Invisible Smart Cities Emerging from Information Decomposition. Guest: Keisuke Toyoda on "SmartCity, Fungi and Buddha"
Photo by Michael Dziedzic on Unsplash
The implementation of common ground should be necessary in order to build a city that coexists with non-human agents like AI or robots.
Keisuke Toyoda, an architect involved in the planning of the Osaka World Expo to be held in 2025, explains the importance of "common ground," a foundation on which digital agents and physical agents can achieve a common recognition.
Given the difference between the physical intelligence of humans and the digital intelligence of computers, how should we prepare our environment? What methodologies are required for its implementation? We discussed this with Mr. Toyoda to explore the image of the smart city that will emerge in the future.
Keisuke Toyoda (Noiz Architects / Tokyo University)
Yasuto Nakanishi (Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University)
Masashige Motoe (Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University)
Hajime Ishikawa (Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University)
Common Ground, where Digital Intelligence and Physical Intelligence have Common Recognitions
Nakanishi： Toyoda-san, you have spoken in various media about the design of Common Ground, could you tell us again what you mean by "common ground" and what you are aiming for?
Toyoda: “Common Ground" is a system that allows digital intelligence and physical intelligence to mutually recognize objects and information with high resolution. If everything that exists in physical space can be converted into general-purpose digital information and put into a situation where humans, robots, and AI can have a common understanding, it can be useful for autonomous mobility navigation, and developing new applications and services.
In the next few years, services related to autonomous vehicles and AR/VR will probably be realized in our daily life, but it should be inefficient for the edge side that provides these services to individually develop SLAM (Simultaneous Localization and Mapping) and protocols for environment description, all on their own.
When we consider manufacturing companies such as Toyota and Panasonic as the first generation of platform companies, information platform companies such as Yahoo and Google as the second generation, third generation companies such as Amazon that handle physical articles with the knowledge of information platform companies, and companies such as Uber and Airbnb that compile the information and attributes of objects that already existed are the fourth generation. This is how trends have changed. I believe that the upcoming 5th generation platformer will probably be a company that can handle existing areas of the city in a composite manner. The value axis that may be emphasized in the future may return from information to physical objects.
There is no incentive to develop a common data format for these purposes though it would be more socially rational if servicers on the edge and platformers on the environment side provided data to each other to some extent, thus, no progress has been made. However, it should be difficult to provide services without a common infrastructure. At the very time, I just got a job for the 2025 Osaka Expo, so I thought about publicly orienting and agitating servicers and platformers to advance in the same direction.
Recently, the "Common Ground Living Lab" was launched in Osaka. It aims to develop a testing ground and protocol as a sandbox for implementing these ideas. Led by the Osaka Chamber of Commerce and Industry, many companies from diverse business categories such as IT infrastructure construction, general construction, real estate developers and electronics manufacturers are participating in the lab. Through demonstration experiments of a common infrastructure for describing all kinds of objects digitally, we aim to develop a general-purpose 3D interface description method like Google Map's KML(Information written in XML for the purpose of managing the display of 3D geospatial information, etc.) that can seamlessly handle indoor spaces and outdoor spaces on a human scale.
An Altruistic Viewpoint seeing the Entire System
Nakanishi: I feel that the Common Ground approach is similar to the post-human-centered design in the sense that it creates a machine-friendly environment. What kind of balance between human-centered and post-human-centered approaches do you think we should incorporate while designing the environment?
Toyoda: Oh, it is a difficult question… I’m afraid that it may not be an answer for your question, but I believe that a view of cities and architecture that humans are the only agents is a viewpoint like the Ptolemaic system. We are indeed human beings, and it is not wrong for us as creatures to move to our benefit, but the current situation might be too anthropocentric. To use an analogy, it is like the situation in the Central League(One of the Japanese baseball leagues) where Tokyo Yomiuri Giants have too pulled out famous players from other teams and this league has become uninteresting. I think it is necessary to think from a group-intelligence perspective that nurtures the entire system, rather than thinking only about what works for oneself.
In order to realize the common ground, it is necessary to have a description method corresponding to each of the four quadrants consisting of the axis of agent and environment, and digital and physical. However, at present, there is only a description method from a human perspective. Unless we design a society that is easy to operate from the perspective of other non-human agents such as robots and AI, the quality of services we receive should eventually fall off.
