Poto credits: http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jun/15/robot-doctors-online-lawyers-automated-architects-future-professions-jobs-technology

Case Sudy_Toward a Theory of Architecture Machines_Nicholas Negroponte

Negroponte’s article ” Toward a Theory of Architecture Machines”, published back in 1969. when the technology has not yet been developed to such an extent, represented very revolutionary not proposal but a big vision of a futuristic architecture machine.

This text introduces the idea of “Evolutionary machine“-  self-improving machine which, beside designers step-by-step instructions, would be capable of creating its own method of solution and would liberate the designer allowing him to do what he really enjoys. Rising the aforementioned machine to a higher level, Nicholas explains the “Learning machine” mechanism which actually presents the union of five very complex subassemblies: 1) a heuristic mechanism which strategy is based on solving certain problem by comparing it to similar ones; 2) a rote apparatus that acts when similar situation encountered, by storing the event and interconnecting it with a response; 3) a conditioning mechanism grounded on the idea that simple repetitious responses after certain time become habits; 4) a reward selector which operates when teacher exhibit happiness or disappointment and 5) a forgetting convenience  or “exponential forgetting” that basically has the ability of forgetting less significant things. The whole system works exclusively  in cooperation with designers. The final point “Seeing machine” is setting an idea of interface or interaction between a machine and the “information environment”. Processors would have capability of communicating with a humans. In order to make this possible in terms that machine has an image of a designer, 3 performances which together form the interface are required: an event (that can be visual, auditory or extrasensory); a manifestation (measures the event according to parameters like friquency, luminance etc. are) and final  a representation.

Personally, I experienced this text as an union of the 3 explained “machines” into one futuristic machine, into one robot that would be innovative in many aspects, especially in terms of designing principles according to which it would have ability to machine itself  brings some conclusions, but never completely  independent of man. In my opinion, the author doesn’t give a “project” of the future machine but he only theoretically investigates  how it might look in the future. As long as the authorship of a certain project is primarily attributed to a man, not to machine, we should not be scared of the technology and of the impact it has nowadays on creativity. As long as machines are only tools under the influence of humans, architecture as well as other branches can only become more interesting, leaving a wide margin for innovation and creativity.

On the other hand, we have all witnessed how today’s technology is advancing fast, and that in many cases the machines are completely replacing man’s role. As a topic for personal research i find this uncontrolled technological growth very interesting. I wounder what we can expact in the nearist future and how things will change in terms of understanding architecture through available technology. Is it going to help our creativity, to open some new windows, new features or is going to close our touch with reality?

A Critical Analysis of “Toward a Theory of Architecture Machines” by Nicholas Negroponte

This article by the well-known technological advocate Nicholas Negroponte was published in 1969 in the Journal of Architectural Education.  It essentially posits that as computers become more advanced they will achieve the capability to learn and to find their own methods of solving architectural problems.  The view of the author is that architects are incapable of solving these problems for themselves since they are either too large and complex, or too small and insignificant.  After highlighting some of the known qualities of the computers of the day (they are formidable clerks), Negroponte establishes five mechanisms that could result in a computer achieving what we know as “artificial intelligence”.  His learning machine would be capable of applying its early lessons, evaluating them with the assistance of humans, and then repeating only successful actions.  The computer would eventually assume the role of the “master designer”, working 24 hours a day alongside the human architect whose function has become interpreting the computer’s instructions to other humans for construction.

Negroponte then takes his theory of the “thinking” computer one step further by giving it the sensory capacity to become what he considers a “seeing” machine.  He breaks this concept down into three stages: the event, the manifestation and the representation.  Essentially the computer senses the event (a broad category presumably including reading plans and conversing with clients) and inputs the information as a manifestation before churning out a response.  If it is beginning to seem like Negroponte’s vision of the future consists of androids behaving exactly like humans, that’s because it is.  He imagines the “architecture machine” wandering about the city absorbing information.  Understanding the limited computing power of the present, Negroponte suggests that a computer may first observe a human building 10 block castles and construct the 11th of its own design.  Similar to engineers designing buildings, this is a prospect that must surely make all practising architects shudder.

The eager and optimistic prediction that computers can receive their high school lessons from a human and then become functioning architects with artificial intelligence has not yet come true, despite the many years of Moore’s law transistor evolution.  Perhaps this article should be read as an ironic critique of architecture during modernism rather than as an honest vision of technological utopianism.  Certainly there are limitations to what a single architect can accomplish, but that is why architects now form teams where the weaknesses of one are offset by the strengths of the others.  Architects working with digital tools are capable of producing far more complex and responsive solutions than ever before, but this can only come along with an understanding of the processing structure of the computer’s brain.  It is interesting to note that Negroponte never mentions the word “nature” in his piece, since in an apparent paradox, the clerk-like processing ability of computers has enabled humans to emulate the logics found in the work of the greatest designer of all.

