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Language: en
whenever we start a new project it has
to have these ingredients of
simultaneous complexity it has to be
novel in terms of the synthetic biology
Material Science robotics engineering
all of these elements that are
discipline based or rooted must be novel
if you can combine novelty in synthetic
biology with a novelty in robotics with
a novelty in Material Science with a
novelty and computational design you are
bound to create something novel
the following is a conversation with
Nary oxman an engineer scientist
designer architect artist and one of the
kindest most thoughtful and Brilliant
human beings I've ever gotten to know
for a long time she led the mediated
Mata group at MIT that did research and
built incredible stuff at the
intersection of computational design
digital fabrication Material Science and
synthetic biology doing so at all scales
from the micro scale to the building
scale now she's continuing this work at
a very new company for now called oxman
looking to revolutionize how humans
design and build products working with
nature not against it
on a personal note let me say that Nary
has for a long time been a friend and
someone who in my darker moments has
always been there with a note of
kindness and support I am forever
grateful to her she's a brilliant and a
beautiful human being oh and she also
brought me a present War and Peace by
Tolstoy and meditations by Marcus
Aurelius it doesn't get better than that
this is Alex Friedman podcast to support
it please check out our sponsors in the
description and now dear friends here's
Nery oxman
let's start with the universe
you ever think of the universe as a kind
of machine that designs beautiful things
at multiple scales I I do
um and I think of nature in that way in
general
in the context of design specifically
I think of nature as everything that
isn't anthropomas everything that is not
produced by humankind
the birds and the rocks and everything
in between fungi elephants whales do you
think there's an intricate ways in which
there's a connection between humans and
nature yes and we're looking for it
I think that from let's say from the
beginning of mankind uh going back 200
000 years the products that we have
designed have separated us from nature
and it's ironic that the things that we
designed and produced as humankind those
are exactly the things that separated us
before that we were we were totally in
complete completely connected
and I want to return to that world but
bring the tools of engineering and
computation to it yes yes I absolutely
believe that there is so much to Nature
that that we still have not leveraged
and we still have not understood and we
still haven't and so much of our work is
designed but a lot of it is science is
unveiling and
um and and finding new truths about the
natural world that we were not aware
before everybody talks about
intelligence these days but I like to
think that nature has
kind of wisdom that exists Beyond
intelligence or above intelligence and
it's that wisdom that we're trying to
tap into through technology if you think
about humans versus nature at least in
the realm at least in the context of
definition of
nature is everything but
um anthropo mass and I'm using on Milo
who is an incredible
Professor from The weissmann Institute
who came up with this definition of
entropomas in 2020
when he identified that 2020 was the
crossover year when anthropomas exceeded
biomass on the planet so all of the
design Goods that we have created and
brought into the world now outweigh all
of the biomass
including of course all Plastics and
wearables building cities but also
asphalt and
concrete all outweigh the scale of the
biomass and actually that was a moment
you know how in life there are moments
that
be a handful of moments that get you to
course correct and and my it was a zoom
conversation with Ron and that was a
moment for me
um when I realized that that imbalance
now we've superseded the biomass on the
planet where do we go from here
and you've heard the expression more
more phones than bones and the
entropomas and the antropocene
um and and the technosphere sort of
outweighing the biosphere
um but now we are really trying to look
at is is there a way
in which all things technosphere are
designed as if as if they are part of
the biosphere meaning if you could today
grow instead of build everything and
anything if you could grow an iPhone if
you could grow a car
what would that world look like where
the touring test for sort of this this
kind of I call this material ecology
approach but this this notion that
everything material everything that you
design in the physical universe
can be read
and written to as or thought of or
perceived of as nature grown that's sort
of the touring test for for the company
or at least that's how I started I
thought well grow everything that's sort
of the slogan let's grow everything
and if we grow everything is there a
world in which driving a car is better
for nature than a world in which there
are no cars is there is it possible that
a world in which you build buildings in
cities that those buildings and cities
actually augment and heal nature as
opposed to their absence is there a
world in which we now go back to that
kind of synergy between nature and
humans where you cannot separate between
grown and made and it doesn't even
matter
is there a good term for the
intersection between biomass and
entropyl mass like things that are grown
yeah so in 2005 I I called this material
ecology I thought what if all material
all things materials would be considered
part of the ecology and would have an
impact a positive impact on the ecology
um where we work together to help each
other all things nature all things human
and again you can say that that wisdom
in nature exists in fungi many mushroom
lovers always contest my thesis here and
saying well we have the mushroom Network
and we have the mother trees and they're
all connected and and why don't we just
simply hack into into mushrooms well
first of all yes they're connected but
that Network stops when there is a
physical Gap that Network
does not necessarily enable the the
whales in the in the Dominican to
connect with an olive tree in Israel to
connect with a weeping willow in Montana
and that's sort of a world that that I'm
dreaming about what what does it mean
for nature to have access
to the cloud at the kind of bandwidth
that we're talking about sort of think
neuralink for nature you know since the
um first computer uh the um and you know
this by heart probably better than I do
but we're both MIT lifers
um we today have computational power
that is
um one trillion times the power that we
had in in those times we have
26.5 trillion times the bandwidth
and
11.5 quintillion uh times the memory
which is incredible so humankind since
the since the first computer has
approach and accessed such incredible
bandwidth
and we're asking what if nature had that
bandwidth so beyond genes and evolution
if there was a way to augment nature and
allow it access to the world of bits
what does nature look like now
and can nature
make decisions for herself as opposed to
being guided and guarded and abused by
by humankind so Nature has this inherent
wisdom that you spoke to but you're also
referring to augmenting that inherent
wisdom with something like a large
language model exactly so compress human
knowledge but also maintain whatever is
that intricate wisdom that allows plants
bacteria fungi to grow incredible things
at arbitrary scales adapting to whatever
environment and just surviving and
thriving no matter where no matter how
exactly so I think of it as large
molecule models and those large molecule
models of course large language models
are based on the on Google and search
engines and and so on and so forth and
we don't have this data currently and
part of our mission is is to do just
that trying to
quantify and understand
the language that exists across all
Kingdoms of Life across all five
kingdoms of life
and if we can understand that language
is there a way for us to First make
sense of it find logic in it and then
generate certain computational tools
that Empower nature to to build better
crops to to increase the level of
biodiversity in in the company we're
constantly asking what does nature want
like what what
does nature want from a compute view if
it knew it what what could Aid it and
whatever the heck it's wanting to do
yeah so we keep coming back to this
answer of nature wants to increase
information
but decrease entropy right so find order
but constantly increase the information
scale and and this is true for what our
work also tries to do because we're
constantly trying to
fight against the dimensional mismatch
between things made and things grown
right and and as designers we are
educated to think in X Y and Z and
that's pretty much where architectural
education ends and biological education
begins so in reducing that dimensional
mismatch we're missing out on
opportunities to create things made as
if grown but in the natural environment
we're asking can we provide nature with
these extra dimensions and again I I'm
not sure what nature wants but I'm
curious as to what happens when you
provide these tools to the Natural
environments obviously with
responsibility obviously with control
obviously with ethics and and moral code
um but is there a world in which nature
can help fix itself uh using those tools
and by the way we're talking about a
company called oxman yeah I'll just just
a few words about the team yeah what
kind of humans work at a place like this
they're trying to figure out what nature
wants you know I think they're first
like you they're they're humanists first
um they come from different disciplines
and different disciplinary backgrounds
and just as an example we have a
brilliant designer who is just a
mathematical genius and a computer
scientist and a mechanical engineer who
has trained
um as a synthetic biologist and
um and now we're hiring a microbiologist
and a chemist
architects of course and designers uh
roboticist so it's really it's Noah's
Ark right two of each and always dancing
between this line of the artificial the
synthetic and the and the real what's
the term for in the natural yeah the
built in the grown nature and culture
technology and biology but we're we're
constantly seeking to to ask how can we
build design and deploy products in
three scales the molecular scale which
I've briefly hinted to
um and their and the molecular scale
we're really looking to understand
whether there is a universal language to
Nature and what that language is and
then build build a tool that
um I think and dream of it is the iPhone
for nature if nature had an iPhone
um what would that iPhone look like does
that mean creating an interface
between nature and the computational
tools we have exactly it goes back to
that 11.5 quintillion times the
bandwidth that that humans have have now
arrived at and and giving that to Nature
and seeing what you know what what
happens there can animals actually use
this interface to know that they need to
run away from fire can plants use this
interface to increase the rate of
photosynthesis in the presence of a
smoke cloud can they do this
quote-unquote automatically without a
kind of a top-down Brute Force policy
based method that's authored and
deployed by humans and so this work
really relates to that interface with
the natural world and then there's a
second area in the company which focuses
on growing products
and here we're focusing on a single
product that starts from CO2
um it becomes a product it's consumed
it's used it's worn by a human and then
it
um goes back to the soil and it grows an
edible fruit plant so we're talking
about from CO2 to fruit yeah it starts
from CO2 and it ends with something that
you can like literally eat so so the
world's first entirely biodegradable
bi-compatible by renewable product
that's grown yes either using plant
matter or using bacteria but we are
really looking at um carbon recycling
technologies that start with methane or
Wastewater
um and end with this wonderful
Reincarnation of a an a thing that
doesn't need to end up in a composting
site but can just be thrown into the
ground and grow Olive and find peace and
there's a lot of textile based work out
there that is focused on one single
element in this long chain like oh let's
create
um you know leather out of mycelium or
or less create textile out of cellulose
but then it stops there and you get to
assembling the shoe or the wearable and
you and you you need a little bit of
glue and you need a little bit of this
material a little bit of that material
to to make it water resistant and then
it's over so that's one thing that we're
trying to solve for is how to create a
product that is materially
computationally robotically novel
um and goes through all of these phases
from the creation from this carbon
recycling technology to
um to the product to literally how do
you think about you know Reinventing an
industry that is focused on assembly and
putting things together and using humans
to do that can that you know can that
happen just using robots and microbes
and that's it and doing it end to end I
would love to see what this Factory
looks like and the factories is great
too I'm I'm very very excited in October
we'll we'll share first
um first Renditions of of some of this
working in February we'll we'll invite
you to the lab I'm there and I've
already applied I haven't heard back I
don't understand okay uh I mean it's
just before we get to number three it'd
be amazing to just talk about what it
takes with robotic arms or in general
the whole process of how to build the
life form stuff you've done in the past
maybe stuff you're doing now how to use
bacteria it's kind of synthetic biology
how to grow stuff by leveraging bacteria
is there examples from the past and yes
and just take a step back over the 10
