BODIES &�BUILDINGS NYU ITP LECTURE COURSE SPRING 2013

APRIL 8, 2013

JEN VAN DER MEER @JENVANDERMEER WWW.JENVANDERMEER.COM

BUILDINGS:

Part 2: Buildings

7. Clean Tech Failures, Clean Tech Long Term View, March 25, 2013

8. LEED and the Passive House Movement, April 1, 2013

9. Passive House + CoGen, April 8, 2013

10. Generative Architecture, Responsive Design, April 15, 2013

Part 3: Concept Development and Final Presentations

11. Concept strengthening – design thinking exercises, business case building, April 22, 2013

12. Final Presentations with guest critics, April 29, 2013

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PLACES TO INTERVENE IN A SYSTEM: 12. Constants, parameters, numbers (subsidies, taxes, standards)

11. The sizes of buffers and other stabilizing stocks, relative to their flows

10. The structure of material stocks and flows (transport networks, population age structures)

9. Length of delays, relative to the rate of system change

8. The strength of negative feedback loops, relative to the impacts they are trying to correct against

7. The gain around driving positive feedback loops

6. The structure of information flows (who does and does not have access to what kinds of information)

5. The rules of the system (such as incentives, punishments, constraints)

4. The power to add, change, evolve, or self-organize system structure

3. The goals of the system

2. The mindset or paradigm out of which the system – its goals, power structure, rules, its culture-arises

1. The power to transcend paradigms

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2. The mindset or paradigm out of which the system – its goals, power structure, rules, its culture-arises

The shared idea in the minds of society, the great big unstated assumptions—unstated because unnecessary to state; everyone already knows them—constitute that society’s paradigm, or deepest set of beliefs about how the world works.

-D. Meadows.

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What paradigmatic assumptions do we follow?

There is a difference between nouns and verbs.

Money measures something real and has meaning. (people who are paid less are literally worth less).

Growth is good.

Nature is a stock of resources to be converted for human purposes.

One can own the land.

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Paradigms are the sources of systems

From them, form shared social agreements about the nature of reality, come system goals and information flows, feedbacks, stocks, flows, and everything else about systems.

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The material apparatus around you

Ralph Waldo Emerson “War” Boston, 1838. Reprinted in Emerson’s Complete Works, vol. XI. 1887.

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Why do we build skyscrapers

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The ancient Egyptians built pyramids because they believed in an afterlife. We build skyscrapers because we believe that space in downtown cities is enormously valuable.

Who has changed paradigms?

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Whether it was Copernicus and Kepler showing that the earth is not the center of the universe

Or Einstein hypothesizing that matter and energy are interchangable

Or Adam Smith postulating that the selfish actions of individual players in markets wonderfully accumulate to the common good

People who have managed to intervene in systems at the level of paradigm have hit a leverage point that totally transforms systems.

So how do you change paradigms?

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D. Meadows paraphrasing Thomas Kuhn:

You keep pointing at the anomalies and failures in the old paradigm, you keep speaking louder and with assurance from the new one, you insert people with the new paradigm in places of public visibility and power.

You don’t waste time with reactionaries; rather you work with active change agents and with the vast middle groun of people who are open minded.

BUILDINGS: �FAILURES AND ANOMOLIES

BODIES & BUILDINGS

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GLOBAL SUPPLY

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ASSIGNMENT: �APRIL 15

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Buildings through the lens of science

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Parallels

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Bodies:

Buildings:

“New starts” is a sign of economic progress

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Failure of measures

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More work needed for feedback loops

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More work needed for feedback loops

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More work needed for feedback loops

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ASSIGNMENT Concept source and exploration?

What part of the system of how we care for bodies, or how we make and maintain our buildings, interests you the most?

What are the anomalies and failures that irk you?

What possibilities do you see?

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READING Pick any one of the “Facsicles” from ArtFarm on architecture theory:

http://www.archfarm.org/en/

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LINKS AND PRESENTATION

Today’s class presentation is available

http://www.slideshare.net/bettybluegreen/bodies-and-buildings-nyu-itp-4-8-2013

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