Giacomin, J

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Brunel University Research Archive

perceptionenhancementquestion which has been loiteringamong my neural synapses for sometime now is what is meant by the useof the word “animate” when describing designproducts. What has a designer achieved whenshe or he has created a product which is “ani-mate”? A quick hop into the Oxford EnglishDictionary suggests that the adjec-tive “animate” has its origins inthe Latin “anima”, which iscustomarily translated as“life” or “soul”. But whatdoes it mean to have life orsoul? Here we quick-ly find ourselves lostin a dense jungle ofphilosophical debate,a rich land of observa-tion, hypothesis andargumentation.However, reappearingideas tends toward thefact that soul somehowrefers to intellectual, emo-tional and moral behaviour.So, a product which is “ani-mate” presumably demon-strates properties of function-al activity, intelligence andpossibly even emotion.But how did this hap-pen? When did productsstart demonstratingactivity, intelligence oremotion? The roots of this phenomena areoften identified with the golden age of theautomaton in the 18th Century, when crafts-men scientists like Jacques de Vaucanson pro-duced mechanical devices and toys with abewildering array of sound and motion abili-ties. Vaucanson’s mechanical duck was a mar-vel of mechanical engineering which awed thepeople of its age. Nevertheless, mechanicalengineering alone could not produce the rich-ness of motion and the diversity of actionrequired to exhibit complex and lifelikebehaviour. Machines capable of such richnessof output are generally believed to have firstarrived on the scene in the 20th Century, withthe advent of the computer and of solid stateelectronics. Since the mid 20th Century researchershave used criteria such as the well known“Turing Test” to compare machine behaviourto human behaviour, attempting in theprocess, albeit indirectly, to define whataspects of our behaviour actually makes ushuman. Today as we enter the 21st Centurywe find ourselves on the shores of a surprisingnew world in which the products we designare becoming smarter, incorporating morenumerous and sophisticated human perceptu-al and cognitive abilities. Thanks to new sen-sor technologies, cost-effective digital electron-ics and flexible servo-motors, many recentproducts blur the traditional distinctionsbetween human and machine.In this new century, which some scientistsdescribe as the century of the human brain,ALife and soulProfessor Joseph Giacomin draws us into the 21st Century whereproducts are demonstrating activity, intelligence and emotion❙ Inview - real-timehead-up display swimminggoggle projecting timeand lap count. KatieWilliams, SharperInnovation Show 2005.ND49_PerceptionEnhance.qxd  22/3/07  14:05  Page 32❙ ASIMO - the humanoidrobot from HondaND49_PerceptionEnhance.qxd  22/3/07  14:06  Page 33perceptionenhancementthere seems to be an ever increasing stream ofdaily announcements regarding new findingsin the fields of physiology, neuroscience, psy-chology and artificial intelligence. While prod-uct design has occasionally struggled to matchthe blistering pace set by the scientific pio-neers, a simple book search on Amazon nev-ertheless suggests that the gap between theoryand the practice is not as wide as one mightthink. Scientifically minded individuals aremoving into the gap with thought provokingworks such as Neil Gershenfeld’s WhenThings Start to Think, Ford, Glynour andHayes’ Thinking About Android Epistemologyand Ray Kurzweil’s The Age of SpiritualMachines: When Computers Exceed HumanIntelligence. Some of our design colleagueshave likewise begun the rush into the gapwith works such as Bill Moggridge’s DesigningInteractions or Dan Saffer’s Designing forInteraction: Creating Smart Applications andClever Devices. Even the quickest of surveysleads to the inevitable conclusion that basicscience’s ever increasing understanding of theworking brain is having a knock-on effect onproduct design. Two particularly recent tech-nological paradigms which I expect will soonbe filling bookshelves and infiltrating conver-sation are those of ‘perception enhancement’and ‘augmented cognition’.The concept of perception enhancementemerges from the observation that not allproduct stimuli are informative. Only certaincognitively-relevant features have meaning forhumans. The term can be used to describeany situation in which the visual, sound, tac-tile, olfactory or gustative stimuli are shaped soas to optimise the flow of useful information tothe user. The goal is to design products whichselectively modify key stimuli such that humaninteraction with the product is enhanced. Inelementary terms, such systems clarify what isgoing on, and, in certain situations, can makethe machine feel like an extension of theuser’s own body. Systems for providinghumans with enhanced perceptual abilitieshave been in use for some years now in mili-tary environments, but they are also