Generative Design

Emergence has been an important concept in biology and mathematics, in artificial intelligence, information theory and computer science, and in the newer domains of climatic modelling and other complex systems analysis and simulations. The seminar course will commence with a survey of the origins of the science and technologies associated with emergence traced from Turing’s work on cryptographic analysis in the Second World War, through the mathematics of evolution and embryological development development, the data structures and processes of the genome to population dynamics and pressures. Applications to structural and architectural design are explored, focusing on algorithms for generative design processes. Students develop their understanding of these concepts by engaging in The Generative Design Experiments. The experiment will conclude with the detailed modelling and analysis of the set of forms, surfaces, and structures evolved in the experiment.