Zenon's City - Prolegomena to a Critique of Urban Reason

/ ITA / Institute of Technology in Architecture / Faculty of Architecture / ETH Zurich / Chair for CAAD / Klaus Wassermann / Leipzig Hot::Spot / 10.12.2010 / 1 v2.14 10.12.2010

Klaus Wassermann

Zenon‘s City

wassermann@arch.ethz.ch

Preliminary Suggestions on Urban Reason

Hot Spots :: der Stadtentwicklung

/ ITA / Institute of Technology in Architecture / Faculty of Architecture / ETH Zurich / Chair for CAAD / Klaus Wassermann / Leipzig Hot::Spot / 10.12.2010 / 2

Hot Spot :: Perspective

personal

formal

medial

Critique of Geometry

Critique of Urban Reason

Which is the Essence of City?

Preliminary Remarksmethodological issues

as a figure of thought in Architecture

Proto-Schemata:Growth-network-Complexity-Information

Potential Elements of Construction

Begin of the first Part:

Preliminary Remarksand a short methodological warm-Up

((( aspects )))

Is it possible to plan „CITY“?

Is it possible to plan „URBANITY“?

theoría: Anschauung, Überlegung, Einsicht

theory = (ortho-)regulation of the genesis and parameterisation of models

City Development – Linguistics of a Figure

ityDevelopment

Engineering

run of„events“

Perform

Individua

Logics

Growth

Methodologicals (I)challenges & constraints by

Disziplinary Perspectivesanalysis of power, conflict-/consumism-analytics (Weber, Durkheim)

Normative (naturalistic) Fallacies Romanticisms and Idealism (Feldtkeller, Mumford)

Reductionisms, IdeologicalizationsMaterialism: statistical (Hillier), naturalistic (Mitscherlich),

formal (L.Wirth, Burgess), cybernetic (Luhmann)

„Projectionism“Import of highly integrated Theories: knowledge (Matthiesen),

evolution (Schamp)

Aspekte und ihr WechselAspects become visible only in their exchange

Methodologicals (II)

Structure

Element

Mechanism

cave definitionem !!!

„City“ is obviously difficult to grasp

?Heterotopia Koolhaas/Foucault

with strong symbolistic Components

SyntheticComparatistics

no existential questions please ... What „is“ ...

serious story telling

Begin of the First Part:

Critique of Geometry

Influence, Reach and Overloadings

The Holiness of Geometryfirst procedure, which promised correctness of a construction ...

independent of ...

locationtimeperson

in opposition to symbolisation

Safety was achieved through the

linkage o structure (axiomatics) and

values (Sinnanspruch)

narration, poetics

Universals

There are none!

are there...?

justific

ation?

Fatal inherited Diseaserole of geometry

by Euclid quite unsuitable positioning of axiomatics

things, that are directly (unmediated) clearWhat, if there is no epistemic directness ?

Primacy of Interpretation

... then axioms would moult into interesting rules of games.

first heureka-experience by the power of „ideomatics“

complementary: Primacy of Modelling

Inherited Disease (II): Phenotypical FoldingsG

alcausal chain

Causality

AxiomaticsD

efinition

If - Then

CyberneticsScience

Juristerei

Frankfurter Schule

control technologyIT

Positivism

Shannon

Luhmann

navigator

Towards the Sun in a straight Line...

City (?) as a kind of Accidens

Karlsruhe m

id 17th century

Obsessions on Centers

Palmanova: Inhabiting or Freedom plans for new garden city,18th century

ova „London“

Nowa Huta (Pl) – City (?) for Heroes of Production

geometry just yesterday

The Roaring Twenties...

bold utterings

serious issues

geometry today: according to human Measure?

urban?

progressive? well developed?

of course, Bucky-Boy won‘t miss...

The straight-lineObsession

Logistics: the straight regime of Causality

CCD Registers: Logistics of Information

The APOLLO Story 1969

the Atlas-phantasm of

the fixed point

the total triumph of the global

equation

Oh holy Grale of geometric Modernism

the steady pole

The Story 2009

never only ONE,

though not yet

just MANY,

but ARBITRARY(as YOU<!> like)Fixed Points

the first and (so far) the only

Compass for topo- logicalSpaces

Owner:

Sparrow, Jack

Zäsur

/ ITA / Institute of Technology in Architecture / Faculty of Architecture / ETH Zurich / Chair for CAAD / Klaus Wassermann / Leipzig Hot::Spot / 10.12.2010 / 27Michael Hansmeyer

What can not be drawn (any more)...

a at the

what we cannotspeak

The end of Expressibility

Formalisability

Axiomatisability

...has to be calculated, may be rendered...has to be calculated, may be rendered

/ ITA / Institute of Technology in Architecture / Faculty of Architecture / ETH Zurich / Chair for CAAD / Klaus Wassermann / Leipzig Hot::Spot / 10.12.2010 / 28Subdivision Mechanism

just a different rendering

What can not be drawn (any more)...

freezed to state

freely choosable point in time

not an algorithm any more

semi-open results

Reaction-Diffusion Mechanism

Michael Hansmeyer

What can not be drawn...

