Marc Böhlen

University at Buffalo, USA

the glass bottom float - embodied collective intelligence for environmental engagement

Summary

People know things computers cannot, and some aspects of this intelligence are directly related to bodily experience. Collecting and analyzing body-centric data from large groups of people can open a window onto qualitatively new kinds of insights: embodied collective intelligence.

The GlassBottomFloat project collects embodied collective intelligence on swimming water quality and builds with it a new metric by which to gauge the health of beach waters and the potential pleasure of swimming in them. The core body-centric input is the swimming pleasure measure (spm), found by interviewing swimmers at the beach. The spm is part of a 30 dimensional water quality evaluation vector that includes weather data, water parameters (e-coli, turbidity, chlorophyll and others), wave motion, and beach usage to a comprehensive environmental descriptor, one that combines the advantages of hard numeric data with soft, intuitive judgment.

See www.realtechsupport.org/new_works/gbf.html for details.

Resume

Marc Böhlen, artist-engineer and author, offers alternate and sometimes uncomfortable proposals for future human machine societies. Böhlen's work has received numerous awards, including the ALIFE/VIDA 7.0 prize, and has been discussed in the New York Times and the Discovery Channel.

Böhlen is currently associate professor in the department of Media Study at the University at Buffalo where he directs the MediaRoboticsLab and co-directs the Emerging Practices Program. Recent and upcoming shows and presentations include DAC (Beall Center for Art and Technology, Los Angeles 2009), ETECH (San Jose 2009) and CYNETART (Dresden 2008). Recent and upcoming publications include Second Order Ambient Intelligence (JAISE 2009), Ambient Intelligence in the City (Springer 2009), and Micro Public Places (Architectural League, New York 2010).

See www.realtechsupport.org for details.