years of the mediated matter group which
was my group at MIT
um has sort of dedicated itself to
biobased design would be a suitcase word
but sort of thinking about that Synergy
between nature and culture biology and
technology and we attempted to build a
suite of embodiments let's say that they
ended up in amazing museums and amazing
shows and and we wrote patents and
papers on them but they were still n of
ones again the challenge as you say was
to grow them and we classified them into
fibers cellular solids biopolymers
pigments and in each of the examples
although the material was different
sometimes we used fibers sometimes we
used silk with silkworms and honey with
bees and or comb as the structural
material with Vespers we used
synthetically engineered bacteria to
produce pigments although the materials
were different and the hero organisms
were different the philosophy was always
the same the approach was really an
approach of computational templating
that templating allowed us to create
templates for the natural environment
where nature and Technology could
duet could dance together to create
these products so just a few examples
with a silk Pavilion we've had a couple
of pavilions made of silk and the second
one which was the bigger one which ended
up at the Museum of Modern Art with my
friend an incredible Mentor Paul
Antonelli that Pavilion was six meter
tall and it was produced by silkworms
and and there we had
um different types of templates there
were physical templates that were
basically just these water-soluble
meshes upon which the silkworms were
spinning and then there were
environmental templates which was a
robot basically applying a variation of
environmental conditions such as heat
and light to guide the movement of the
silkworm you're saying so many amazing
things and I'm trying not to interrupt
you but like one of the things you've
learned by observing by doing science on
these is that the environment defines
the shape that they create or
contributes or intricately plays with
the shape to create and so so like and
you get to that's one of the ways you
can get to guide their work is by
defining that environment by the way you
said hero organism which is an epic term
so that means like because whatever is
the biological living system that's uh
doing the creation and that's what's
happening in Pharma and and biomaterials
and by the way Precision Ag and and food
new food design Technologies as people
are betting on a hero organism is the
sort of how I think of it and and and
and the hero organism is sometimes it's
the palm oil or or it's a it's the
mycelium there's a lot of mushrooms
around for good and bad and and it's
cellulose or
it's you know fake bananas or the the
Workhorse E coli but these hero
organisms are being vetted on as like
the
what's the one answer that solves
everything Hitchhiker's Guide 42 42 yeah
these are sort of the 42s of of you know
of the enchanted new universe and back
at MIT we said instead of betting on all
of these organisms
let's approach them as almost like
movement in a symphony and let's kind of
lean into
what we can learn from each of these
organisms in the context of building a
project in an architectural scale and
those usually were Pavilions and then
the competition of templating is the way
you guide the work of this how many did
you say 17 000 17
532 so each of these silkworms threads
are about you know one one mile
um in distance and and and they're
they're beautiful and when and just
thinking about the amount of material
you know it's a bit like thinking about
them you know the the length of
capillary
vessels that grow in your belly when
you're pregnant to feed that incredible
new life form
um it's just nature is amazing but back
to the silkworms I think I had three
months
um to build this incredible Pavilion but
um we couldn't figure out how we were
thinking of emulating the process of how
a silkworm goes about building its
incredible architecture this cocoon over
the period of 24 to 72 hours
and it builds a cocoon basically to
protect itself it's it's a beautiful
form of architecture and it uses pretty
much just two materials two chemical
compound saracen and fibrin the saracen
is sort of the glue of of the Cocoon the
fibroid is the fiber base material of
the coconut through fibers and glue and
that's true for so many systems in
nature lots of fiber and glue and that
architecture allows them to
metamorphosize and in the process they
vary the properties of that silk thread
so it's stiffer or softer depending on
where it is in the section of the Cocoon
and so we were trying to emulate this
robotically with a 3D printer that was
six axis Kuka arm one of these baby
kookas and we're trying to emulate that
process computationally and build
something very large when one of my
students now
um a brilliant Industrial Engineer
roboticist on my team Marcus said well
you know we were just playing with those
silkworms and enjoying their presence
when we realized that
if they're placed on a desk or a
horizontal surface they will go about
creating their cocoon only the Cocoon
would be flat
because they're constantly looking for a
vertical Post in order to use that post
as an anchor to spin the Cocoon but in
the absence of that post
on surfaces that are less than 21
millimeters and flat they will spin flat
patches and we say aha
let's work with them to produce this
this Dome
as a set of flat patches and a silkworm
mind you is a is quite an egocentric
creature
um and actually the furthest you go you
move forward in evolution by natural
selection the more
um egoism you find in creatures so when
you think about termites right they the
their material sophistication is is
actually very primitive but they have
incredible ability to communicate and
connect with each other so if you think
about the entire All of Me All of nature
let's say all of living systems as like
a matrix that runs across two axes one
is material sophistication which is
terribly relevant for designers and the
other is communication
um uh the the termites Ace on
communication but their material
sophistication is crap right it's just
saliva and feces and some soil particles
that are built to create these
incredible termite Mounds at the scale
that when compared to human skyscrapers
transcend all of buildable skills uh at
least in in terms of what we have today
in architectural practice just in
relative to the size of the termite but
when you look at the silkworm
the silkworm has zero connection
communication across silkworms they were
not designed to connect and communicate
with each other they're they're sort of
a human design species because the the
uh the domesticated silk moth uh creates
the Cocoon we then produce the silk of
it and then it dies
um so the it has dysfunctional Wings it
cannot fly it's not so so and and that's
another problem that the sericulture
um industry has is why did we in the
first place author this organism four
thousand years ago that is unable to fly
and is just there
um to basically live as
um to serve a human need which is
textiles and so here we were fascinated
by the computational kind of biology
dimension of silkworms but along the way
by the way this is great I never get to
tell the full story
so much I always I'm always like people
say oh
paragraphs they're way too long and this
is wonderful this is like heaven
you're driving so many good lines but
but but really those uh those silkworms
are not yes they're not designed to be
like humans right they're not designed
to connect communicate and build things
that are bigger than themselves through
connection and communication so what
happens when you add 17 000 of them
communicating effects that's a really
great question what happens is that at
some point
the templating strategies and as you
said correctly there were geometrical
templating material templating
environmental templating chemical
templating if you're using pheromones to
guide the movement of bees
in the absence of a queen where you have
a robotic Queen
um but whenever you have these
templating strategies you have sort of
control over nature right but the
question is is there a world in which we
can move from templating from providing
these computational
material and immaterial physical and
molecular platforms that guide nature
almost like guiding a product almost
like a gardener
um to a problem or an opportunity of
emergence where that biological organism
assumes agency by virtue of accessing
the robotic code and saying now I own
the code I get to do what I want with
this code let me show you what this
Pavilion may look like or this product
may look like and I think one of the
exciting moments for us is when we
realized that these robotic platforms
that were designed initially as
templates actually inspired if if I may
a kind of a
collaboration and cooperation between
silkworms that are not a swarm based
organism they're not like the bees on
the termites they don't work together
and they don't have you know social
orders amongst them the queen and the
drones Etc they're they're all this the
same in a way right and and here uh what
was so exciting for us is that these
computational and Fabrication
Technologies enable the silkworm to uh
sort of to to kind of hop hop from from
the branch in Ecology of of of worms to
the branch and Ecology of maybe
human-like intelligence where they could
connect and communicate by virtue of
you know feeling or rubbing against each
other in in an area that was hotter or
colder and they were so the product that
we got at the end the variation of
density of fiber and the distribution of
the fiber and the transparency the
product at the end seems like it was
produced by a swarm silk Community but
of course it wasn't it's a bunch of
biological agents working together to
assemble this thing that's really really
fascinating to us how can technology
um
augment or enable a swarm-like behavior
and creatures that have not been
designed to work as swarms so how do you
construct a computational template from
which
uh a certain kind of thing emerges so
how can you predict what emerges I
suppose so if you can predict it it
doesn't count as emergence actually
that's a deeply poetic line we can talk
about it I mean it's a bit like this
concentrated it doesn't count that's
right right speaking of emergence
an empowerment because we're constantly
uh
um moving between those as if they're
equals in the on the team and one of
them Kristoff shared with me a
mathematical equation for what does it
mean to empower nature and what is
empowerment in nature look like
um
and that relates to emergence and we can
go back to emergence in a few moments
but I want to I want to say it so that I
know that I've learned it
and if I've learned it I can use it
later yeah and maybe you'll figure
something out as you said of course
Kristoff is the master here but but
really
we were thinking again what does nature
want nature wants um
nature wants to increase the information
Dimension and reduce entropy
um what do we want we kind of want the
same thing we want more but
um we want order right and this goes
back to your conversation with your
shavat stochastic versus deterministic
languages or processes his definition or
the definition he found
um
was that an agent is empowered
if the entropy of the distribution of
all of it states it's high while the
entropy of the distribution of a single
state given a choice given an action is
low meaning it's that kind of uh
um
yeah Duality between opportunity like
starting like this and going like this
opening and closing and and this really
I think is analogous to to human
empowerment given uh infinite wide array
of choices what is the choice that you
make uh to
you know to to enable to empower uh to
provide you with with the agency that
you need and how much is that making
that choice actually control the
trajectory of the system that's really
nice so this this applies to all the
kinds of systems you're talking about
yeah and
to a human on an individual basis but or
a silk or more a b
um or a microbe a microbe that has
agency or by virtue of of of a template
but it also applies to a community of of
organisms like the bees
um and so we've done a lot of work sort
of moving from you've asked how to grow
things so we've grown things uh using
um co-fabrication where we're digitally
fabricating with other organisms that
live across the various Kingdoms of Life
and and those were silkworms and bees
and uh and with bees
um which we've sent to outer space and
we turned healthily and they were
reproductive okay you're gonna have to
tell that story you're gonna have to
talk about the robotic queen and the
pheromones come on like
um so we've built what we called a
synthetic apiary and the synthetic
apiary was designed uh as an environment
that was a Perpetual spring environment
for the bees of Massachusetts they go on
hibernation of course during the winter
season
um and then we lose 80 percent of them
or more uh during that period we're
thinking okay what if we created this
environment where
um before you template right before you
can design with you have to design four
right you have to create this space of
mutualism space of sort of shared
connection between you and the organism
and with bees it started as the
synthetic apiary and we have proven that
that curated environment where we
designed the space with high levels of
control of temperature humidity and
light and we've proven that they were
reproductive and alive and we realized
wow this environment that we created can
help augment bees in the winter season
in any City around the world where where
bees survive and thrive in the summer
and spring seasons and could this be a
kind of a new Urban typology an
architectural typology of symbiosis of
mutualism between organisms and humans
where these are by the way the synthetic
apiary was in a co-op in you know nearby
Somerville we had you know we had robots
our team you know slept there every day