Schuytgraf, NL

real-time

constraint

optimization

120 clients

1000‘s of constraints

hierarchy of goals

ethz caad

Globus Zh, CH

pre-specificdesign

das differential ofarchitectonicmatter

End of the First Part:

Critique of GeometryThe End of axiomatic Universals

Begin of the Second Part:

((( which are the essences of any thinking about the City, beyond of any specific theories? )))

Conditions for a Thinking of City-Becoming

Layout (genealogy) of our Critique

Network

Growth

Associativity

Complexity

Self-Organisation

peration

Information

formalisable structural models

Efficacy Causality

das einfachste Wachstum

entlang des Atomgitters: Mikro=Makro

repräsentationale Symmetrie

::by attachment (from the outside)

vollständig de-individualisierte „atomare“ Module

::by attachment (from the outside)

::by attachment (from inside)

the principle:fixing of singular points & differentiating & repeatingfinding of a particular point: 2-Component System

fraktal growth

welwitschia

Welwitschia – a living fossil

Plant (-like)

Growth in Plants2-Component-System at singular mikro fields (meristeme)

self-affine replication

added complexity by repetition of processes

::by attachment (from outside & inside)

added complexity by standardised regulation

primitive division of labor

::by attachment (from outside & inside)

Michael Batty, 2008Caglioni & Giovanni, 2003

::differentiation towards the inside

::differentiation towards the insideK

loon 1993

::differentiation towards the inside

verticalve

::differentiation towards the inside: embryo

locally-induced growth,foldings AND Apoptosis !

fractality establishesonly lokal any more

„blue prints“

Koolhaas, an embryologist?

melting

Embryonic Growth

added Complexity by deeply layeredand embedding regulation

gain ofadaptivity

and potential

Differentation towards

the inside

emergence ofcontexts and individuality

::differentation towards the inside ...

innere Kompartimente können umarrangiert werden: potentielles schmelzen, Fusion von Räumen und Membranen

Zuweisung von „innen“ / „aussen“ muss immer wieder neu verhandelt werden

Growth, Differentiation: ImmaterialGrowth

Konrad Lorenzchanges in behavior precede changes of morphology

Evolution

Training

Learning, Memory, Habits, Virtualisation, Mediatisation

unfolding

structural dynamics

scaling

immaterial differentiation

changes inmorphology

Interestingness and Patterns of Growth

which patterns

are the most frequently used?

associative (as a „body without organs“)

which arethe most promising?

anorganic, crystalline

swarm-basedplant-likeembryonic

informationallogistic, optimizing (leafs)

learning & behavior

organic

interim resultCritique of Urban Reason

Growth

temporal dynamicstemporal dynamics of the transformation of structures

overcoming of the „contingencycontingency--hypothesis“

transition to evolutiveevolutive processes

new questions: regulative factorsregulative factors, e.g. for continuity, melting

typology typology of differentiation processes (epi/genetics)

Genealogy of our Critique: Part 2

Networks

Growth

Associativity

Complexity

Self-Organisation

peration

Information

formalisable structural models

Efficacy Causality

living things

social issues

Complexity: Bestandsaufnahmeclear and dark bright and

labyrinthinedark and convoluted

Luhmann, Sozial Systeme: „Complexity is that information, which is missing for the system, in order to measure, comprehend and describe its surrounding environment completely.“

Self-preservation develops into a problem, „since for any system the surrounding environment is more complex than the system itself."

Complexity as a cipher for non-understandability

Complexity als inevitable external threat

Complexity as a syntactic-algorithmic entity

definitely ineligible for

real contexts

Context of Complexity

complexity is not reducible

makroskopichproperties are notdescribable on the mikroscopic levelin principal

complexity involves strong emergence

strong emergence is indispensable for adaptivity

What is the minimal, sufficient

(and necessary)

description of emergence ?