currentlyfinding their way into consumer productdesign. Products ranging from the primarycontrols of an automobile through to homevideo games can be designed so as to be per-ception enhancing. Further, if the designer isboth courageous and determined, advancedsensors can be built into productssuch that the human opera-tors sees and feels infor-mation which are notnormally availablethrough the usual bio-logical channels. Heatcan be seen, smell canbe felt and movementcan be heard. There aretoday few technologicallimits to the ability to filter,adapt and transform stimulibefore they reach the product’suser. The concept of augmentedcognition emerges from the observation thathuman cognitive mechanisms are usually thebottleneck of the information processing whichoccurs when a person uses a product. Thegoal when designing an augmented cognitionsystem is to extend human capabilities bymeans of tech-34 newdesign issuefortynine❙ EmergencyCommunicator - med-ical product which providessimple instructions to untrained userson what to do for the owner in the event ofan emergency. Josh Cable, MadeinBrunelInnovation Show 2006.❙ TomTom GO710 - portable car navigator system. ND49_PerceptionEnhance.qxd  22/3/07  14:07  Page 34perceptionenhancementnologies which overcome human cognitive lim-itations. Some typical ways in which a productdesigner can achieve this goal include the useof cues to attract attention to specific items ofdata, the use of cues to aid in the efficientswitching between tasks and the use of multi-modal or multi-dimen-sional informationstreams. Currently,we are witnessinga literalexplosion in thenumber of consumer prod-ucts which include some level of augmentedcognition. Simple glasses and goggles provideinformation by means of embedded or heads-up displays, some devices for the home moni-tor the correct function of various items andwarn the occupants of unusual situations, andvarious medical and navigation devices aidpeople by means of instructions in both writ-ten and natural language formats. Intelligenceand animation are already obvious characteris-tics of many products, and the number ofproducts which exhibit such characteristics islikely to expand dramatically as cheaper andmore intuitive technologies are made availableto designers.So, the use of the words “intelligent” or“animate” must refer to this growing tendencyto design products which assist their users,either by perception or by cognition. Sciencefiction? Scary? Well... not really. It has alwaysbeen good design practice to produce func-tional, intuitive and emotionally engaging prod-ucts. This does not change in the new land-scape. What does change, however, is therigour which the designer can deployto achieve these tradi-tionalgoals.Whereas in the past aproduct concept might be judged against theaesthetic and emotional values of the designer,or of the client or of a small user group, theemerging science of the brain, and the newtechnologies that it brings with it, are providinga wealth of rigorous neural, psychological,philosophic, ergonomic and artificial intelli-gence criteria which the designer can use toachieve his or her objectives. The designer ofthe 21st Century is therefore faced with theimmense opportunity, but also with the notinconsiderable challenge, to master these newtechniques so as to systematically achieve highquality, emotionally engaging, product designs.Ask today a randomly chosen stranger onthe street what is meant by good design andhis or her response will very likely involve theuse of the words “form” or “function” or “emo-tion”. It is quite possible, however, that in 10 or20 years time the same randomly chosen per-son may respond that good design is achievedwhen the product is animate. A walk aroundany recent design show, or a quick readthrough many recent product catalogues, sug-gests that products are evolving. The interestedobserver might also spot that many aspects ofperception or of cognition are being designedinto many new products. Some small part ofwhat it is to be human is being put into theproducts we use. What is very interestingabout this process is that, far from beingscary, this trend appears to be finding a warmreception from the public. In many marketareas it seems that the public cannot getenough of animated products, with buyersstreaming into stores to purchase a range ofproducts from wearable electronics, to satellitenavigators to robotic toys. In fact, this is alsothe century of the humanoid robot, possiblythe ultimate in perception enhancing and aug-mented cognition systems. What about thesenew household partners? What are the socio-logical, technological and ethical considerationsneeded to design them? Designers be advised, we are at the start ofa very busy century... ❙Professor Joseph Giacomin is Head of Design,School of Engineering and Design atBrunel University. newdesign issuefortynine 35ND49_PerceptionEnhance.qxd  22/3/07  14:38  Page 35

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