Know-how to Collaborate with Different Fields
Motoe: The implementation of the common ground is an issue that cannot be achieved by the conventional construction industry approach to urban design, thus collaboration among different disciplines is necessary.
Toyoda: Few people in the urban and architectural fields can discuss the differences in the description style of 3D data and the correspondence between its versatility and purpose. Due to the lack of knowledge to recognize it, and the essence of the issues that need to be tackled is not well communicated.
For example, there is an opinion that BIM can be used to describe the environment. BIM is a software mainly for construction design and is excellent for writing attribute information, however, it is not designed for digital agents to recognize the environment, so it basically cannot divert to this purpose. In addition, BIM can only describe a few percent of a city, and it cannot handle non-building elements such as roads, subways and street trees.
Game Engine has the potential to describe the entire environmental system, furthermore, multi agents run on it smoothly. BIM and CAD systems are designed for modeling architectural data and describing static relationships, so they are not assumed to describe the fractions of a milli-second order data required for autonomous driving and MR/AR, and the data tends to be heavy. On the other hand, game-engine is designed for running lots of objects in a virtual environment without causing the player to experience delays. So I believe that game-engine can work as an interface that incorporates movements of humans and various objects in real-time while describing a more complex environment.
Game-engine could have the potential to connect the physical world and the digital world. However, we have several problems to solve to realize it. For example, we have to implement functions to incorporate information on invisible parts in BIM such as structures and equipment or specific attribute information of materials and members into the game-engine, ones to digitize existing areas where data does not exist, ones to import data scanned with Lidar or camera.
On the other hand, it is difficult to convey the importance of describing cities with a game-engine to guys in the game industry. In the long term, even if we tell them that the fields of urban design or mobility design have more business potentials for game-engine, they tend to think of developing a game using that data.
Too much specialization in these fields is problematic, and we actually sometimes encounter situations with difficult communications among various specialists. But it's our challenge, and I think we need a cross-disciplinary ecosystem that fosters know-how for collaboration with other fields. I recently had the opportunity to be on the stage of CEDEC with Hirofumi Motoyama in BANDAI NAMCO Research Inc. on the possibilities of game design and cities, and the response was far more positive than I expected[1]. I feel that the time is getting ripe.
City and Architecture of the Future that Cannot Be Fully Depicted as a Picture
Nakanishi: I think that Toyoda-san's proposal for SHIBUYA HYPER CAST.2 expresses a desire as an architect to create a place where decomposed elements are brought together again. I found it interesting to see the fusion of elements close to machine landscapes such as a pathway for robots and a landing site for drones, and elements of the natural landscape such as plants. What are your thoughts on the relationship between machine landscape, natural landscape, and computational design? Also, you utilized the Voronoi pattern in planning the venue for the Osaka Expo, and I would like to know your intentions.
Toyoda: Until the 20th century, cities and architecture could be expressed in form, but from now on, the essence of that novelty and innovation will no longer appear in forms and objects. For example, Uber generates cabs by changing information attributes, so we don't need to change the quality or design of the car. From now on, the editability of the information dimension will have to be meta-expressed.
SHIBUYA HYPER CAST.2 is a visual metaphor for the elements that will appear in the city of the future, and they are stacked vertically. I believe that an intermediate structure as a system will emerge that balance these elements in the cities of the future. For example, In a fully autonomous driving society, the topology of the physical environment might change dynamically as the road width increases or decreases depending on the amount of traffic and time, rather than the site and the road being separated and fixed in the modern city. The Osaka Expo site plan, in which I worked as an advisor, was planned to serve as a demonstration test site for such a transitional change. Based on the premise that both social and urban structures will become more discrete, fluid, and decentralized, we analyzed the elements and logic of new types of cities and searched for a form that is reintegrated under the new framework of city. The network structure by Voronoi tessellation is an embodied temporary image of the new logic while such research and theory have been under construction.
A New Way to Update City with Networks like Fungi
Motoe: The essence of fungi is not fruiting bodies that are visible and tangible, but an invisible network of mycelium. What you said about only the intermediate structure appearing as a form is exactly similar to the ecology of fungi.
Toyoda: That may be true. I had never thought of it in terms of fungi metaphor, but from now on, I think we should move to fragmented redevelopment. For example, it means changing from large-scale redevelopments; from building a high-rise tower that aggregates single-function offices and commercial facilities to making use of the discreteness and editability created by a mycelium-like network.
