IDEA Proposal

Hybrid Proposal for IDEA New Rochelle 2018

The aim is to create empathy between humans and other species of animals by creating technology driven platforms to expand perception. Placing humans in the position of animals that perceive and inhabit our sorroundings in different ways and are affected by our ignorance of their needs and customs.

New York is a key city to develop technology proposals precisely because there are spaces like IDEA where art and new technologies converge (and technical and technological resources as well).

Image 1. This glove prototype captures electromagnetic fields and translates them into sound and image (see img 3 and 4),with exeption of the arduino and the protoboard, this was entirely made out of electronic thrash

Colombia is a country with a highly diverse and vast biodiversity, its topography and geography produce an enormous variety of ecosystems where thousand of species of animals and plants thrive. The observation of animals from a technological and creative perspective is a major aspect in this project because it points out to our imminent dependency of nature, and how we are ought to have a smarter and more effective understanding of this dependency.

Image 2. A prototype version of the same glove built with leather and a new structural core with all the circuits inside, it also has vibrating motors in the fingertips to allow the user to sense the electromagnetic fields around him. The jacket also has sensors that translate the heat in the ambience into a light pattern that is visible through a hand made fiber optic fabric. All of the fabrics and designs are original for the project.

Therefore, the idea of humans copying animal anatomy and behaviour goes back to the early years of mankind when the first humans appropriated of certain techniques by observing animal behaviour. As an example many studies point to a strong influence of songbirds in human verbal communication.

In regards of the relationship between nature and technology, Jean Francois Lyotard in his book ‘The inhuman’ approaches technology not as a human development but instead as a natural development that ‘designed’ all life forms. This reflection is very important in this project because the workshop utilizes nature as a model to follow in the field of sensorial prosthetics. Historically, since the mid eighties, the robotic technology began studying animals, which led to the foundation of modern robotics.

In practical terms the project looks for ways to enhance the human senses allowing for humans to perceive the world in a way they never perceived before. Technology and creativity serves as link between the ordinary and the extraordinary.

Image 3. A electromagnetic field visualization using the glove connected to a matrix of particles.

Facing the task of imagining the future of biodiversity in America, we propose to carry out a process of research and experimentation from the fields of philosophy and art, about the ways of life of three of the most emblematic species and in the process of extinction of Colombia, namely, the golden frog (Phyllobates bicolor), the churuco monkey (Lagothrix lugens) and the tingua bird (Porphyrio martinicus). The objective is to think, from the organs and sensitivity of these species, the mechanisms by which they encode the information of environmental conditions and specifically, the risks to which they are exposed; that is, the way they are affected within their ecological niches.

Through an articulated analysis between ethology, philosophy and aesthetics, the fields of experience knotted to the bodies of both species are addressed, in order to understand the vital knots of information and communication that are expressed in their behaviors, in the midst of complex interactions with their environments. We are interested, following the path opened by one of the fathers of ecology and biosemiotics, the zoologist Jacob Von Uexkull, to question the existence of a single world common to all species, embodied in the image of the human world. On the contrary, according to the notion of Umwelt (surrounding world) raised by the zoologist, we would like to affirm the specificity and pluralism of the worlds that emerge from the variety of biological endowments existing in the animal kingdom: the Umwelt would operate as a species of enveloping bubble around animal, composed of the perceptual and effective world of each body, bubble equivalent to that which could properly be identified as its world. The value of the concept of Umwelt is widely recognized by the tradition of contemporary philosophy, which has continued to develop in various ways to this day. We believe that it is a concept whose aesthetic and political power acquires all relevance in the task of thinking about the future of biodiversity in Colombia. Thus, the unit that makes up the theoretical research (biology and philosophy) and the production of the plastic work, have the purpose of generating a space of empathy that draws the imagination of readers and spectators, to adopt the first-person point of view of the two species in question, and therefore, to bring it closer to their worlds. In this way, in a critical and aesthetic exercise, the world of the dominant meaning, of the world of the human senses in its individualistic and anthropocentric version is invited, in parentheses, by the irruption of the sensitivities of the animals in question.

