Dr. Neil Leach's Lecture to FAU Artificial Intelligence-Based Topical Studio by Dr. Shermeen Yousif

As part of the FAU School of Architecture’s research and teaching of artificial intelligence and architectural design, our faculty member, Dr. Shermeen Yousif, is offering a topical studio titled "Deep Ecologies: Navigating an AI-Generated Design Space towards a Bio-centric Architecture." A guest speaker to the studio, Prof. Neil Leach, the author of "Architecture in the Age of Artificial Intelligence: An Introduction to AI for Architects," offered a lecture titled "Do Robots Dream of Digital Sheep?" for Dr. Yousif’s students.

Dr. Yousif interrogates the new possibilities offered by integrating AI into the design process. According to Dr. Yousif, “It is important to move beyond the deterministic rule-based parametric design approaches. AI models are now capable of autonomously defining their own parameters from information present in their input datasets. Recent AI methods, such as generative deep learning, are considered "learning systems" that learn directly from data without input rules and can offer "unexpected" solutions. With the incorporation of AI models, a second generation of generative design systems is emerging, marking a shift in design processes, towards an unlimited exploration of the design space. Adopting this premise, the studio interrogates the development and experimentation of a new design framework where multiple interconnected artificial intelligence models are employed at every design task, and to address a specific architectural system in a connected framework. Within this human-machine collaborative mode, creativity is augmented, and exploration is expanded, allowing innovative design solutions to emerge. Importantly, adopting a bio-centric rather than an anthropocentric approach, the project brief is to design a high-rise habitat with ecological design principles. Inspiration will be derived from natural systems towards symbiosis between architecture and nature, to achieve an ecologically adaptive micro-system where humans and natural ecologies co-exist.”

Link to the lecture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eyUNwHdYMyg