Past OPEN Lectures

In Dialogue with the Sciences

The 21st century has blossomed to grant us with technological advancements in computer vision, augmentation, synthetic biology and artificial intelligence. Naturally, we are inclined to ask questions around ownership, control, and the limits of machine, nature and human alteration. As we expand tracking, build autonomous machines, push intelligence and redefine our living materials, we challenge the boundary of what is human, machine or nature and venture in to a new world of moral landscape. What new forms will we give to represent the world when we augment our perceptual apparatus? When we alter our senses, perception, ecology and urban landscape, what kinds of systems will be inclined to create and what ethical implications might we stumble upon? The new era of design requires us to cultivate a curious and critical mind to help facilitate important conversations among other disciplines and begin bridging gaps with not only computer science but also social and life sciences.

Yasaman Sheri is a Designer and Researcher who works with new technologies to explore possible and becoming futures. Her research focuses on Life Sciences, Synthetic Sensing and Augmentation.

When: Tue, June 6th 2017, 5 PM.
Where: CIID, Ground Floor

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Machine Learning as Creative Interaction Design Tool

In this talk, I will discuss my research on better enabling musicians, artists, interaction designers, and students to employ supervised learning in the design of new real-time systems. I will show a live demo of tools that I have created for this purpose, centering around the Wekinator software toolkit for interactive, realtime machine learning. I’ll discuss some of the outcomes from 7 years of creating machine learning-based tools and observing people using these tools in creative contexts. These outcomes include a better understanding of how machine learning can be used as a tool for creators of new interactive systems, where it can support crucial design activities such as rapid prototyping, iterative refinement, and embodied engagement, as well as a deeper appreciation for how using machine learning for design differs from more conventional application contexts.

When: Thu, June 1st 2017, 5 PM.
Where: CIID, Ground Floor

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Future Betting with Gene Editing

Designer babies. Woolly mammoths. Cures for genetic diseases. The “new eugenics”. If you follow the news about emerging biotech, it seems as though we’re going to have all of those things on Earth fairly soon. But without giving into hyperbole or science fiction, what is the real state of the science and technology today? What directions is it leading us in? What new ethical issues does it create? And how is it going to change the world? In this CIID Open Lecture, Britt Wray – documentarist, author of Rise of the Necrofauna and PhD Candidate in Science Communication at the University of Copenhagen – will give an intrepid tour through the field of gene editing and discuss how it applies to humans, non-humans, extinct creatures and endangered species.

When: Tue, May30th 2017, 5 PM.
Where: CIID, Ground Floor

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Blockchain: A Future Without Money

Imagine a world where meaningful contribution outweighed the need to have a job. Robotic labor is coming, and in addition to shifting the labor market, high quality chip sets can also be used to shift the foundation of our embedded inner concepts of finance through the creation of stores of value like Bitcoin. Blockchain technology, the underlying infrastructure behind bitcoin, enables new forms value creation, measurement and exchange to flourish, potentially solving issues like Universal Basic Minimum income without the need for taxation. The marketplace is just emerging, and I am here to teach you how to navigate the landscape.

Toni Lane is an artrepreneur in the Digital Currency and Blockchain Industry who has been affectionately entitled, “The Joan of Arc of Blockchain” and “Young Star of Bitcoin” by her peers and various publications.

Casserly has been in the blockchain sphere since 2011, and is notably working on creating competitive marketplaces for governance with UNESCO Netexplo winner, Bitnation. As a humanitarian, Toni Lane used Bitcoin as a tool for direct response to the Ebola crisis in Sierra Leone. She co-founded CoinTelegraph and serves as an advisor to several notable companies, funds and family offices, including, but not limited to: The United Nations, SingularityU, Factom, HSBC, Bosch, Cicso, P&G, Institute for the Future and St. Gallen Symposium.

When: Mon, May 29th 2017, 5 PM.
Where: CIID, Ground Floor

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New Media, Interaction, and Software Aesthetics

In many media, techniques in commercial design are foreshadowed in the art world. Graphic design has roots in early 20th century print making and poster art, big budget movies repurpose many techniques from art films, and now interactive products are starting to borrow techniques and styles from new media art.

New Media artists have spent the last four decades exploring the aesthetics of modern technology and interaction and it’s effects on human behaviour, relationships, and evolution. Our work in UX, interaction design, and information architecture is rooted in the intersection of technology and culture. The way we understand the world has been changed forever by networks, computers, and media, just as our culture changes the evolution of these technologies. Artists have playfully tested these relationships and boundaries in ways spectacular, disturbing, and amazing.

Join Matt Nish-Lapidus, a practicing new media artist and designer, to explore the history and language of new media and interactive art, how it relates to our work today, and what we can learn from the seminal works of important artists and innovators including David Rokeby, Stelarc, and Steve Mann.

When: Tue, May 16th, 2017, 5 PM.
Where: CIID, Ground Floor

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