What is the minimal, sufficient

(and necessary)

description of emergence ?

weak, farweak, far

strong, closestrong, close

micro-antagonistic self-referential 2-component system

Turing P

attern

a mystical-opaque concept

is being transformed

into a non-deterministic

parameter space

Elementarisation of Complexity

Dissipation

Antagonistic Forces

Standardisation

Active Compartmentalization

systemic Knots

reaction-diffusion-system, dialectics as population

flow of entropy, consumption of energy

sign theoretical: semiotic, algorithmic, geno-/phenotype, code, rule

transition from order to organisation; demands for: left-overs, death, reduction

internal model-based control provokes latentantagonisms, „self-sustaining complexity“

RD-Prozesse: Besonderheiten

absolutely„impermeable“epistemologicseparation

molekules, cells, ants, words, events, human individuals, actants in a network

descriptive categories can NOT be applied to

the other layer mutually!

interim resultCritique of Urban reason

Complexity

Elementarisation allows for Operationalisabilityof creative Processes

objective diagnosis / prognosis ofstasis, Adaptivity or chaos-like melting

Genealogy of Critique U.R.: Part 3

Networks

Growth

Associativity

Complexity

Self-Organisation

peration

Information

formalisable struktural models

Efficacy Causality

Networks

Cities are networks, ok, so what? a TRIVIAL remark?

Concept had not been in use before 1980.

Network Knots and Links (everything is network, isn‘t it?)

From different Worlds

Logistic Networks

Associative Networks

geometric-causal

algebraic-informational

effect-orientiet::basic typology of networks

temporally neutral, „real-time“

actualizes just as operation = as sth temporal

hubs, scale-free

hierarchical

fractal

deterministic

rhizomatic

Growth ?

redundant

recurrent

probabilistic

random density

Learning !

...... a powerfula powerful andand scalablescalable formalformal

modelmodel

mapping of n-dimensional descriptions mapping of n-dimensional descriptions

onto a m(2+)-dimensional maponto a m(2+)-dimensional map

self-organizing map (SOM)self-organizing map (SOM)

Associativity in the Space of the City

Meta-Stability of Neighborhoods

not reducible to the reasoning power of individuals

“Once set up, a city is a great sorting mechanism

which ... infallibly selects out of the population

as a whole the individuals best suited to live in

a particular region or a particular milieu.”Robert Park, 1952: Human Communities.

Zürich Augustinergasse,Farbraum Stadt, 2010

Associativity and Memory

Logistic Networks

are the great Optimizers

of identified Relations

in (quasi-)material contexts

useful

are the great inducers and inventors

of potential Relations,

yet to be constructed

Associative Netwerks

Randolations

in purely informational contexts

interesting

urban- material-proto-inter-net in steel &

The Manhattan-Syndromthe „Urban“ & the Web share important properties

associativity

abundant heterotopias

information as essential driver

high density, intensive flows

mediagenicity

web(b)ed Urbanity = Wurbanitythe new mash-up: the Urbane und das Web

descriptional scheme: abstracting from both = WURB

development of cities not (anymore just) as built substanceInternet of Things (150 web devices/person by 2015) local semi-virtualisation of physical processesextending social realities as kind of „mixed reality“ New Media, new Spaces, new habits, new densification

New kinds of „Urbanity“

interim resultCritique of Urban Reason

Associativity

description of dynamic aggregations

dynamics of qualitative properties becomes accessible

„collective“ memory processes are rendered explicable

Schemata of a Critique of Urban Reason

Networks

Growth

Associativity

complexity

peration

formalisable Struktural Models

formalisable

skalogen

active Comparatistics

operationalisable

interdependent Conditions for Thinking the Costruction of the City

End of the second Part:

conditions for a thinking of constructing the city

Begin of the third Part:

Potential Elements of Construction

((( getting operational )))

(semi-)abstract conditions for a City-becoming

Conditions of the Possibility of Urbanity

Logistics material as well as immaterial, visible body of rules,organisatorically adaptive, „real-time“ function

irreducible dimensional construction

Participation real-time, „mixed-reality“, and densified

Continuity organisatorical-(quasi-)material

Heterotopia informatorical-ordinal, open, manifold and mediatised antagonisms

„Abundance“ local, accessible, due to suitable scaling

Entwicklungsfelder Urbaner Vernunft

Stadt densified potential for the creation of organisation from order, often limited tophysical-material aspects

residential areas

tradition-bound order of individual roles as predecessors of institutions, often centralistic, oligarchic or autokratic

Urbanität volatilised AND virtualised conditions for „Citiness“ in the realm of the immaterial;in the future tendentially more as „Wurbanity“

Zenon‘s City ...

A field made from differential, volatile, sprouting inertial reference systems! ... which as a (semi-)autonomous entity develop its own character and its own power (as potential)

Thanks !

Zenon's City - Prolegomena to a Critique of Urban Reason

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