The Operationalizing of Lynch’s Cognitive Representation Elements of Large Scale Environments

The result of operationalizing Lynch’s (1960) cognitive representation elements of large scale environments is a set of images that can be employed in a research project identifying the various domains of the brain where each of Lynch’s (1960) elements occur. With such data, designing wayfinding within buildings: in urban habitats, and even within virtual worlds can be better realized. The research design will use Siegel and White’s (1975) model as a spatial representation of Lynch’s (1960) five elements of large-scale environments’ physical form. These contents of physical form are classified as followed: paths, edges, districts, nodes, and landmarks. It is well-documented that other influences of spatial representation, such as the social meaning of an area, its function, its history, or even its name, play a part in the development of representations. Brain research indicates that three of Lynch\u27s contents: paths, edges, and landmarks are cognizable in the brain via neurons action potential of horizontal or vertical lines. Whereas what constitutes nodes and districts are, for the most part, spaces inhabited by other humans, thus associated with communication and socialization. The hypothesis states that cognitive activity in the brain, from observation of paths, edges, and landmarks, will be located in those neural domains seeking vertical and horizontal lines as compared to nodes and districts that will activate locales in the brain dealing with communication and socialization. The goal of the summer 2015 research grant .is to have a set of operationalized elements to employ as visual stimuli while conducting brain imagery employing fMRI. The researcher would partner with the Southern Illinois University Center for Integrated Research in Cognitive and Neural Sciences to conduct the fMRI research

A Secondhand Reflection R. Buckminster Fuller and Peter London

Dr. John Daniel Davey presented this article as a PowerPoint presentation during the inauguration of The Peter London Papers to the University of Illinois, Carbondale

A Theoretical Model of Learning Employing Constructivism, Phenomenology and Neuroscience: Constructivist Neurophenomenology

The purpose of this research study was to propose a new learning theory for career and technical education with a foundation in philosophy and neuroscience. It purports to combine constructivism, phenomenology and neuroscience into a proposed learning theory entitled ‘constructivist neurophenomenology embedded in embodied cognition, that is, the formative role that the environment plays in the development of cognitive processes. The theory represents a trinity of constructivism’s genetic epistemology manifesting itself in (a) accommodation, (b) phenomenology’ intentionality, that is there is always something there for consciousness, and (c) neuroscience cell assembly. These three actions of the brain construct consciousness, memory, and learning via metaphorical thinking

KID ARCHITECTURE

The kid architecture program was developed thirty years ago to introduce young people to the design of the built environment. The one-week camps structured for three different learning levels, grades 4th–6th, middle school and high school have been conducted in various locations internationally to include the Smithsonian, The National Building Museum Washington D.C., Canada and China. The camps have received national and regional awards for the broad breath of hands-on activities and implementation of technology. The ten objectives for kid architecture endeavor to develop an understanding of the following: • Why buildings look the way they do • Why building stand up • What architects and designers do? • Design drawing as a problem solving tool/method • The use of the design process as employed by architects • How a building is designed, constructed, used and reused • Construction materials used in buildings • How and why people “define” space 6 • The use of computer graphics, animation and Computer-aided design • Participation in the design of the built environment The philosophic foundations that kid architecture is built upon is the assumption that those who are exposed early to architectural design will have a different conceptual base from which to formulate more complex and differential ideas about the built environment. Architecture Camps’ personnel believe this cognitive skill is as basic to a young person in the modern world as knowing left from right or discriminating the letters “b” from “d.” Future advances in the conceptualization of buildings, cities, and personal living spaces will be made by people who are deeply aware of the built environment