with our with our tools and machines and
we made it happen and the neighbors were
very happy and and they got to get a ton
of Honey at the end of the winter and
and those bees of course were released
into the wild at the end of the winter
Alive and Kicking so then in order to
actually experiment with with the
robotic Queen
an idea or concept we had to prove
obviously that we can create this space
for uh for bees and then after that we
had this amazing opportunity to send the
bees to space on Blue Shepherd mission
that is part of blue origin and we of
course said yes we'll take a slot we
said okay can we outdo NASA so NASA in
1982 had an experiment where they sent b
b's to to outer space the bees returned
they were not reproductive and um
and some of them died and and we thought
well is there a way in which we can
create a life support system almost like
a small mini bio lab of a queen and her
retinue
um that would be sent in this blue
origin new Shepherd Mission uh in this
one cell and and so that's if the
synthetic APO is an architectural
project in this case this second
synthetic apiary was a product it was
right so from an from an architectural
controlled environment to a product
scale control environment and this bio
lab this life support system for bees
was designed to provide the bees with
all the conditions that they needed and
and we looked at that time at the
national pheromone that the queen uses
to guide the other bees and we looked at
pheromones that are associated with a b
and thinking of those pheromones being
released inside the capsules that go the
capsule that goes to outer space they
returned um back to our the media lab
roof and those bees were alive and
kicking and reproductive and you know
and they continue to create comb and and
it ended with a beautiful nature paper
that the team and I published together
we gave them gold nanoparticles and
silver nanoparticles because we were
interested if if bees recycle wax it was
known
forever that bees do not recycle the wax
and by feeding them these gold
nanoparticles we were able to prove that
um that the bees actually do recycle the
wax the reason I'm bringing this forward
is because
we don't view ourselves as designers of
consumable products and and
Architectural environments only but we
love that moment where these
Technologies and by the way every one of
these projects that we created
involve the creation of a new technology
whether it be a glass printer or the
spinning robot or
or the
um life support system for for the bee
Colony they all involved a technology
that was associated with the the project
and I never ever ever want to let that
part go because I love love technology
so much
um and but but also another element of
this is it always these projects if
they're great they reveal new knowledge
about or new science about
um the topic that that you're
investigating be it you know
silkworms or or bees or or glass that's
why I say I always tell my team it
should be at MoMA and the cover of
nature are science at the same time we
don't separate between the art and the
science it's it's it's it's one of the
same so as you're creating the uh the
art you're going to learn something
about these organisms or something about
these materials I mean is there
something that stands out to you about
these hero organisms like bees silkworms
you mentioned E coli has its pros and
cons this bacteria what have you learned
that small or big that's interesting
about these organisms yeah it's a
beautiful question what have I learned
I've learned that
um
you know uh we did we also worked with
shrimp shells with ago how we built this
tower on the roof of SF Momo which by
um a couple of months ago and until it
was on the roof we we've shown the
structure completely biodegraded into
then well not completely but almost
completely biodegrade to the soil and
um and this notion that a product or
part an organism or part of that
organism can reincarnate is very very
moving thought to me because I
want to believe that I believe in
reincarnation I want to believe that I
believe yeah that's my relationship with
God I want to I want I I like to believe
in believing most great things in life
are second derivatives of things but
that's part of another conversation I
feel like that's a quote that's gonna
take weeks to really internalize that
that notion of I want you to want or I
need you to need or
um that that that it there's always
something a deeper truth behind what is
on the surface and so I like to go to
the second and
tertiary derivative of things and and
discover new truths about them through
that but what have I learned about
organisms and why don't you like E coli
I like E coli and and a lot of the work
that we've done uh was
possible without are working on E coli
or other Workhorse organisms like
cyanobacteria how are bacteria used
Death Masks the Death Masks so what are
Death Masks so we did this project
called Vespers and those were basically
death masks that was said as a process
for designing a living product what
happens and we looked at bit I looked at
the remember looking at Beethoven's
death mask and agamemnon's death mask
and just studying how they were created
and really they were sort of
geometrically attuned to the face of the
dead and what we wanted to do is create
a death mask that not was not based in
the sh in was not based on the shape of
of the of the wear but rather it was
based on their legacy and their biology
and maybe we could
um harness a few stem cells there for
future Generations or contain the last
breath Lazarus which preceded Vespers
was project where we designed a mask to
contain a single breath The Last Breath
of the wearer and again if I had access
to these Technologies today I would
totally
re-incorporate my grandmother's last
breath in in in in in a in a product so
it was like an air Memento so with
Vespers we um
we actually used E coli to
um to to create pigmented masks masks
whose pigments uh would be recreated at
the surface of the mask and
I'm skipping over a lot of content but
basically there were 15 masks and they
were created as three sets The Masks of
the past the mask of the present and the
mask of the future
um The Masks there were five five and
five and the mass of the past were based
on
um ornaments and they were
um
embedded with natural minerals like gold
yes yes yes and we're looking at
pictures of these and they're gorgeous
yes extremely delicate and interesting
fractal patterns that are symmetrical
they look symmetrical but they're not
this is intense this is we intended for
you to be tricked and think that they're
all symmetrical but there's
imperfections there are imperfections by
Design
all of these
um
all of these forms and shapes and
distribution of matter that you're
looking at was was entirely designed
using a computational program so none of
it is manual
um but long story short the first
collection is about the surface of the
mask and the second collection which
you're looking at is about the volume of
the mask and and and what happens to the
mask when all the colors from the
surface yes enter the volume of the mask
inside create pockets and channels to
guide life through them
um they were Incorporated with pigment
producing living organisms and then
those organisms were templated to
recreate the patterns of the original
death masks and so life recycles and
re-biggins and so on and so forth the
past meets the future the future meets
the past from the surface to the volume
from Death to life to death to life to
death to life and that again is a
recurring theme in in the projects that
that we take on but there from a
technological perspective what was
interesting is that we embedded chemical
signals in the jet in the printer and
those chemical signals
um basically interacted with the
um pigment producing bacteria uh in in
this case E coli that were introduced on
the surface of the mask and those
interactions between the chemical
signals inside the resins and the
bacteria at the surface of the mask at
the resolution that is native to the
printer in this case 20 microns per
voxel allowed us to compute the exact
patterns that we wanted to achieve and
we thought well if we can do this with
pigments can we do this with antibiotics
if we can do this with antibiotics could
we do it with with melanin and what are
the implications again this is a
platform technology now that we have it
what are the actual real world
implications and potential applications
for this technology and we started a new
area of one of my students Rachel
her PhD thesis uh was entire was titled
after this new class of materials that
we created through this project Vespers
hybrid living materials hlms
um and these hybrid living materials
really paved the way towards a whole
other set of products that we've
designed uh like
um like the work that we did with
melanin for for the Mandela Pavilion
that we presented at sfmoma
um where again we're using the same
principles of templating in this case
not silkworms and not bees but we're
templating bacteria at a much much
um much a more finer resolution and now
instead of templating using using a
robot or templating using a printer but
compute is very very much part of it and
the what's nice about bacteria of course
is that
um from an ethical perspective I think
there's a range right so at the end of
the silk Pavilion I got an email from
Professor in Japan who has been working
on transgenic silk and said well if you
did this this create amazing silk
Pavilion why don't we create
um
um you know glow in the light silk
dresses and and in order to create this
glow in the light uh silk we need to
um you know to to to to to apply
um uh genes that are taken from a spider
to a silkworm and this is what is known
as a transgenic operation and we said no
and that was for us a clear decision
that no we will work with these
organisms as long as we know that what
we are doing with them is not only
better for humans but it's also better
for them and and again just to remind
you where
um I forget the exact number but it's
around a thousand cocoons per single
shirt that are exterminated in in India
and China and in those Seri culture
industries that are being abused now yes
this organism this organism was was
designed to serve the human species and
maybe we should maybe it's time you know
to
to to retire that you know that
conception of of organisms that are
designed for a human-centric world or
human-centric set of applications I I
don't feel the same way about E coli
um I not that I'm agnostic organism
agnostic but but still I believe there's
so much for us to do on this planet with
um with with bacteria and so in general
Your Design principle is to uh
grow cool stuff as a byproduct of the
organism flourishing so not yes not
using the organism the win-win the
Synergy a hole that's bigger than the
sum of its parts it's interesting I mean
it just feels like a gray area where
genetic modification of an organism
it just feels like I don't know if you
if you genetically modified me to make
me glow in the light
I think you have enough of an aura all
right thank you that was I was just
fishing for compliments thank you I
appreciate it so absolutely right and by
the way the gray area is you know is
where some of us like to live and and
like to thrive and and that's okay and
and thank goodness that there's so many
of us that that like the black and white
and that thrive in the black and white
my husband is a good example for that
well but just to clarify in this case
you're also trying to thrive in the
black and white in that you're saying
like the silkworm is a beautiful
wonderful creature let us not modify it
is that the idea or is it okay to modify
a little bit as long as we can see that
it benefits the organism as well as the
final creation uh so with silkworms
absolutely let's not modify it
genetically let's not modify genetically
um
and then some because why did we why did
we get there to begin with four thousand
years ago in the Silk Road and and
we should never get to a point where we
evolve life for the service of mankind
at the risk of these wonderful creatures
um across the kingdoms across the
kingdom of life I don't think about the
same kind of ethical range
um when I think about bacteria
nevertheless bacteria are pretty
wonderful organisms I'm moving to my
second cup here
as things are getting serious now
bacteria are yeah for sure let's give
bacteria all the love they deserve we
wouldn't be here without them they were
here for I don't know what it is like a
billion years before anything else but
in a way if you think about it they
create the matter that we consume and
then
and then we reincarnate or dissolved
into the soil and then creates an a tree
and then that tree creates more bacteria
and then that bacteria could I mean
again again that's why I like to think
about not recycling but reincarnating
because that assumes a kind of imparting
upon nature that dimension of agency and
and maybe awareness but yeah lots of
really interesting work happening with
bacteria
um directed evolution is one of them
we're looking we're looking at directed
Evolution so high throughput directed
evolution of
um of bacteria for the production of
products and again those products can be
a shoe um wearables biomaterials
therapeutical Therapeutics and doing
that direction computationally totally
computationally obviously in in the lab
with with with the hero organism the
hero bacteria
um and and and what's happening today in
in
um equal microbial synthetic biology
synthetic biology that lends itself to
ecology and again all of these fields
are coming together it's such a
wonderful time to be a designer I can
think of a better time to be a designer
in this world
um but with
um High throughput directed Evolution
and I should say that the physical space
in our new lab will have these capsules
which which we have designed
um that are
um that they are designed like growth
Chambers or grow rooms
um and in those Grow rooms we can