The reason I am uncomfortable with the term "Smart City" is that it gives the impression that value can be restructured within the closed area. Using the Fungi metaphor, the invisible network like mycelium will update the structure of value drastically by the editability or the ubiquity while connecting city, suburb, countryside and wild area. By using the word "Smart City" to a high-tech closed area, we may miss the potential of the vast mycelium network. The most interesting would be editing the value of physical places and objects through information technology.
A "Smart City-like" city augmented based on the Fungi-like network would look like an existing city such as Shimbashi (a Japanese classic chaotic town in the middle of Tokyo), however, they are fundamentally different in that they are connected to a vast network that realizes them. I think that the cities developed based on the Fungi-like network will initially take the form of a mishmash of various fiction such as "suburbs" and "resorts" in parts. The point is that "physical instance" is only a fiction like Disneyland, so the value of the real things that cannot be "designed" as the value of location such as history or story of the land will increase. This might be a frustrating situation for "Designer" because it presupposes the impossibility of control by designers.
In terms of network-type discrete re-development, local developers with bases in suburbs and regional cities would have potential. By networking facilities in the local areas of work, housing, and commerce in rural areas, each area will become more suitable for remote work, and a completely location-free local residence will become feasible. Furthermore, if it becomes possible to transfer one's senses to an avatar in high resolution, it will be possible to exist in multiple locations without a physical body.
Recently, I often say that the discretization and fluidization of the four elements of work, housing, comfort, and study are the keys to the next-generation of smart society. In addition to entertainment which had been discretized in the first place, the COVID-19 crisis has begun to discretize and fluidize work and housing. But, the last bottleneck is the lack of progress in the discretization and fluidization of the education sector. I think this is a major point. If an educational system could be built in a network, it might be possible to take classes three days a week in the city and two days a week in a rural school with the same curriculum. Also, if such a discretization of educational institutions is realized, it will be possible to have children learn, for example, rural okagura (Japanese-Shintoism music and dance). It may not be 100%, but it will be possible to pass on a few tens of percent of the local culture that might die in the current society where there are only two choices, either rural or Tokyo. Allowing such thinness, and taking advantage of fluidization and discretization will realize to stack thin values on multiple layers. I believe that such attitudes and mechanisms will become important in the future for rural areas.
The Changing Architect's Professional Ability and Skill
Ishikawa: Landscape designers also have the dilemma of drawing a picture in spite of not being able to draw the complete picture. Its design purpose is sometimes to create lively scenes, and we sometimes just draw a vague image of people gathering because it is impossible to draw the environment which we design since we cannot control the growth of plants. Such a drawing often miss-leads design deviates from the essence of the design concept. Do you have any ideas or methods to overcome those misunderstandings and convey the essence or logic when we presuppose the impossibility of control by designers?
Toyoda: When I say things like this, I may be jeopardizing the profession of architects, but I feel that what architects deal with is shifting from form to phenomenon. If the power and value of 20th-century architecture were to control everything and show a confrontation with nature, what is required for 21st-century architecture will be the know-how itself that can indirectly handle causal relationships without the dogma that 100% control is design.
As the design targets change from simple objects and forms to intermediate structures, the points to be addressed differ in each design project, and collaboration is required while creating a common language with other fields on a case-by-case basis. It is difficult to systematize such now-how and implicit knowledge, and currently individuals may have to accumulate meta-knowledge.
New viewpoints for value that emerge by decomposing and editing attributes
Nakanishi: In order to overcome the functional modernism in designing space, we would need alternative design methodology with an altruistic viewpoint and a new sense of value toward various species and others: not only robots and AI, but also diverse organisms and the environment, as you mentioned earlier. What are your thoughts on future design methodologies that go beyond conventional values?
Toyoda: Oh, I receive awfully heavy questions for a Monday morning...(laughs)
If we are talking from such a broad perspective, I feel that the era of expanding the physical world is reaching its limits. Humans have been physically expanding for thousands of years, discovering new continents or frontiers, etc. After the Age of Exploration and Discovery, we have almost covered the area of the earth that can be sustainably developed, and there is no longer any area left to expand. The only way to expand further is to go to outer space, so we are now talking about the moon and Mars. But I don't think it will pay off in any way. It is similar to the situation where Hideyoshi Toyotomi tried to invade the Ming Dynasty because there was no more territory in Japan to give him a prize. Now that technology allows us to handle digital space as parallel dimensions, shouldn't we be extending the world into the information dimension, rather than considering expansion into the universe by simple analogy?