The Line of Research

To that end it may be appropriate to analyze some of the great accomplishments achieved by the human mind in the realm of quantum mechanics (also known as the study of the way things really are).  The creative power of great minds in physics, such as Bohr, Einstein, Gell-Mann and Hawking, deserves to be understood by architects who are by nature fascinated by abstractions of reality.  There is no place more abstract than the multi-dimensional mathematical universe constructed by the beautiful equations of physicists.  Therefore it is worth noting that while a computer randomly outputting characters could eventually write E=mc², its true usefulness is that of a tool; although one so powerful it can demolish our preconceived illusions of the universe like so many walls surrounding us.

Termite mound

Maybe a lot of the neurons in our brains are not just capable but, if you like, motivated to be more adventurous, more exploratory or risky in the way they comport themselves, in the way they live their lives. They’re struggling amongst themselves with each other for influence, just for staying alive, and there’s competition going on between individual neurons. As soon as that happens, you have room for cooperation to create alliances, and I suspect that a more free-wheeling, anarchic organization is the secret of our greater capacities of creativity, imagination, thinking outside the box and all that, and the price we pay for it is our susceptibility to obsessions, mental illnesses, delusions and smaller problems.

          Daniel C. Dennet

During the last decades philosophers and scientists have been discussing about the human mind and what we named awareness, as the state to perceive, to feel, to be conscient and to recognize environmental and inner variations, though being able to choose between multiple possible future reactions. What generates problem between researchers are the achievements of neurosciences in studying neurons and brain connections. Suddenly, we were obliged to think us (our brain/mind) as an organism made of objective, automatic and unconscious elements (neurons) that, however, act like surviving animals, always addressed to the best and rational choice for their lives. In this scenario, it emerges that conscious and aware beings (or supposed to be that) can take shape from unconscious, unaware, electrical and always moving beings. The system is conceived as an infinite loop in which death and life continuously switch from one to the other in the same time and at the moment seems to be impossible to detect any kind of starting point, singularity or first energy injection.

The same logic of neurons can be found in machines and computers. One of the best examples of this process is the core of the register machine, that is the basis for the actual informatic and computational architecture. The idea is to construct a system with n numbered containers and m objects. After having randomly distributed the elements in the containers, we provide a simple set of rules (increment, decrement, clear to zero) according to the number of elements in each container and the machine will provide us the right result to our question. In this manner, with few and simple rules it is possible to create other scripts (multiplication, comparison, repositioning) and solve different problems without be obliged to generate different machines for different purposes. The scripts or softwares are able to simulate more analogic processes on the same virtual machine.

Digital tools discussion lead us to the change provided by technology in architecture and building processes. The relevant importance of new technologies and techniques has not to be located in the increase of production, rather in the vision of a world that is going to the pluralism of parts and that is able to compare itself with neutrons and scripts, all elements of the same reality. Steven Johnson told us about ants collective intelligence and its different and essential parameters to work: more is different, ignorance is useful, encourage random encounters, look for patterns in the signs, pay attention to your neighbours. This five sentences could be considered the minimum request to a living system to maintain its own dynamism. It looks foolish not to detect similarities with the human living system. In particular, we can argue to be involved in all of these rules, except for the last one, that is the only one liable to be controlled. In this sense, many architects and designers have been starting to conceive their works as flexible and adaptive systems that promote dynamism, energy flows and inner relations, thanks to the adoption of sets of rules instead of intentional design acts. As results we can include the Watercube in Beijing, the Yokohama Terminal and the Rolex Learning Center in Lausanne. Clearly, though with the same logic of building the landscape, these programs have different purposes. While in the intervention of SAANA it is possible to detect the will of linking inside and outside along multiple vectors (even if the horizontal is the main one), in the FOA’s Terminal the site offers itself to be layered and to host different programs. In Beijing, this logic generates one component that, after being put in the system, is able to confer to the building an unusual energetic performance.

Swarm intelligence is the word that better represents the main feature of evolution and nature. Even human beings are within it, as we admit our superiority when linked in and between groups. But animals’ efficiency is really beyond ours and, looking at termites for example, the proportions are not the same, making them able to build more complex and functional organisms. In a certain way, machines and computers are going to move us toward the animals’ way of building: digital beings are now the channels to express the potential of our neurons, that are not able to be explicit with us, into a production process. We are trying to understand our minds using technologies and to translate it into reality. As we saw many times during the human growth, we are forcing our system to obtain operative information addressed to improve our surviving skills. In this direction, many attempts have been made, but still there are inexplicable influences, about how the building could react to the environment and, above all, how the people think at themselves within the environment.

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