basically
um
program
um top-down environmental templating
right top-down environmental control of
Lights humidity light Etc so light
humidity and temperature
um while doing a bottom-up genetic
regulation so it is a wet lab but in
that wet lab you could do at the same
time you know genetic genetic modulation
regulation and and environmental
templating and then again the idea is
that in one of those capsules maybe we
grow transparent wood and in another
capsule we you know we transparent wood
for architectural application another
capsule we grow a shoe and in another
capsule we look at that language you
know large language model that we talked
about and there's a particular
technology associated with that which
we're hoping to reveal to the world in
February
um and in each of those capsules is
basically a high throughput
computational environment like a
breadboard that has think of sort of a
physical breadboard environment that has
access to oxygen and nitrogen and CO2
and nutritional dispensing and these
little capsules could be stressed
they're sort of a an ecology in a box
and they could be stressed to produce
the food of the future or the products
of the future or the construction
materials of the future
um food food is a very interesting one
obviously because of food insecurity and
and and the issues that we have around
both in terms of
food insecurity but also in terms of the
future of food and what what will remain
after we can't eat plants and animals
anymore and all we can eat is these
false bananas and and and and and
um you know and insects as our protein
source so there we're thinking you know
can we design these capsules to stress
an environment and see how that
environment behaves think about a kind
of a an ecological a a biodiversity
chamber right a kind of a time capsule
that is designed as a
biodiversity chamber where you can
program the exact temperature humidity
and light
um combination uh to emulate the
environment from the past so Ohio 1981
December 31st at 5am in the morning what
did tomatoes taste like uh to all the
way in the future 200 years ago these
are the the input the environmental
inputs these are some genetic
regulations that I'm testing and what
might the food of the future or the
products of the future or the
construction materials of the future
um
feel like tests like behave like Etc and
so these capsules are designed as part
of a lab that's why it's been taking us
such a long time to get to this point
um because we started designing them in
2019 and they're currently literally as
I speak to you under construction how
well is it understood how to do this
dance of control in these different
variables in order for various kinds of
growth to happen it's not it's never
been done before and these capsules have
never been designed before so I you know
when when when we first decided these
are going to be environmental capsules
people thought were crazy what are you
building what are you making so the
answer is that we don't know but we know
that there has never been a space like
this where you have basically a wet lab
and a grow room at that resolution
um that granularity uh of of of of of of
control over organisms
there's a reason why there is this
incredible evolution of products in the
software space
um the hardware space that's a more
limiting space that because of the
physical infrastructure that we have to
test and experiment with things so we
really wanted to push on
creating a wet lab that is novel in
every possible way what could you create
in it you could create the future you
could create a a you could create an
environment of plants talking to each
other with a robotic referee and the
robotic referee we you know and you
could you could
set an objective function and let's say
for for for for for the uh
um transaction driven individuals in the
world let's say the objective function
is carbon sequestration and
um and all of those plants are
um
are implemented with a gaming engine and
they have this reward system right and
they're constantly needing to optimize
the way in which they carbon sequest we
read out the bad guys we leave the good
guys and we end up with this like ideal
Ecology of carbon sequestering Heroes
that connect and communicate with each
other and once we have that model this
biodiversity chamber we send it out into
the field
um and we see what happens in nature and
that that's sort of what I'm talking
about
augmenting plants with that extra
dimension of
of bandwidth that they do not have and
they're they're just just last week
um I came across a paper
um that discusses uh the in Vivo neurons
that are that are augmented with a pong
game and uh and in a dish they basically
present sentience and the beginning of
awareness which is which is wonderful
like that that you could actually take
these neurons from a mouse brain and and
you have the electrical circuits and the
physiological circuits that enable uh
these cells to connect and communicate
and together arrive at Sort Of Swarm
situation that allows them to act as a
system that is not only perceived to be
sentient but is actually sentient
um Michael Levine calls this a gentle
material material that has agency right
so so so so this this this is of
interest to us because this is sort of
again this is emergence post templating
you template until you don't need to
template anymore because because the
system has its own rules right what we
don't want to happen with AGI we want to
happen with synthetic biology what we
don't want to happen online and software
with language we want for it to happen
with with bio-based materials because
that will get us closer to growing
things as opposed to assembly and and
mechanically yeah putting them together
with toxic materials and compounds if I
can ask a pothead question for a second
so you mentioned just like the silkworms
the individualists silkworms got uh to
actually learn how to collaborate or
actually to collaborate like in a swarm
like way you're talking about getting
plants to communicate in some
interesting way based on an objective
function is it possible
to have some kind of interface between
another kind of organisms humans and
nature so like a human to have a
conversation with with a plant there
already is you know that when we cut
freshly cut grass I love the smell
but it's a smell of actually it's a
smell of distress that the Leaves of
Grass are communicating to each other so
the grass when it's cut emits green leaf
volatiles glvs and those glvs are
basically one leaf of grass
communicating to another Leaf of grass
be careful mind you you're about to be
cut
these incredible life forms are
communicating using a different language
than ours we use language models they
use molecular models at the moment where
we can parse we can we can decode these
molecular moments is when we can start
having a conversation with plants now of
course there is a lot of work around
Plant neurobiology it's a real thing
plants do not have a nervous system but
they have something akin to a nervous
system it has a kind of a ecological
intelligence that is focused on a
particular time scale and the time scale
is very very slow slow slow time scale
so it is when we can melt these time
scales and and and and connect with
these plants in terms of the content of
the language in this case molecules the
duration of the language and we can
start having a conversation if not
simply to understand what is happening
in the plant kingdom Precision
agriculture I promise to you will look
very very very different right because
right now we're using drones to take
photos of crops of corn that look bad
and when we take that photo it's already
too late but if we understand these
molecular Footprints and things that
they are trying to say the stress that
they are trying to communicate then we
could of course predict the
physiological biological behavior of
these crops both for for their own
self-perpetuation but also for the the
foods and and the Pharma and and the
type of molecules that we're seeking to
grow for the benefit of humanity and so
these languages that we are attempting
now to quantify and qualify will really
help us not only better nature and help
nature in its striving to surviving but
also help us you know design better
wines and uh you know and and better
foods and and and better medicine and
better products again across all scales
across all applications Mains is there
intricacies to understanding the time
scales like you mentioned at which these
communications these languages
like operate is there something
different
which in the way humans communicate and
the way plants communicate in terms of
time remember when we started the
conversation talking about
sort of different definitions in the
context of design and then in the
context of being
that question requires I think a kind of
a shift
um
a humility that requires a kind of a
humility towards nature understanding
that it operates on different scales we
recently discovered that uh you know
that the molecular footprint of a rose
or of a plant in general during night
time is different than its molecular
footprint during daytime so these are
circadian rhythms that are associated
with what kind of molecules these plants
emit
um given stress stresses and given
um you know there's a reason why
why the Jasmine Jasmine field smells so
so delicious and 4am in the morning and
then there's like there's there's peace
and rest amongst you know amongst the
plants and you have to sort of tune into
that
time dimension of of the plant kingdom
and that of course requires all this
humility where in a single capsule to
design a biodiversity chamber it will
take years not months and definitely not
days and to see these products and also
that humility in design comes from
Simply you know looking at how we are
today as a civilization how we use an
abused nature like just think of all
these Christmas trees right these
Christmas trees they take years to grow
we use them for one night the holiest
night of the year
and then we let them go and think about
in nature to design a quote-unquote
product an organism spends energy and
time and thoughtfulness and many many
many years and I'm thinking about the
Redwoods
um to grow these channels these you know
this cellulose layers and channels and
reach these incredible Heights takes
sometimes hundreds of years sometimes
thousands of years am I afraid of
building a company that designs products
in the scale of thousands of years no
I'm not and the way of being in the
physical world today is really not in
tune with the time dimension of the
natural world at all and um and and that
needs to change and that's obviously
very very hard to do in a community in
of of human beings that is at least in
the western world that is based on
capitalism and so here the wonderful
challenge that we have ahead of us is
how do we impart upon the capitalist
Movement we know that we need to produce
Now Products that will enter the real
world and be you know shared and used by
others and still benefit the natural
world while benefiting humans and that's
a wonderful challenge to have so
integrate technology with nature and
that's a really difficult problem I see
parallels here with another company of
newer link which is
uh is basically like you I think you
mentioned neuralink for nature that
their short-term products you can come
up with but it's ultimately a long-term
challenge of how do you integrate the
machine
with this creation of nature this
intricate complex creation of nature
which is the human brain and then you're
speaking more generally nature
how every company has an image like this
one single image that embodies the
spirit of the company
and I think for neurolink it was to me
that chimpanzee playing a video game
it was just unbelievable but with plants
there potentially is a set of molecules
that
impacts or inspires I like that word the
plant to
um behave or act in a certain way and
allows still to plan the possibility of
deciding where it or she or he wants to
go
uh which is why our first product for
this molecular space is going to be a
functionalized fragrance
so here we're thinking about the future
of fragrances and the future fragrances
and flavors
um you know these these products are in
the industry as we know it today are
designed for totally for a human-centric
use and
um and enjoyment and Indulgence and
luxury
um they're used on the body for the sake
of I don't know attraction and and
feeling good
um and smelling good and we were asking
ourselves is there a world in which
um in which a fragrance can be not a
functional fragrance because you could
claim that all fragrances are functional
but is there a world in which the
fragrance becomes functionalized is
again imparted upon or given agency to
connect with another organism is there a
world in which
um you and I can go down to your garden
and use a perfume that will interact
with the Rose Garden downstairs
um I've just been enamored with the
statements that are being made
in the media around oh this is
completely biologically derived
fragrance and it's bio-based and but
when you look into the fragrance and you
understand it in order to get to this
bioderived fragrant fragrance you went
through you blew through you know 10 000
10 000 bushes of rose to create five
milliliters of of a rose fragrance and
all these ten thousand bushes of Rose
they take space they take you know water
management and and so much waste um is
this really what we want the future of
our Agriculture and molecular Goods to
look like and so when we did the ago
Pavilion on the roof of SF Moma we
calculated that for that Pavilion we had
40 000 calories embedded into this
Pavilion that was made of shrimp shells
and kaitizen and
um Apple skins and and cellulose from
tree tree pulp and we calculated that
overall the structure had 40 000
calories interesting way to think about
a structure right from the from the
point of view of of calories but as you
left the gallery you saw these three
