Author: sansal

sansal-reading01

I selected tenet number 5, "The Critical Engineer recognizes that each work of engineering engineers its user, proportional to that user's dependency upon it."

This means that engineers and their engineering projects form a sort of symbiotic relationship, both relying on each other and making each other better. The first thing I thought of when I read this tenet was Newton's Third Law of Motion, which states that every action has an equal and opposite reaction, in a way relating to engineers and their work, where both have an equivalent effect on one another. One example of this is machine learning. In machine learning, humans program a machine to perform some tasks, and learn from each of those tasks so that is builds a basic form of AI and is able to accomplish much more difficult tasks independently. Eventually, the machine will be able to teach the human (the creator) how to do those tasks, which illustrates this dependent relationship.

sansal-lookingoutwards01

One major project that inspired me to take this class was the teamLab lecture and presentation last year. Their BORDERLESS installation in the MORI building in Tokyo was incredible (though I have not had the chance to visit in person, I am referencing the images presented during the lecture and on their website). TeamLab specializes in large-scale installations, incorporating both art and computer science into an interactive experience that is different for each viewer, as it relies heavily on user movement and actions. As a student interested in both art and computer science, and pursuing a degree in BCSA, this project seemed like a perfect harmony of the two disciplines, combining them in a way I never thought of before. I do not know the exact number of people involved in making it, but it must be a few hundred people involved in the entire process. To my knowledge, all of the computer graphics, artwork, and sound are created by teamLab, using custom scripts to program the entire installation. The project's creators might have been inspired by Japanese folk stories and cultural tales, as well as cultural objects of Japan. The project points to more connections and collaboration between computer scientists and artists, and the coming up of a more technological and interactive world.

https://borderless.teamlab.art/ , BORDERLESS, teamLab.