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Sørensen Mikkel | Junior Fellow
2003-08-01 - 2004-01-31 | Research area: Other
Investigations in Biomimetic Design Heuristics for Ambient Intelligence
My project is an investigation into the possibilities of designing biomimetic intelligent technologies within the field known as Ambient Intelligence. As a philosopher my approach is theoretical and centers around questions concerning the organization and development of intelligent behavior, especially in the form of intelligent assisting technology. The central aim is to investigate the optimal way of supporting and enhancing human activities by the aid of intelligent devices and environments. Biological theories seem the most promising venue to obtain IT that is both ‘internally’ and ‘externally’ better designed (i.e., self-organizing and self-maintaining) in order to be autonomous and robust, but also adaptive. An example would be to model Ambient Intelligence environments as biological niches or ecosystems were different agents (devices or applications) get selected for by providing wanted functionalities in an evolution-like process. Another organizational question is whether intelligent assistance is best obtained by designing environments with radically distributed intelligence, i.e., constituted without agent-like poles or if we get better results by designing more heterogeneous intelligent environments comprised by both elaborate agent-like entities and more simple forms of self-organizing nodes. The design has to balance the need for truly adaptive capabilities, which normally emerges from self-directed autonomous agents, with a ‘calm’ technology, that keeps the intruding pro-activity of the IT at a minimum. My focus includes the relation between the materiality and the informational aspects of complex natural systems, the aim being to bridge the gap between hardware and software in IT.