clocks that were so beautifully designed
by Felix on our team and these clocks
measured temperature and humidity and we
were connected them to Weather Channels
so that we could directly
um look at how the Pavilion was
biodegrading in real time and and and in
our calculations I say this long-winded
uh description of the Pavilion to say
that in the calculation we incorporated
um you know how much electricity we used
for our computers for the 3D printers
that printed the Pavilion and you know
and these were called emergy
calculations right energy and materials
and when you think about a product when
you think about you know a shoe or a
chair or a perfume or a building you
don't stop at the object you want to go
all the way to the system again instead
of Designing objects or singular
embodiments of a the will of the
designer you're really tapping into an
entire system that is interconnected and
if you look at the energy budget that
characterized the project
it traverses the entire planet right
some of these shrimp shells were brought
from places in the world we haven't
thought of in terms of the apples and
the shrimp shells and the tree pop and
so going back to you know going back to
to fragrances
um it's really really important to
understand the product in the context of
the ecological system from which it's
sourced and and how it's designed and
that is the kind of thinking
um that is not only desired but is
required if we are to achieve Synergy
between humanity and nature it's
interesting because the system level
thinking is almost always going to take
you to the entire Earth to considering
the entire Earth ecosystem which is why
it's important to have a left brain and
a right brain competing for attention
you mentioned a fragrance that kind of
sends out a message to the environment
essentially a message in a bottle yeah a
message in a bottle so like so you can
go to a rose garden and trick the Rose
Garden to think it's 4 AM
essentially you could if you wanted to
but maybe that is not trick trick is a
bad word right Inspire but Inspire I
like I I like the idea of providing
nature with a choice which is why I love
that elegant mathematical equation of
empowerment and agency empower the uh
the Rose Garden to uh to create a
romantic moment for the uh for the
wearer of the fragrance but now again
you're you're again all of this to go
back to back to that human-centric
notion of romance but maybe there's
another way to do romance right that
that we haven't yet you know that we
haven't yet explored and and maybe
you know there's a way to tap into what
happens to the Rose when it's dreaming
assuming that plants are sentient and
assuming that we can tap into that
sentience what can we discover about
what what does the Rose want like what
is what is it actually want and and and
what does it need and what are what what
are the Roses
um you know
dreams but do you think there's some
correlation in terms of romance in terms
of the word you sometimes use Magic
is there some similarities in what
humans want and what roses want and what
nature wants I think so
I think there isn't if I did not think
so oh my goodness this would not be a
nice world to live in I think
we all want love
I recently read this beautiful letter
that was written by Einstein to his
daughter
um and was discovered Einstein asked his
daughter to wait 20 years until she
reveals these letters and so she did
it's just one of the most beautiful
letters I've ever read from a father to
his daughter and the letter overall is
imbued with a kind of a a sense of
remorse or
maybe even feelings of sadness and there
is some kind of melancholy note in the
letter uh where Einstein regrets not
having spent enough time with his
daughter having focused on you know the
theory of general relativity and
changing the world and then he goes on
to talk about this beautiful and elegant
equation of E equals MC square and he
tells his daughter that he believes that
love is actually the force that shapes
the universe because it is like gravity
right it attracts people it is like
light it brings people together and
connects between people
um and it's all empowering and and so if
you multiply it by the the speed of
light you could really change the world
for the better and I I call me a
romanticist I know you are too
um which is why I so love being here I I
believe in this I I totally and utterly
um believe in in love but let me just
excerpt from Einstein's letter there's
an extremely powerful force that so far
science has not found a formal
explanation too it is a force that
includes and governs all others and is
even behind any phenomena operating in
the universe and has not yet been
identified by us this Universal force is
love
he also the last paragraph in the letter
as you've mentioned I deeply regret not
having been able to express what is in
my heart which has quietly beaten for
you all my life
maybe it's too late to apologize but as
time is relative
that jokester Einstein I need to tell
you that I love you and uh thanks to you
I've reached the ultimate answer your
father Albert Einstein yeah but that
regret I deeply regret not having been
able to express what is in my heart
maybe that's a universal regret
filling your days with busyness and
silly Pursuits and not
sitting down and uh expressing that but
it is
everything it is everything it is why I
love that expression and I forget who
said this but
I I love my daughter more than
um Evolution required right and
um I feel the same way towards
my other half and and I feel that when
you find that connection
um everything and anything is possible
um and it's a very very very magical
[Music]
um
a magical moment so I
I believe in love and I believe in the
one
it might be the same thing it might be a
different thing but let me ask you a
ridiculously big philosophical uh
question about beauty
Dostoevsky said Beauty will save the
world in the idiot one of my favorite
books of his uh what is beauty to you
you've created through this intersection
of engineering and nature
you have created some incredibly
beautiful things what do you think is
beauty
that's a beautiful question
maybe it is connected to the love
question it is connected to the love
question of course everything is
connected to the love question okay
um
to me beauty is agency
to me something that has agency
it is beautiful there is this special
quote from Buckminster Fuller which I
cannot remember word for word Fest I
remember the concept
which goes something like this
um when I work on a problem I never
think about beauty but when I'm done
solving the problem and I look at what
I've created and it's not beautiful I
know that I was wrong
okay yeah he's a kind of a an agency
that speaks to quote unquote the
objective function of the creation right
whether for Bucky it's useless or useful
so this idea of empowerment that you
talked about yes they connected to it
comes back to that yeah what's the
difference that you hinted at between it
empowerment and emergence is a emergence
completely lacks control
is it and empowerment is more
uh is more controlled
there's an agent making decisions is is
there an interesting distinction there
yes I think empowerment is a force with
Direction it has directionality to it
emergence
is I believe multi-directional again
that depends on the application
emergence is perhaps
in terms of sort of a material
definition is the isotropic spirit when
um empowerment is at the end is a Tropic
and counterpart
um
I think
they overlap because I think that
empowerment is a way of
um
inspiring emergence I think emergence
does not happen without empowerment but
empowerment can happen without emergence
do you think of emergence as the loss of
control like when you're thinking about
these capsules and the things they
create is emergence of things that is uh
not a desirable
conclusion I love that question because
to some of us the loss of control is
control
in design we're used to like extreme
levels of control over form and the
shape of a thing and how it behaves and
how it functions
and that's something we've inherited
from the Industrial Revolution
but with nature there is this
um
there's this diversity that happens
without necessarily having a reward
function right this is good or bad
things just happen and some of them
happen to have wings and some of them
happen to have scales and
you know you end up with this incredible
potential
um for for diversity so I think the
future of of design is in that soft
control is in the ability to design
highly controlled systems that enable
um that enable the loss of control and
creativity is very much part of this
because
creativity is all about letting go
and beginning again and beginning again
beginning again
and when you cannot let go you cannot be
creative and you can't you you can't you
can't find novelty but I think that
letting go is a moment that enables
empowerment agency creativity emergence
and they're all connected they're sort
of associate themselves with definition
of Destiny or the inevitable
a good friend of mine shared with me
elegant definition of Faith which is the
ratio of of who you are and and who you
want to be
ratio of who you are who you want to be
exactly and that sort of ends up
defining you yeah and those tools I
think when when when when you let go you
sort of find you you give peace to your
will right to a sense of Will and and
and so I think that's very very
important
in design but also in life
she said this fate is the ratio of
um who you are what you want to be who
you want to be do you think there's
something to this whole manifestation
thing like focusing on a vision of what
you want the world to become and in in
that focusing you manifest it like Paula
Cole said in The Alchemist when you want
something all the universe conspires in
helping you to achieve it
is there something to that I think so
yes and I always think of you know what
I do as this the culmination of energy
information and matter and how to Direct
Energy Information and matter in the
design of a thing or in the design of a
life
I think living is very much a process of
channeling these energies to where they
need to go I think that the
manifestation or part of that
manifestation is the pointing to the
Moon in order to get to the moon and and
and that's why manifestation is also
directional it has that vector quality
to it that
I think of agency is
have you uh in your own life has there
been things you've done where you kind
of direct
that energy information and matter in a
way that opens up new possibilities yeah
I mean you've also said somewhere I'm
probably misquoting that uh you're
you're you're
many things you and Harry are many
things and you become new things every
10 years or so oh I did say that
somewhere somewhere that every decade
you're sort of Switched that was an old
that was a previous scenario that said
that yeah I did say some time ago that
you have to sort of reboot reboot every
10 years
um to to keep creative and keep
inventive and and keep fresh is there
things you've done in your life which is
kind of uh doors opened
I think everything everything uh
everything good I've found in my life
has been found in that way of
um
letting go and suspending my sense of
disbelief and often you will find me say
to the team suspend your disbelief
I don't care that this is impossible
let's assume it is where does it take us
and that suspension of disbelief is
absolutely part and parcel of the
creative act
and you know
I did so when
um
I was in medical school I was in
Hadassah and in the Hebrew University
and um
I remember I left medical school for
architecture the day my grandmother
passed away
and that was a moment of relief and that
was a moment a door that was closing
that opened other opportunities
um but that of course required letting
go of the great vision of becoming a
doctor and letting go of the dream of
you know being surrounded by
wonderful patience and the science of
medicine and the research associated
with that science and letting go of that
dream
to accomplish another
um
and and it it has happened throughout my
life in in different ways
um MIT was another experience like that
where people pointed at me as you know
the designer for whom the academic
currency is not necessarily the citation
index
and of course in order to get tenure at
MIT you have to look at the citation
index but for me it it was not that it
was manifesting our work in shows and
writing papers and writing patents and
creating a celebration around work and I
never saw a a distinction and you know
between those ways of being I also think
that another
um
kind of way of being or a modality of
being that I found helpful is
um Victor Frankel wrote this incredible
book man searched for meaning after the
Holocaust and he writes different people
uh
pursue life for for different reasons
According to Freud the the the goal of
of life is to find pleasure and
according to Adler it's you know to find
power
and
um and for Victor Frankel it was about
finding meaning
and when you let go of the titles and
the disciplines and the boundaries and
the expectations and the perception you
you are elevated to this really special
yes spiritual but definitely very very
creative plane where you you can sort of
Start Anew
look at the world through the lens of a
bacterium or a robot or it or you know
or look at ecology through the lens of
chemistry and look at chemistry the
lines of Robotics and look at robotics
through the lens of you know
microbial ecologies and so on and so
forth and and I feel that kind of
rebooting
um not every 10 years but every minute
every breath
is very very important for a creative
life and for for just maintaining this
fresh mind to reboot reboot to begin
again with every breath begin again and
and that can be confusing for some right
for my team members you know I I like to
change my mind it's who I am it's how I
think it's how I operate
um you know and and and they'll come and
