Date
Tuesday May 14, 2024 from 3:30 PM to 4:30 PMLocation
Neuron 0.262Co-organizer
Industrial DesignPrice
freeMatter and Meaning: Towards A Soft Science of Soft Robots
Jonas Jørgensen, Associate Professor at SDU Soft Robotics at the Biorobotics section of the University of Southern Denmark, is a guest of Amy Winters, Assistant Professor of Future Everyday, Department of Industrial Design, TU/e.
Title | Matter and Meaning: Towards A Soft Science of Soft Robots
Soft robotics has provided an exciting new playground for a radically interdisciplinary type of robotics research that has broken with long held key assumptions and priorities of robotics. Unfolding through intensive collaborations between fields and disciplines including computer science, material science, and biology, soft robotics research has asserted the critical importance of utilizing embodied perspectives on artificial intelligence. Despite branching in different directions, soft robotics research has favored natural science methods and mainly pursued research interests anchored in technical science. In this lecture, I will consider how aesthetic perspectives can also generate pertinent insights about soft robotics that so-called “hard science” overlooks. These may prove essential both for designing embodied intelligence in soft robots and for soft robotics technology successfully transitioning from basic research to real-world applications. Through a presentation of selected examples of our work, I will seek to elucidate how aesthetic approaches can provide a more nuanced account of the potentials and consequences of rendering robots soft. I will argue that considerations on aesthetics are a prerequisite for actualizing the full range of possibilities for intelligent interaction soft robotics technology affords.
Jonas Jørgensen
Jonas Jørgensen, Associate Professor at SDU Soft Robotics at the Biorobotics section of the University of Southern Denmark, was originally trained as a physicist (BSc) and an art historian (BA, MA) at Copenhagen University and Columbia University (New York). He received the PhD degree at the IT University of Copenhagen as a member of the ”Robotics Evolution and Art Lab” (REAL).
Jonas’ work addresses issues related to artificial embodiment, soft materiality, and human-robot interaction and combines technical and natural science methods with humanities perspectives and practice-based art and design approaches. His writings have appeared in peer-reviewed as well as popular outlets including artist monographs, exhibition catalogues, academic journals, anthologies, and conference proceedings.
He has given lectures, presented papers, and organized workshops at several international conferences and festivals. Jonas’ art projects have been exhibited widely internationally at institutions including MSU Museum of Contemporary Art (Zagreb, Croatia), Ars Electronica Festival (Linz, Austria), and Chronus Art Center (Shanghai, China).
Eindhoven Artificial Intelligence Systems Institute
EAISI brings together all AI activities of the TU/e. Top researchers from various departments and research groups work together to create new and exciting AI applications with a direct impact on the real world. All this in close collaboration with our students and representatives from industry.