This sensitive irruption is carried out in a theoretical way through the conceptual research on the affections or modes of codification of animals in their ecological relationships, and in a plastic way, thanks to the invention of three prostheses that operate as strategies to connect the human body with the animal world. We say strategy because we are interested in recovering the powers of empathy production that technology offers based on ecological uses and not on their destruction. The prosthesis is proposed as a means to tune into the sensory worlds of two species at risk of disappearance and as a possibility to experience, in the human body, the adverse conditions of the environment that threaten the future of biodiversity, that is, the relationships of pollution and destruction of the living spaces of the country. The prosthesis will be developed from the study of the mechanisms of reaction and detection of the threatening conditions of the environment, which both the frog and the monkey use. On the one hand, the mechanism of cutaneous respiration of the amphibian and on the other, the mechanisms of vocal alertness of the mammal.

In the case of the frog, it is known that the contamination of the atmosphere penetrates through its skin, becoming a true cause of destruction if the levels of toxicity are high enough, thus, the forearm prosthesis would be printed in 3d and It would be equipped with a sensor that measures CO2 and chemical agents contaminating the environment.

Said agents will be processed through an interface, which would allow translating that data into a heat signal that will increase as environmental pollution levels worsen. In this way, the thermal sensation in the user's skin will increase if the environment is loaded with these components. In the case of the monkey, the ear prosthesis would consist of two parts designed from the significant function of the high intensity cries that these animals use in the face of danger: on the one hand, a transmitting mechanism and on the other, a receiver intended for to translate and communicate vibration impulses between one body and another at a distance. The prosthesis could be calibrated to issue calls for help in the distance, non-vocal type, that work as a kind of silent shouts beyond the voice, because we think it is important to emphasize that the cry of alarm of the monkey seems not to be significant for the human, because it is clear that their meaning matters little when it comes to exploiting their territory. The idea would be that the prosthesis encodes the tactile signals of the threatened body of the user, in vibrations available to be transmitted, by means of data, to the receiving device of the other user, in such a way that sensitive forms of making calls for help could be experienced when it is not possible scream or when the scream is simply not heard.

Image 4 and 5. A electromagnetic field visualization using the glove connected to a matrix of particles.

From this perspective, it is emphasized in the ways in which animals build abstractions from environmental conditions and translate them into vibrations and chemical signals that they use, not only to communicate with their congeners, but to relate to other species. The theoretical research aims to illuminate the possibilities or ways of technical concretization of these mechanisms, to make them available to human experience and in this way generate ways to "listen" to their warning cries. It is an exercise that thinks from and uses contemporary technology, moving from its purely monetary functions, through artand in favor of ecology.

The process proposed here can be understood as a mode of sensitive symbiosis between the frog, the monkey, the bird and the human being. In a certain way the fact that the disappearance of a species is the death of a world of meanings, is put in perspective, it is the loss of a somatic plan and a whole universe of non-human significance. Given the crisis or the risk of biodiversity that has been pointed out for some time now, where there is talk of an acceleration and massification of the extinction of beings due to pollution and the destruction of their habitats, it seems that we are witnessing a process in which the diversity of the worlds agonizes. Like a science fiction story, one could think of a future in which the planet's vital wealth plummets in the midst of a technical ratio-nality at the service of a monetary hyperproductivity. In this universe, not only the frog, the Tingua bird and the woolly monkey, but all the animals will be destined to a merely audiovisual existence, as files of an ancient memory of the Earth.