and we found another technique or
another technology that's interesting
and we thought that you know that we
were working on this functionalized
fragrance but now there's another
opportunity and let's go there and to me
I would much rather you know live life
like if I had to pick sort of my
favorite Broadway show
um to enter and live through it would be
into the woods it's not a specific fairy
tale it's not
you know the Sleeping Beauty or or
Little Red Riding Hood
um or Rapunzel it's all of them it's
sort of moving into the forest and
seeing this wonder and getting close and
learning about that and then moving to
another wonder and life is really about
tying all of these
little fairy tales together uh in work
and and also in life unafraid to LEAP
into the unknown unafraid to LEAP into
the unknown speaking of mid you got a
tenure at MIT and then you leaped
to New York and start a new company that
with a vision that doesn't spend a
couple of years but centuries
I did it was my destiny to start a
company and and do I have mornings when
I wake up and I ask myself what the hell
am I doing yes I I have those mornings
what do you do with those mornings by
the way I embrace them and I I find
gratitude and I say to myself thank
goodness I I'm so lucky to you know to
have the the the ability to be
frustrated in this way
um so I really really Embrace these
frustrations and I and I I
I take them I wrap them in a bubble and
I look at it you know on the outside of
my my uh
um aware mind
um and and I laugh at them I smile at
them
if I could return actually to the
question of Beauty for a second I forgot
to ask you something you mentioned
imperfection
in the Death Masks what role does
imperfection
play in um
our conception of beauty what role does
imperfection play in um
in nature there's a there's this
Japanese Aesthetics concept of wabu-sabi
which basically uh Embraces imperfection
nothing lasts nothing is finished and
nothing is perfect what do you think of
that I totally agree that change is the
only permanence that imperfection is
there if only to to signal that we are
part of a bigger thing than ourselves
that that we are on a journey
um that that were
that things are in movement
um and if they were perfect I of of
course when things are perfect it is
just so boring we end up with
stereotypes and as humans but I think
just in general as living beings
we're here to find meaning and that
meaning cannot be found without struggle
and without seeking to not to perfect
but to build to work to build towards
something better
um when I was a child my mother who who
I love so much always explained to me
how important it is to fall and to fail
and to fight and to argue
and
um
and that there is a way that there is a
culture to
to to to failing and and and to
imperfection
um so I I think it is
it is uh
necessary for something beautiful to be
imperfect and it is a sign that it is a
sign of nature because nothing in nature
is perfect
what about human relations you mentioned
finding love
are the flaws in humans in perfection in
humans a component of love
like what role do you think the the
flaws play
it's a that's a really profound question
I think
the flaws are there uh to
the flaws are there to present a a
vulnerability and those flaws are
um
are
um a sign of those vulnerabilities
and I think
love is very very gentle right love
with Bill we often talk about between
the two of us about what drives all
human behavior and for him it's
incentive as you might expect and he
will repeat this sentence to me oh
incentive drives all human behavior but
I I would say to me it's love love very
much so
um and
and I think flaws are part of that
because flaws are a sign of that
vulnerability whether physical whether
emotional vulnerability and those
vulnerabilities these vulnerabilities
they either tear us apart or they bring
us together
um the vulnerability is what is the glue
I think I think that the vulnerability
enables connection the connection is the
glue and that connection enables
accessing A Higher Ground as a community
as opposed to as an individual so if
there is a society of the mind or if
there are higher levels of awareness
that can be accessed in community as
opposed to
again going to the silkworm as opposed
to on the individual level I think that
those occur through the flaws and the
vulnerabilities and without them we we
cannot find connection community and
without Community we can't build what we
have built as a civilization you know
for the past hundreds of thousands of
years so I think not only are they
beautiful but they have a functional
role in in building civilizations
yeah there's a sense in which love
requires vulnerability and maybe love is
the leap into that vulnerability and I
think yes I think
a flaw think about it like physically
I'm thinking about
a brick that's flawed but in a way the
the I think of a flaw as a as an
increased surface area
that's a good line right a surface area
that like physically emotionally right
it sort of introduces this whole new
dimension to a human or a brick and
because you have more surface area you
can you know yeah use mortar and build a
home and and yeah I think of it as
accessing this additional dimension of
surface area that could be used for good
or bad right to to to connect to
communicate to collaborate
it makes me think of that quote from
this incredible movie I've watched years
ago
Particle Fever I think it was called
documentary about the Large Hadron
Collider an incredible film where they
talk about the things that are least
important for our survival are the
things that make us human
like the the pure romantic act or you
know the notion of and and Victor
Frankel talks about that too
he talks about
feeling the sun on his arms as he's as
he is
um
working the soil in
two degrees Fahrenheit with without
clothes and
the officer
berate him and says what have you done
have you been a businessman before you
came here to the camp
and he says I was a doctor and he said
you you must have made a lot of money as
a doctor and he said I all all my work
I've done for free I've been helping the
poor
um but he keeps his he keeps
his
um humility and he he keeps his
um modesty and he keeps his
preservation of the spirit
um
and he says the things that actually
make him
able to or made him able to outlive the
the Terrible
um experience in the Holocaust was the
the really cherishing this moment when
the Sun hits his skin or when he can eat
it
um a grain of rice a single grain of
rice so I think
cherishing is a very important part of
um living a meaningful life being able
to cherish those simple things
like to notice them and to to notice
them to pay attention to them in the
moment
and I I do this now more than ever
I mean there is something the Bukowski
has this poem I like called Nirvana
where it tells the story of a young man
on a bus going through like North
Carolina or something like this and they
stop off in a cafe and he has this
there's a waitress and just he talks
about that he notices the magic
something Indescribable we just notice
the magic of it and he gets back on the
bus with the rest of the passengers and
none of them seem to have noticed the
magic
and
I think if you just allow yourself to
pause it just to
feel whatever that is maybe maybe
ultimately is a kind of gratitude yes
for
I don't know what it is
it's just that I'm sure it's just
chemicals in the brain but it's just so
incredible to be alive yeah and noticing
that yes and appreciating that and being
one in that with others yes yes and and
that goes back to
you know to the fireplace right to the
First Technology what was the first
technology it was fire First Technology
to have built community and it emerged
out of a vulnerability of wanting to
stay away from the cold and be warm
together
and and and of course that fire is
associated with not only with comfort
and the ability to
uh form you know
biorrelevant nutrients in our food and
and and and and provide heat and comfort
but also spirits and and
um a kind of a way to enter up you know
to enter a spiritual moment to enter
a moment that can only be experienced as
as
in a community as a as a form of a
meditative moment
there is a lot to be said about light
light
um is I think an important part of
these moments
of
I think I I think it's a real thing I I
really truly believe that we're born
with an with a
with an aura surface area that is
measurable I think we're we're born into
the world with that you know
with uh
with an aura
and
um and how do we channel that is really
is sort of ends I mean and ends up sort
of defining
you know defining the light in our lives
do you think we're all do you think
we're all lonely you think there's
loneliness in US humans oh yes yes
loneliness is part yes I think we we all
have that loneliness whether we're
willing to access that loneliness and
look at it in the eye or completely
um
you know completely avoid it or deny it
it's like uh it feels like it's a some
kind of foundation for longing and
longing leads to this uh this
combination of vulnerability and
connection with others yes it feels like
that's a really important part of being
human is being lonely very it's very we
are born into this world alone
again being alone and being lonely are
two different things right and you can
be together but be lonely and you can be
alone but not be lonely at all
we often joke bill and I that
um he he cannot be lonely he cannot deal
with being by himself he always needs
people around him and I strive long
um must have creative Solitude must find
pockets of solitude and loneliness
in order to find creativity and
reconnect with myself
so loneliness is a recipe for
um for community in my opinion and I
think those things complement each other
and they're synergetic absolutely the
yin and yang of of
of of togetherness and they allow you I
think to yeah to reset and to tune in
to
that ratio we've talked about of who you
are and who you want to be
if you if you go to this place of
creative Solitude what's your
what's your creative process
is there something you've noticed about
what you do that leads to your to good
work
I love to be able not only
to lose focus but kind of to focus on
the peripheral View
and to allow
um different things to occur at once so
I will often in my loneliness Journeys I
will often
listen to like Leonard Bernstein
anything I can find online by Lenny
Bernstein it's reading a nature paper
it's War and Peace it's really
revisiting all the texts that are so
Timeless for me with opportunities that
are very very timely and I think for me
the creative process is really about
bringing
timeless
problems or concepts together with
timely Technologies
to observe them I remember when we did
the Mandela Pavilion we Read Moby Dick
the whiteness of the whale the albino
the different the other
and that got us to work on melanin and
and melanin also was sort of an output
from the death mask so it's lots of
things happening at the same time and
really allowing them
allowing them to come together to form
this view about the world through the
lens of a spirit being or a living being
or a material and then focus on the
world through the lens of that material
the glass work was another project like
that where we were fascinated by glass
because obviously it's superb material
for architecture
but we created this new glass printing
technology for the first time that was
shedding light on
the biomechanics of fluid glass the math
and the physics of which was never done
before which was so exciting to us but
revealing new knowledge about the world
through technology that's one theme
The Reincarnation between things
material and immaterial that's another
theme
Lenny Bernstein Warren Pete Tolstoy
you've already tweeted I told a quote
from War and Peace as of course you
would everything I know I know because
of love love yeah I love this quote so
you use these kind of
inspirations
uh to focus you and then find the actual
idea in the periphery yes and then
connect them with whatever it is that
we're working on whether it's you know
High throughput directed evolution of
bacteria
um you know whether it's you know
recreating that Garden of Eden in the
capsule and what it looks like the food
of the future
it is a little bit like directing a film
creating a new
project
is a bit like creating a film and
you have these Heroes you have these
characters and you put them together and
there's a narrative and there's a story
whenever we start a new project it has
to have these see these ingredients of
simultaneous complexity it has to be
novel in terms of the synthetic biology
Material Science robotics engineering
all of these elements that are
discipline based or rooted must be novel
if you can combine novelty in synthetic
biology with a novelty in robotics with
a novelty in Material Science with a
novelty in computational design and you
are bound to create something novel
period and that's how I run the company
and that's how I pick the people and so
that's another very very important
ingredient of The Cutting Edge across
multiple disciplines that come together
and then in the background in the
periphery there is all these messages
The Whispers of the ancient oldies right
the beethovens and the picassos so
Beethoven's always whispering to you
yeah how could one not include Beethoven
and The Whispers I'm going to ask you
about Beethoven and The Afghani kissing
you've mentioned because I'm I've played
piano my whole life I've obviously know
a lot about Beethoven
um and it's it's one of the private
things for me I suppose because I don't
think I've ever publicly played piano by
the way me too
yeah yeah people sometimes even with
guitar people ask me can you play
something and it just feels like certain
things are meant to be done privately
yeah it's weird I mean it's a difficult
and and some of uh the times I have
performed publicly uh it is It
ultimately been vulnerabilities very
very very difficult for me and I'm sure
it's I know it's not for a lot of people
