In a More Volatile World, New Models Are Needed

In a More Volatile World, New Models Are Needed

Simulation of obstacle configuration and Gilbert Delta formation / Eduardo Rico, Arup-RelationalUrbanism, AA/ UCL

Now, perhaps more than ever, we understand our world is shaped by complex, interactive, dynamicsystems. Increased climate volatility has shown us why we need to understand these complexsystems when we design landscapes. While landscape architects have been fast to embraceecological systems thinking, they have been slower to see how systems thinking can transform ourways of imagining, visualizing, and then intervening in the environment.

There have been significant advances in the tools we use to understand and represent the multitudeof biological and physical factors that shape our environment, particularly in the areas ofcomputational modeling and simulation. These advances were the focus of the recent SimulatingNatures symposium, organized by Karen M'Closkey, ASLA, associate professor of landscapearchitecture at the University of Pennsylvania and PEG Office of Landscape + Architecture, andKeith VanDerSys, also with PEG, and hosted by the landscape architecture department at theUniversity of Pennsylvania.

While computers and suites of software programs have become integrated into classrooms, studios,and offices, they have largely been used to computerize manual drawing and modeling processes,despite their ability to move beyond the purely representational and into the realms of projectionand speculation. As James Corner, ASLA, founder of Field Operations, stated in his keynote lecture

at the symposium, "Because of the facility afforded by technology and software, it's relatively easy toproduce novel forms. Design has become easy if you only think it's about form-making and aestheticresponses. It's not so easy to start to think about how to make the world better. How do we thinkabout tools that allow us to improve conditions rather than to just invent new forms?"

To date, we have embraced a simplistic view of ecology that trends toward modeling efficiencies,operating under the assumption that there is a singular universal truth, so we gear modeling effortstoward definitive answers. Presentations from the symposium challenged this notion: Each sessiondemonstrated a different approach to the act of modeling and simulation, offering suggestions as tothe roles new models might play and how they could be used to engage dynamic systems that evolveand change. These roles included the model as a choreographer of feedback loops; the model as aprovocateur and tool for thinking; and the model as a translator of information.

Models as Choreographers of Feedback Loops

The first session focused on the capability of hydrodynamic models to chart and understand therelationships among various invisible processes, enabling us to register change over time.Hydrodynamic models can choreograph feedback loops through an interplay of physical modeling,sensing, analysis, and digital modeling. The work of panelists in this session nests different physicaland temporal scales, simulating the impacts that interventions have on larger systems. For example,Heidi Nepf at MIT has a laboratory that models the small-scale physics of aquatic vegetation tosimulate larger patch dynamics. Philip Orton, with Stevens Institute of Technology and who oftencollaborates with SCAPE / Landscape Architecture, focused on modeling the effects of breakwatersand benthic interventions on storm surge in Staten Island and Jamaica Bay.

Delaware River hydrodynamic simulation using Aquaveo SMS/ SRH-2D, PEG office of landscape +architecture

Physical laboratory simulation of sea grasses / Heidi Nepf

Together, the models from the first session challenged our assumptions of what is permanent.Bradley Cantrell, ASLA, Harvard University Graduate School of Design, linked many of the session'spresentations through his advocacy for a shift from modeling for efficiency to modeling forresistance. Efficiency assumes a predetermined end goal while resistance leads toward adaptation,evolution, and new novel landscapes, which is critical to designing for resiliency. Working towardadaptability represents a paradigm shift that calls into question our idea of the fixed state.

Models as Tools for Thinking

Philosopher Michael Weisberg then offered the idea that the model can serve as a tool for thinking --an experimental mechanism for exploring new ideologies. The session examined agent- or rule-basedmodeling techniques that simulate the dynamic interaction of multiple entities, which can be used tosimulate adaptive, living systems. Through a process of bottom-up, rather than top-down modeling,the interrelationships of individual agents can be used to explore the relationship between scenarioand outcome. These models show potential for how we might engage complex socio-ecologicalsystems, which is imperative as we enter the Anthropocene Era.

For artist and NYU professor Natalie Jeremijenko, agent-based modeling has led to an "organism-centric design" approach. Understanding intelligent responses to stimuli from non-human organismscould offer a more compelling way of understanding complex interrelationships than twodimensional quantification in graphs and charts.

Panelists discussed our tendency to model that which we know and can predict, which is problematicin that it leaves significant territory unexplored. The concept of "solution pluralism," presented byStephen Kimbrough, calls for an open-ended decision-making process that culls the number ofpossible outcomes in order to limit discussion to that which is determined to be reasonable, whileleaving the final selection of a decision open.

Models as Translators of Information

Finally, we heard examples of how models might serve as translators, communicating environmentalpatterns that underlie the visible environment. Panelists presented new ways of translatinginformation for delivery and consumption, linking the real and the abstract, which are driven by newmethods of sensing and data collection.

Slime mold network optimization as a simulation of urban growth through emergent collectivebehavior / ecoLogicStudio

Michael Allen's work on monitoring microscopic activity in soil represented a departure from thetraditional method of core sampling. Through the real-time monitoring of soil coupled with sensingwater and nutrient concentrations, we can now understand the dynamism of production andmortality below grade.

The MIT Sensable City Lab's Underworld project, presented by Newsha Ghaeli, aims to use sewageas a platform for monitoring public health, tracking disease, antibiotic resistance, and chemicalcompounds in real time. Combined with demographic and spatial data at the surface, the project has

the potential to map our environment in a revealing way.

Unpredictable issues require unprecedentedtools -- but they, in turn, may yieldunpredictable results. As M'Closkey stated,"Variability and change are built into thethinking behind simulations. The uncertaintyinherent in many simulations reflects theuncertainty inherent to the systems theycharacterize."

Watch videos of the entire symposium.

This guest post is by Colin Patrick Curley,Student ASLA, master's of architecture and master's of landscape architecture candidate, Universityof Pennsylvania.

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