Emergent Design Systems in Architecture

Read full post on http://khizerishtiaq.wordpress.com/

Emergence, the spontaneous creation of order and functionality from the bottom up, is all around us. If we look at the physical world, we can see emergent patterns everywhere, spiral galaxies, our own solar system, even the giant red spot on the surface of Jupiter. All of these are emergent phenomena. On our own planet, we see emergent structures everywhere, mountains and rivers take wondrous shapes, animal and plants exhibit beautiful patterns. Even inside us, our body is made up of nervous system, skeletal systems. Each of this system is comprised of small structures, Cells, which interact in such a way that they create something emergent which is more than the sum of their parts.

‘How these wonders of creation are assembled from such simple building blocks? How same laws that turn nature chaotic can also turn simple dust into living human being? How cells that start identical, known to become skin or eyes? How can a simple system that works in a regular manner, becomes unpredictable?’

- Secret Life of Chaos

We see emergent structures all around us and we see it at every scale. It’s true if we take a telescope and look at the cosmos, or take a microscope to look inside the human brain. Not only we see structure, we also see that it has functionality, heart beats, rivers carry water, antelope run, all of this happens without a central planner. It emerges from bottom up.

‘Nature throws grotesque shapes and turbulent events, yet we are able to find patents within them. Man has struggled to put order in a perversely irregular world. And these imperfections he didn’t understand. Now man has a new weapon a computer. Man challenges the kingdom of chaos’.

- Original Script Of Chaos

Due to these computational capabilities, we are now at a platform, where we can finally decipher the laws of nature and uncover its deepest secrets.

But then, It is one thing to generate images or forms that resemble real objects: Quite another to devise the rules that made them that way in the first place.

- Original Script Of Chaos

Architecture in contemporary times is shifting its role from a ‘medium of statement’ to a ‘tool of exploration' - Bernard Tschumi. Historically it was used as a form of domination and authority, now it is more of a means to develop new knowledge, to discover new plateaus. This contemporary shift triggered from emergent technologies and the sole credit goes to the computational advancements. Twenty years back computers were only used for presentation and visualization in architecture, now it has evolved into a sophisticated, smart assistant in design. The diagram (presentational media) becomes the conceptual engine allowing human bias to step aside a bit as in this intuition finds an indirect way to feed the process.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7BKWRw6O8I8

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Comment by Khizer Ishtiaq on June 22, 2012 at 6:30am: True, simulation, optimization and evaluation is part of the process to generate and refine rules... once the rules are refined... the architect steps asides and let users grow the system themselves... that is why i stated in the post that "then the role of the architect then becomes to design systems and frameworks"

Comment by pyrit on June 22, 2012 at 5:25am: One thing is for certain, emergent systems produce structure and functionality from bottom up, they are capable of achieving very complex behaviors by interactions of simple rules at bottom level...

This what im really interested in ... Im not sure if we can speak from a bottom up driven process if we only "simulate" the agents. In my view real bottom up process can only be possible if the architect incooperates real people.

For the design process i really love the agents/swarm idea that can negotiate between different ideas (which also can come from different designers) and so produce maybe some unvorseen results / symbiosis (as you described in your project )

But as i said i think its somehow problematic to label such design strategics as bottom up.

Comment by Khizer Ishtiaq on June 20, 2012 at 11:34pm

Emergence - this word begs a whole new discussion. When I started my project and the study of emergent systems, it appeared to me as emergence is a behavior that allows a system to produce random behaviors that aren't the sum of its parts... but as the project progressed, my understanding of the idea emergence has changed... The universe doesn't produce something out of the blue, everything is part of a series of events, its the minute deviance in the details and the reading that cause the system to tip from its usual behavior or appear random, emergence in true sense ( or strong emergence as they call it) is just apparent...

The next question that came to my mind was if the universe is a series of cause and effects, then does it produce emergent (new) rules of interactions of particles/ agents... it turns out no, as the universe evolves new rules do form, but then again, they are derived rules, not something out of the blue... they evolve from the current to produce new...

One thing is for certain, emergent systems produce structure and functionality from bottom up, they are capable of achieving very complex behaviors by interactions of simple rules at bottom level...

Coming to the spatial rules to produce emergent systems, one example is the circulation in my system, which resolves itself providing various exit routes for any organization.

There are 3 agents namely personal spaces, combine spaces, open spaces

These are the rules (very simplified)

Two personal spaces share one common wall
Newborn Personal space will share at least one wall with the parent
A Combined space hold up to 3 personalized spaces only
At least one side of combined space is connected to an open space
Every open space have at least 2 open spaces connected to it to provide entrance and exit

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkKMImNOATM

The result produced is this simulation, where red and blue are the personalized and combined spaces while yellow are the open spaces... Things to observe here is the circulation being resolved and the creation of wide open spaces, which was never intended or expected from the code... and it is not a coincidence, no matter how times and in how many different ways it is simulated, the circulation resolution and the wide spaces are prominent, so it is part of the system behavior

Comment by pyrit on June 20, 2012 at 4:33pm: Could you descibe the spatial rules you set up to "produce" emeregence ?

Im really interested in a discussion...

best p

Comment by Khizer Ishtiaq on June 20, 2012 at 11:59am: It sounded a bit different in my head... I meant it to be a relative statement

Comment by pyrit on June 20, 2012 at 11:40am: Due to these computational capabilities, we are now at a platform, where we can finally decipher the laws of nature and uncover its deepest secrets.

Are you serious ?