but it is for me anyway we will turn to
that but since you've mentioned
combination of novelty costs multiple
disciplines and that's what you seek
when you
when you build teams or pick people you
work with I just wanted to kind of
Linger on this um idea of
what kind of humans are you looking for
in this endeavor that you're taking on
this fascinating thing that you've been
uh talking about want to think somewhere
else
a previous version
version 5.7 of Nary said somewhere that
there's four fields
that are combined to create this
intersection of biology and Engineering
work in is computational design additive
manufacturing material engineering
synthetic biology I'm sure there's
others but how do you how do you find
these humans machine learning is in the
mix
I manifest and they come
um yeah there are a few approaches to
Memphis
they show up okay um you know send your
message upon the water I mean those job
descriptions that you saw the first ones
I wrote by myself uh and you find
interesting people and brilliant people
when you
look we talked about second derivative
when you look under and under and under
and if you look deep enough and
specialized enough and if you allow
yourself to
look at the cracks at the flaws at the
the cracks between disciplines and
between scales you find really really
interesting Diamonds in the Rough and so
I I I I like for those job descriptions
to
yeah to be those messages in a bottle
that bring those really interesting
people our way
um I mean they have to have humility
they have to have a shine in their eye
they have to be hungry and foolish it's
his job so famously said
a friend of mine who's a dean of
well-known architectural School said you
know today Architects don't want to be
Architects Architects don't look up to
the starchy texts as role models
starchitects are no longer Role Models
Architects Want to Build by virtue of
not building right Architects one she
said we're back in the 60s when we think
about architecture back in the hippie
movement I think I think that in a way
um they have to be somewhat of a hippie
somewhat of a a kind of a
um Jack of all trades master of all
um and yet
with humility now that is hard to find
and that is why you know when I start an
interview I talk about childhood
memories and I asked about music and I
asked about connection and through these
interviews you can learn a lot about a
person's future
by spending time hearing them talk about
their past do you find that educational
back like uh phds versus like what's the
life trajectory yours is an interesting
life trajectory too like uh what's the
life trajectory that leads to the kind
of person that would work with you um
it's you know people who have
um ideally had industry experience and
know what it's like to be in the
quote-unquote real world they're
dreamers that are addicted to reality as
opposed to realists that are addicted to
dreams
meaning they have that innocence in them
they have the hunger they have the
idealism without
um being entitled and with understanding
the systems that govern our world and
understanding how to utilize these
systems as Trojan horses to bring those
values into the world
there are individuals who are feel
comfortable in this friction between
um between you know highly wondrous and
dreamy and incredible
fantasy Renditions of what the world
could be with extremely
um and extremely brilliant skills in
terms of their disciplinary background
so PhD with industrial experience in a
certain field or a double major and two
fields that make no sense whatsoever in
their combination I love it yeah are
things that really really attract me and
especially that that's been this the the
technology biology
yes Gap technology biology nature
culture I mean the secret to one thing
is through the lens of another and I
always believe in that kind of
translational design ability to be able
to see something through the lens of
another and always allows you to think
Again Begin Again re-establish redefine
suspend your disbelief revisit
um and when you revisit enough times
like a hundred times or like 200 times
and you revisit the same question
through the lens of any possible
discipline and any possible scenario you
you find you get eventually you get to
the truth I have to ask you because you
work at the interplay of uh the machine
and the natural world is there a good
definition for you of what is life
what what is a living organism
I think like 440 million years ago there
were all these plants
that
[Music]
um
the cyanobacteria I believe actually
that that God that that was like the
first Extinction right there were six
five extinctions we are apparently the
sixth we are in the eye of the storm we
are in the six Extinction we are going
to be extinct as we speak I mean death
is upon us whether we want to admit it
or not and actually they found in
Argentina and in in you know various
places around the world they found these
spores of the first plants that existed
on the planet and they
emerged out of these cyanobacteria where
the first of course and then they found
these spore-based plants and because
they didn't have seeds or only Sports
the spores became sort of the fossils by
which we've come to known of their
existence
and because of these spores we know that
this first Extinction existed
but this Extinction is actually what
enabled plants to resurrect right so the
death of these first plants because they
clinked to the rocks and they they
generated a ton of phosphorus that went
into the ocean by
clinging to the Rocks like 60 times more
phosphorus than without them and then
all this phosphorus basically choked the
oceans and made them super cold and a
um without oxygen aoxic and then and
then we lost the plant kingdom and then
because of the death of these first
plants they actually enriched the soil
and created nutrients for these new
plants to come to the planet
um and those planets had like more
sophisticated vein systems and they were
moving beyond spores to seeded plants
Etc and flowering plants and so in a way
you one mass extinction sort of LED
in in the the
or division period sort of led to Life
as we know it and where would we be
without plants in a way so I I think
that death is very much part of life and
through that definition that kind of
planetary
the wide definition in the context of
hundreds of millions of years
um life gains a completely new sort of a
new light and that's where
that's when the particles become a wave
right where humans are we are not alone
and we are here because of those plants
right so I think death is is very much
part of life so in the context of you
know the redwood tree perhaps you know
life is defined as uh ten generations
and through the lens of a bacteria
perhaps life is defined as a millisecond
and perhaps through the lens of of an
AGI life is defined as all of human
civilization and so I think it really is
a question of
um
this time scale again the time scale and
the organism the life form that's asking
the question through which we can answer
what is life
what do you think about this since
you're if we think of ourselves as in
the eye of the storm of an another
Extinction
the the natural question to ask here is
you have all all of nature and then you
have this new human creation that is
currently being termed artificial
intelligence
how does your work play with the
possibility of of a future super
intelligent ecosystem and AGI that
either joins or supersedes humans yeah
um so I'm glad you asked this question
and I hope full are terrified both I'm
hopeful and terrified I did watch your
interview with Ellie ezrautkovsky and I
loved it because you were scared or
because you were excited or because
there's first of all I was both I I was
I totally scared shamed excited and
totally also inspired because he's just
such an incredible thinker
um and I can agree or disagree with what
he says but I just found his way of
thinking about AGI
um and The Perils of humanity as a
result there's an inevitability to what
he's saying his advice to young people
is that prepare for a short life yeah he
thinks
it's very
almost simple it's almost common sense
that AGI would get rid of humans that he
can't imagine a trajectory
eventually that leads to a place that
doesn't have AGI kill all humans there's
just too many trajectories where a super
intelligent systems gets rid of humans
and in the near term and so yeah the the
that Clarity of thinking is very uh
sobering to me
it's maybe it is to you as well it's
super inspiring because I think he's
wrong but it's like you you almost want
to prove him wrong
it's like no we humans are clever Bunch
we're gonna find a way it is a bit like
jumping into super cold water it's sort
of a kind of a fist in your face it
wakes you up and I like these moments so
much
um and and he was able to bring that
moment to life even though I think
a mother can never
think that way ever
um and and it's a little bit like that
that notion of I I love her more than
Evolution requires on your question
about AGI in nature look I think
we've been through a lot in terms of to
to get here we sort of moved from data
right the ability to collect information
to knowledge the ability to use this
information for utility from knowledge
to intelligence and what is intelligence
is the ability to problem solve and
adapt and translate so that's sort of
from from data to information to
knowledge I think the next Frontier is
wisdom
um and what is wisdom wisdom is the
ability to have or find Insight
um about
um the world and from wisdom to
spiritual awareness which is sort of
transcends wisdom and is able and to
chart the world into new territory but I
think what is interesting about AGI is
that it is sort of almost like a
self-recursive thing right because it's
like a washing machine of like a third
derivative Wikipedia it uses kind of
like language to create language to
create language to create language it
feels like novelty is being constantly
created I don't I don't it doesn't feel
like it's regurgitating and that's so
fascinating because you know these are
not the stochastic parrots this is sort
of a new form of emergence perhaps of uh
of of novelty as you say that exists by
virtue of using old things to create new
things
um
um but it's not as if the AGI has
self-awareness right it's not as if it
has maybe maybe maybe maybe it maybe it
has but as far as I can tell it's not as
if AGI has approached Consciousness or
sentience just yet it it it's it's
probably getting there but the language
appears to present itself as if as if
there is sentience there but it doesn't
but I think that's the problem at the
point where this AGI sounds like me and
speaks like me and behaves like me and
feels like me and breathes like me and
my daughter knows the AGI to be me is
sort of the end of it and the end of
everything right it's the end of human
agency
but what is the end of human agency to
humans I think is the beginning of
agency to Nature because if you take all
of this agency if you take all of these
language models that can summarize all
of human civilization and Consciousness
and then upload that to Nature and have
nature now deal with that World Of
Consciousness that it never had access
to
so maybe through eliezel's lands the
short-lived human becomes sort of a very
long-lived human like sentient weeping
willow maybe maybe that's the end and
the beginning and and and and maybe
um on the more optimistic side uh for us
humans
um it's a different form of existence uh
where everything we create and
everything we consume and everything we
process is all
made up of six uh you know six elements
and that's it and there's only those six
elements and not 118 elements and
um and and it's all the stuff of biology
plus some you know fair amount of bits
bits genes and atoms well I think the
idea a lot of Beethoven a lot of
Beethoven I think the idea of connecting
AGI to Nature through your work is
really fascinating
sort of uh
unlocking this incredible Machinery of
intelligence that is Agi
and connecting it to the incredible
Machinery of wisdom that is nature has
evolved through billions of years oh
pretty crazy intense Evolution exactly
and unlike sort of again I'm going back
to
directed Evolution unlike
um this sort of high throughput Brute
Force approach if there is a way to
utilize this Synergy for
diversity and diversification
like
like yeah how like what happens if you
ask a chat GPT question but it takes 10
000 years to answer that question like
what does that look like right when you
like completely switch the time scale
um and you can afford the time to answer
the question
and I again I I don't know but but that
world to me is possibly amazing
do you think there's uh
because when you start to think about
time scales like this looking at Earth
all the possible trajectories in my take
of this living organism that is Earth
do you think there's others like it do
you think there's other planets with
life forms on them that are just doing
their thing in this kind of way because
you
in what you're doing you're
you're directly playing with what's
possible with life
life-like things that kind of maps the
question of well what kind of other
things are possible elsewhere
do you think
um there's other
worlds Full of Life full of alien life
out there I've studied the calculations
that point you know towards the
um verdict that the possibility of life
in you know in in and around us is is
very very low we are a chosen planet in
a way right there's water and there's
love what else do you need
um and and and that sort of
very peculiar juxtaposition of
conditions the oxygen the water the
carbon
um again is is is in a way a miracle
given the
um
massive extinctions that we've been
through as life forms and that said I
cannot believe that there is no other
life form I I want to believe
um more than I know
that that yes that there are life forms
and you know in the white fountain that
is the black hole right that there are
these life forms that are
um you know
