New Mexico

photo by National Radio Astronomy Observatory

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swarm intelligence

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Termite MoundNifold Plains

Lake Field National Park, Austrailiaphoto by Kerry Trapnell

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swarm intelligence

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Final Documents

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117

118

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121

122_conclusion

WHAT DOES ALL OF THIS MEAN?

I’ve agonized over the last few years how to come up with new designs, without cribbing from those who’ve gone before. The implica-tions of utilizing a site that extends beyond the geographic are enormous; in investigating the “space” created by interaction we throw ar-chitecture into a completely new world which only science fiction authors have explored. The impacts of technology become ever important in this type of design. The other facet of creating something that is truly my own means under-standing and utilizing the technologies (analog, digital, organic...nano...etc.) at my disposal in a manner that reflects personal expression in ad-dition to any technical expertise.

The architecture of this thesis will create a dy-namically changing space which will mold to the site in order to allow a realization of an unper-ceivable site situation. The architecture of this thesis will roam free, un-tethered by the tradi-tional constraints placed upon it, spaces created will be dynamic to facilitate an ever changing environmental topography. The architecture fit-ted within the topography of radiation and the geography of nature and technology in Pripiat will function as a prosthetic for humanity to ex-perience the elements it traditionally has no per-ception of. It’s impossible to truly predict what that understanding will be or what impact that interaction and understanding will mean for the world untill it has been done. This means that there is still more experimentation and investiga-tion to be done beyond this thesis.

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