Open Set Seminar #4 - Complexity of Rhythms

17 November 2018, 10:00-14:00 | Location: CBK Zuidoost

During this session, different artists and scientists will join us in a response to the inaugural lecture of Prof Dr Caroline Nevejan titled: 'Urban Reflection: On the Design of Diverse Engagement in the Networking City of Amsterdam’.

In this inaugural lecture, Dr Caroline Nevejan will argue that cities are becoming complex systems in which design is playing new important roles. She will argue that trade-offs for trust and truth are shifting because we are bearing witness to each other in new ways, due to the different technologies that format our presence. She will then discuss her research on rhythm, which appears to be fundamental in enhancing trust between residents in city neighbourhoods. Establishing a rhythm allows diverse rhythms to attune to each other, and is core to our sensorial perception and to our ability to communicate; unfortunately, technology design does not take this into account.

Lastly, Dr Nevejan will make a plea for an understanding of and a design of urban experience as a shared reflection on the many sensations and emotions a city offers. Such a shared reflection, such a ‘collaborative authoring of outcomes’, is necessary and needs to nurture diversity in order to enable networking cities to contribute to survival and well-being. It is still unclear how technology can contribute to such a reflection. However, with the acceleration of AI around the world, and the potential to create thinking robots, the human capacity for shared reflection needs to position itself in relation to these developments.

In conclusion, Dr Nevejan will argue that for networking cities to contribute to well-being and survival, these cities will need to be reflective and rhythm based. Such cities need to invent and design processes of complex governance for diverse engagement in order to contribute to the collaborative authoring of outcomes in every street, borough and/or enterprise.