light years away from us and that are
that are forming other forms of life
forces yeah I'm much more worried about
probably the thing that you're working
on which is that there's all kinds of
life around us that we're not
communicating with yes there's aliens in
a sense all around us that we're not
seeing that we're not talking to they
were not communicating yeah because that
to me just seems the more likely
situation that they don't care that
they're here they're all around us in
different forms that that there is a
connection there's a thing that connects
all of us all of living beings
Across the Universe and like we're not
we're just beginning to understand any
of it and I feel like that's the
important problem is I feel like you can
get there with the tools of science
today by just studying life on Earth
unlock some really fundamental things
that maybe you can start to answer
questions about what is consciousness uh
maybe this thing that we've been saying
about uh love but in this in honestly in
a serious way and then you'll start to
understand that uh that there is alien
life all out there and it's much more
complicated and interesting that we've
kind of realized as we're still look
into human-like exactly human-like
things it's the variety of life that's
possible is just almost endless I
totally agree with you I I think again
um
fine alien right yeah Define
intelligence Define life right and
Marvin Minsky used to say intelligence
is a suitcase word right it's a word so
big it's a word like sustainability and
it's a word like you know rock and roll
and
suitcase words are always very very
dangerous speaking of rock and roll
you've mentioned music and you mentioned
Beethoven a bunch of times
um you've also tweeted about uh
evgenie kissing performance and and so
on what uh what can you say about the
role of music in your life I love music
um I always wondered why is it that plus
plaque art meaning architecture and
sculpture and painting can't get us to
cry and music
gets us to cry so quickly and connect so
quickly there is something about music
that it is and no wonder that plants
also respond to music but that that is
the top of the creative pyramid in in my
opinion and it's a weird mystery that
we're so connected to music well by the
way to push back a good bridge will make
me cry a good Arc it's true and I I will
say uh when I visited the Sagrada
Familia I had that kind of spiritual
reverence towards that spatial
experience and being in that space and
feeling the the intention and the space
and appreciating every little gesture so
it's true
this is the universal language it's it's
the language of waves right it's the
language of the waves not the language
of the particles it is the universal
language I believe
and and that is definitely one of my one
of my loves and you said that if you
weren't doing what you were doing now
perhaps you would be a film director so
have to ask what uh what do you think is
the best film of all time maybe top uh
top three yeah
maybe The Godfather
Godfather okay The Godfather is is
definitely up there Francis Coppola is
one of my heroes have you met him I have
met him yes yes yes I I was very very
lucky we were very lucky uh to work with
him on his new film at gallopolis which
is coming out I hope in 2024 and think
about the cities of the future in in the
context of new materials and
the unity between nature and culture
Godfather is definitely up there
um 2001 is up there
I would watch that film again and again
and again
it's incredible
the last scene in
Odyssey 2001 that's
um just watch the last scene of 2001
then listen to kovsky and then sort of
and then go to the garden and that's
pretty much you know the end in the
beginning but that scene that last scene
from 2001 is everything
it says so much with so little and it
leaves
it it's sort of the embodiment I believe
of
ambivalence and
um there's opportunity to believe in the
beginning of humankind the end of
humankind the planet child star or star
child of the future
um was there a death was there an
reincarnation
um you know that final scene to me is
something that I go back to and and
study and every time there is a
different reading of that scene that
inspires me so that that scene just and
then the first scene in The Godfather
still one of the best scenes of all
times sort of a portrait of America the
ideals and values that I brought from
Italy and a family of loyalty of uh yes
of values of how how different values
are constructed yes loyalty and and the
human spirit and how Coppola celebrates
the human Spirit through the most simple
gestures in language and acting and I
think in in Kubrick you see this highly
curated and controlled and manicured
um vision of creating a film and with
with Francis it's
it's like an Italian Feast it's like
anything anything can happen at any
moment in time
and just being on the set with him is
um is an experience I'll take with me to
my grave it's it's very very very
special and you said music is also part
of that of creating a feeling in the
movies yeah actually the The Godfather
um
That Tune that makes me like emotional
every time at some weird level yeah it's
one of these Tunes I'm sure that has
you know
they played to
to a Jasmine you'll get the best scent
of all time so I think like there's but
I think with that particular tune I
learned staccato
something very very happy and joyous
and then made into this stretched in
time and became kind of the refrain of
Nostalgia and Melancholy and loyalty and
all of these values that ride on top of
this one single tune
you can play in all kinds of different
ways I've I've played on guitar in all
kinds of different ways and I think in
Godfather 3 the sun plays it on guitar
to the father
I think this happens in movies
but sometimes a melody and that's a
simple Melody you can just like
and the Strauss melody in 2001 yep and
when you juxtapose
this
um this Melodies with
the scene you get this again hole that's
bigger than some of its parts where you
get this moment
that is I think
like these are the moments I would send
you know with the next Voyager to outer
space I definitely sent the Godfather in
in 2001 would definitely be beyond that
um golden record you are an incredibly
successful scientist engineer architect
artist designer you've mentored a lot of
successful people can you give advice to
young people listening to this
how to have a successful career
and uh how to have a successful life
look I I think there's
this beautiful line and Sheltering Sky
how many times have you seen a full moon
and
um in your life and actually took the
time to ingest and explore and reflect
upon the full moon probably 20 I believe
he says
um I I spent time with a full moon
I take my time with a full moon and I
pay attention to a full moon
and I think paying attention
to the seasons and taking time to
appreciate
um the little things the simple things
is what makes a meaningful life
uh I I was very lucky to have had you
know to have grown up in a home that
um
taught me this way of being my my
parents my grandmother who played a very
important role in in my growing up
um
and
and that ability to pay attention
and to be present is so so so so I could
not emphasize it
uh enough is so crucial
um and be grateful and be grateful yeah
I think gratitude and presence
um appreciation uh really
um the the the most important things in
life if you could take a short tangent
about your grandmother
who's played a big role in your life
what uh what do you remember what what
lessons have you learned from her
she had this blanket that she would give
me every time I came back from school
and say you know do your homework here
and and meet with your friends here and
it was always in her garden and her
Garden in my mind was ginormous but when
I you know last I went there and saw the
site which has now become the site for
another
tall building it was a tiny tiny little
garden
um that that to me seemed so large when
when I was um growing up because it it
had everything it had
um
it had fig trees it had olive trees it
had mushrooms it had the blanket I would
do my homework there it was everything
and I needed nothing nothing else
and
um and and that was my Garden of Eden
that was my childhood being and she
taught me you know you know we would lie
on the blanket and look at the clouds
and reflect upon the shapes of the
clouds and study the shapes of the
plants and there was a lot of wonder in
that childhood
um with her and and she taught me the
the
importance of Wonder uh in in sort of in
an eternal childhood and and living uh
adulthood as as a child and and so I I'm
very very grateful for that I think it
is the sense of wonder
um
the uh um speaking up was always
something that she adhered to to speak
up your Truth uh to be straightforward
um to be positive that these are things
that I also got from my mom
um
and for my mom the sense of humor she
she had the best sense of humor of uh
that I could think of and and was just
um just a joy to be around and
and and my father taught me everything
my father taught me everything I know my
mom taught me everything I feel that's a
girl my grandma taught me everything I
Insight well I I see the sense of wonder
that just carries through everything you
do so I I think you would you make your
grandmother proud
uh well what about advice for how to
have a career
so you've had a very interesting career
and a successful career but not not an
easy one it took you took a few leaps I
did take a few leaps and they were
uncomfortable my father and I'll never
um forget
uh I think we were like listening to a
rolling stone song in the kitchen and my
dad
was actually born in Boston he's
American
um
he said
uh
I I started to have sort of these second
thoughts about continuing my education
in Israel and I wanted to you know go I
I was on my way to London to the
architectural Association to do my
diploma studies there
and he looked at me and he said get out
of here kiddo gotta get out of here
and you know you've outgrown where where
you're at you need to you know you need
to move forward another thing he had
taught me
um the feeling of discomfort as you as
you say the feeling of loneliness and
discomfort is is is
imperative to growth growth is painful
period any form of growth is difficult
and painful birth is difficult and
painful
um and and it is really really important
to place yourself in situations of
discomfort I like to be in a room where
everyone in the room is more intelligent
than me I like to be in those in that
kind of state where the people that I
surround myself with are
orders of magnitude more intelligent
than I am and I can say that that is
true of all of my team members and
that's the intellectual discomfort that
I feed off of the same is true for for
physical exertion
um you gotta put yourself in these
uncomfortable
um situations in order to grow in order
to find Comfort
um and then
on the other hand is is love is finding
finding love and finding that
um
you know that
human this other human that complements
you and that makes you a better version
uh of the one you are and even of the
one you want to be but with gratitude
and and attention and love you can go so
so far to the younger generation I don't
speak of a career I never thought of
um
my work as my career ever and there was
this constant entanglement between life
and work and love and longing and being
and mothering it's all the same
and uh I appreciate that to some people
that doesn't work in their you know in
in their
arrangement of of will versus
um comfort uh versus the reality but for
me it has always worked so I I think
to the younger generation I say don't
think of
your career a career is something that
is imposed upon you think of your
calling that's something that's innately
and directionally
um
moves you and it's something that
transcends a career similarly you can
think about the difference between
you know learning versus being educated
being educated something that's given to
you that's external that's being imposed
that's top down imposed this learning is
something that comes from within it's
also the difference between joy and
happiness many times I'm sad and I'm
still joyous
and it's very very important to
understand the difference between these
externally
perceived success uh paths and
internally driven value-based
you know ways of being in the world and
we together when when we combine all of
these you know all of these uh uh the
broken puzzle let's say of of of
substance and
um vulnerability we get this bigger
Gestalt this wondrous world of a future
that is is is
peaceful that is uh
um that you know that is wholesome and
that that you know that proposes or you
know advocates for that kind of synergy
that we've been talking about throughout
but it's all fun
uh well thank you for this incredible
conversation thank you for all the work
you're doing and I just have to say that
thank you for um noticing me and
listening to me you you're somebody from
from just today and from our exchanges
before this
like there's a sense where you care
about me as a human being which is in
which I could tell you care about other
humans thank you for doing that thank
you for having empathy and just like
um yeah really listening and noticing me
that I exist so thank you for that I've
been a huge fan of your work uh been a
huge fan of who you are as a human being
it's just an honor that you would sit
with me thank you uh thank you and uh as
long as I feel the same way I'll just
say the same and I look forward to
hearing the response to my job
application that I've submitted oh
you're you're accepted oh damn all right
we all speak of you all the time thank
you so much thank you Mary thank you
thanks for listening to this
conversation with Mary oxman to support
this podcast please check out our
sponsors in the description and now let
me leave you with some words from Leo
Tolstoy
everything I know
I know because of love
thank you for listening I hope to see
you next time