Those who were once inhabitants of the planet will exist, in the same way as the dodo, the Mexican bear or, more recently, the chinese river dolphin, as ghosts in documentaries, photographs, books, paintings and plush toys. The human being, in this future of biodiversity, will become increasingly alone, accompanied only by the species that are raised for food. The animals would be, in time in history just like that, technical ghosts whose ultimate materiality would be composed of ones and zeros in a binary code. The bio-informatic treasure that constitutes the biodiversity of the planet, formed over the course of thousands of years, will be reduced to a mere electrical existence displayed on monitors and screens. That is why the uses of technology exposed in this proposal point to the possibility of subverting processes of this nature, for the benefit of an ethic, of an ethos or technical behavior that at the same time is ecological.

Through this proposal of philosophical and artistic construction, and with the aim of contributing to the development of environmental knowledge and awareness-raising practices in Colombia, we explore some of the fundamental elements that can not be left aside in a thought that tries to imagine and act in terms of the present and the future of biodiversity, such as life, plurality, the world, communication and empathy. This is an approach to the biodiverse essence of social existence, to the benefit of a community of life, which is becoming increasingly pressing.

New prosthetics to build during the residence at IDEA Three prosthetic devices will be delivered based on the sensory organs of three emblematic animals of the Colombian fauna, available for use in awareness raising practiceswith the public. The first, based on the golden frog, is constructed as a metaphor for theprocess of breathing through the skin of the animal, specifically in the way that toxinsfrom the environment can, in a certain time, poison the frog. In practical terms, it will be a prosthesis for the forearm built via 3D printing (the material will not be plastic, but rubber), assembled to an interface that will connect a sensor that measures the level of contamination in the environment (Co2 sensor) and transmits the data, through the interface that processes the data, converting them into impulses that will activate a series of heating elements located on top of the prosthesis. These heating elements will raise thetemperature of the piece and therefore will reveal the presence of polluting agents in the environment for those who wear the device.

A bluetooth module is optional, it is used to send data to servers or remote computers. The circuit and the sensors are powered by 5V rechargeable batteries.

Rubber printing is possible with fused fillament deposition 3D printers like the Prusa V2.0. This type of material is important as it is able to emulate the touch and feel of skin, since conceptually we believe that to promote a sensitive reflection on the worlds of other species is one of the objectives of our proposal.

The second device is based on the way in which the monkeys communicate. We are interested in the idea of the scream as a subsistence mechanism in the midst of a threatening environment. The prosthesis is divided into two parts, a transmitter and a receiver, and is designed to be used by two people at a time. The transmitting mechanism allows, by touch, to send morse-code signals to the receiver, which translates the signals it receives into vibration pulses. This is the idea of a silent scream exposed in the first section of the text on the purpose of the proposal: if the cry of the monkey does not alert us, let us think of an analogue of its distress signals, in presence a medium that threatens to become extinct.

The third prothesis is based on the tingua Porphyrio martinicus which is a migratory bird that looks for water mirrors and marshland areas in the city of Bogota, where it feeds on aquatic species and plants that grow in the Bogotano wetlands. Each year when this species migrates from the eastern plains and wetlands of Magdalena, where it nests and reproduces, as it passes through the city of Bogota, it is common to find these birds lying on the ground exhausted and lost. So little is the wet territory that remains in the city that there is no intersections of hunting and resting areas on their migratory route and are lost in urban areas. It is not only the deforestation and the urbanization of their resting areas but the olfactory pollution and electromagnetic smog of the city that prevent them from finding these places of refuge.

According to studies,radio and electromagnetic waves emitted by different electronic and transmission equipment present in the cities can disturb the sense of orientation of the birds that use the magnetic field of the earth as a reference to navigate and of which they have a memory that marks their migration path. The disruption of the magnetic signal that migratory birds use as a beacon gives rise to a prosthesis that follows a distant signal that is affected by the parasitic electromagnetic fields that the innumerable electronic devices that are found in the cities and places inhabited by the man emit.

A series of antennas and coils collect the electromagnetic information and feed it to a crown of bone transducers that depending on the location of the strongest signal, indicate through vibration the direction that the individual following the signal must follow. The viewer will be subject of the disorientation and overwhelming feeling experienced by migratory birds that seek refuge in areas that have been urbanized.