Just as online meetings can now be held without moving the body, there are many things that we have assumed need to be physically packaged, and that might be decomposed and integrated in a different way. And if we can decompose and edit the attributes of things that have been fixedly packaged in the body or physical space and handle them, tons of new combinations of values different from what we have seen so far will be created. The systematization of the know-how to decompose attributes and the logic to edit them should be actively pursued by society in the future. I believe that this should be our new continent.
Quantization of a person and a new type of collectiveness
Nakanishi: In past interviews, Toyoda-san has used the keyword "quantization of people" to describe the state of being able to exist in various places by placing personal identities in digital space.
Toyoda: I believe, once our physical boundaries become looser and informatic attributes of our identity become more separable and editable, our boundaries of self-consciousness would expand and start overlapping with others, then partially form something new like “collective-self”, which makes a person sense a communal body as a boundary of extended yourself. COVID-19 has forced us to build more consciousness of local communities through empathy for others who struggle in unexpected circumstances. For instance, many people learned further about their neighbor communities and local stores due to the forced work-from-home circumstances, by supporting each other in daily activities. Such a sense of community and consciousness in contribution help to build a sense of ambiguity between person and community, and such association over different scales may eventually help human society to build ways to solve even larger issues like global environmental problems. In other words, without having such a sense of merger beyond scales developed into certain methodologies which become a social system, we may not be able to have a way to control such large issues we face. I’d imagine our life up to the 20th century was merely a low-resolution version of computer graphics, such as 8-bit pixel art type of composition made out of clear pixel units, which force people to be captured within a clear threshold of each unit – there’s no ambiguity. Whereas now in the age of information technology, our attributes can be transferred, shared, and copied in a more detailed and complex form to different locations, which makes our belongings and identities blurred and fluid, making ourselves constantly unclear where the threshold is and where you are at certain timing. I call it “human quantization", as human starts to have wave-particle duality, beyond a physical threshold. Indeed, it is already happening everywhere – we are daily having online discussions from different places, and you may also be checking messages and probably dealing with kids by the dining table. Our daily life is already dispersed to a certain degree.
Possibility of new value derived by decomposition of attributes
Nakanishi: In this project, we believe that we should discuss what new aspects of human intelligence and physicality the physical environment with robots or AI derives. What were your thoughts on such matters when planning the 2025 Expo?
Toyoda: In the venue plan for the 2025 Osaka-Kansai Expo, which I led, the value of planning three distinctly different venues was brought to the forefront: not only the traditional physical venues, but also virtual venues and the common-ground venues that connect the three. Travis Scott's virtual concert in the world of the game "Fortnite" attracted 28 million people, and a similar virtual mobilization should be possible. "Common Ground" venues should be designed to allow AR avatar attendance, or avatar attendance that can be transferred to robots or buildings, etc. At the very least, KPIs should no longer be based on the number of physical bodies that pass through the gate. Nevertheless, such industrial implementation will require a great deal of collaboration across companies and business categories. Japanese companies are not very good at making large investments toward a vision that is still unclear, so I think that by using the Expo as a milestone, we can use it as an opportunity to overcome barriers that are usually insurmountable. The activities of the Common Ground Living Lab, which I mentioned earlier, are just such an example.
Ishikawa: When you start to break down the attributes of the event space, it shakes up the concept of the venue. When I think about the Olympics from this perspective, I feel that the significance of gathering together to play sports is being re-examined. The Olympic Games are held in the same city at the same time for different sports in different environments, which causes cost or social problems such as venue construction. Perhaps there could be a new way to hold the Olympic Games also.
Toyoda: For now, we should expand the possibilities of new values that can be created by connecting the digital world and the physical world. Regarding the Olympics, it may be difficult to unify weather conditions, etc., but it may be possible to hold the preliminary rounds in different locations. Other possibilities include the development of 3D scanned broadcasting technology, which may create a new style of watching the games with VR goggles that make you feel as if you are right next to the athletes. I think the Tokyo Olympics could be a good opportunity to fundamentally change the value system of sports and the way the experience is shared, but it is sorry that it is not being discussed at all.
[1] https://cgworld.jp/feature/202010-cedec2020-toshi.html
(Text by Naruki Akiyoshi, Editing by Kotaro Okada, Translation by Momoko Yoshida)
この記事が気に入ったらサポートをしてみませんか？