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SCARCITY

SCAR CITY

A Manual for Re-Embedding Value in Excavated Land Skye Ruozzi Dariusz Kulinski

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SCARCITY

SCAR CITY

A Manual for Re-Embedding Value in Excavated Land

AUTHORS Skye Ruozzi Dariusz Kulinski

CRITICS Richard Sarrach Cathryn Dwyre Jeff T. Johnson

STUDIO Pratt Institute School of Architecture Scripted Ecologies The Architecture of Play Fa 2015 - Sp 2016

printed March 2016 1

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Thanks to Timothy Kuzmeski for the proofreading, support, and ideologically running with all facets at a zestful gallop.

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[GOAL] 6 I. CONCEPT 8 II. ABSTRACT [STORY] [GLOSSARY]12 III. LEXICON 14 IV. BONANZA! [GAME] [CONTEXT] 18 V. CATALOG VI. GENEALOGY [THEMES] 26 42 VII. SCENARIOS 51 VIII. PROGRAM 60 VIX. SITES X. MATERIAL [STUDIES] 71 86 XI. ANNOTATED BIBLIO 91 XII. BIBLIOGRAPHY 5

CONCEPT

[GOAL]

“Those who search into the very bowels of reality in order to know and assimilate its values and wretchedness; and those who desire to go beyond reality, who want to construct ex novo new realities, new values, and new public symbols.�

- Manfredo Tafuri, Architecture and Utopia

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As architectural designers, we propose to address the depleted mining site at the end of its life cycle.

We will give the mined landscape a second life through actions of reversemining that generate a new set of extractable value. The reactivation and reanimation of the site will generate a new and renewable value system: a system predicated on knowledge.

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ABSTRACT

[STORY]

The mining site is of notable interest in its role as an access point to multiple ecologies, histories, and futures. It is a place where the eons of sedimentation of nature meet the determination of humankind on the industrial quest for their future.

Some of humanity’s major milestones have come from developing the technologies to harness the elements of Earth. The Industrial Revolution marks an important transition to harvesting minerals from the Earth.

Manipulating and combining these azoic elements creates fuels and components that generate more tools of progress. This process of converting eons-old rocks into usable resources is known as mining. The mining site has been operated upon by humans to extract its embedded value.

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The geologic formation of the earth occurred over the past 4.5 billion years. As the strata of minerals were deposited in layers, they were also eroded, tilted, distorted, and even inverted. The resultant landscape beneath our feet is a complex puzzle of interlocking deposits. Any core sample will contain only a partial ratio of the composition that occurs in the netherworld of rocks and minerals. Embedded in these mineral deposits is a timeline of the formation of the earth. This extractable knowledge gives us a picture of the history of the planet. Traces can be found of its evolving biological and geologic characters.

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The formation of the universe occurred over the past 13.82 billion years. The extraction of observable knowledge in the night sky is similar to an archaeological pursuit into the past. Because of the great distances of outer space, any information garnered from it has traveled hundreds, or even tens of thousands, of years to reach us. Therefore, this data is already history.

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LEXICON [GLOSSARY] augury noun a sign of what will happen in the future azoic adjective having no trace of life or organic remains, Archean biotic adj description of, relating to, or resulting from living things, especially in their ecological relations. depleted adj exhausted of resources [relative here to the commodifiable minerals extracted] dissipation adj of, relating to, or resulting from living things, especially in their ecological relations embedded verb fixed firmly in a surrounding mass enervate verb cause to feel drained of energy or vitality; weaken erode verb gradually wear away genius loci noun the prevailing character or atmosphere of a place igneous adjective (of rock) having solidified from lava or magma immanent adj inherent or preexisting and operating from within matter noun physical substance in general, as distinct from mind and spirit miasma noun a heavy vaporous emanation or atmosphere that tends to deplete or corrupt or obscure

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nimiety noun excess, overabundance open systems noun a material system in which mass or energy can be lost to or gained from the environment profuse adj abundant and exuberantly plentiful propitiation noun the action of appeasing a god, spirit, or person reification noun generally refers to making something real, bringing something into being, or making something concrete spall verb break (ore, rock, stone, or concrete) into smaller pieces, especially in preparation for sorting strata noun layers of material, often formed on top of one another value noun the importance, worth, or usefulness of something

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CATALOG

[MINERALS, MINING]

Throughout the life cycle of a mining site, many factors are at play. Politics, economics, infrastructure, geology, and environment all are separate ecologies that can effect the projected productivity of a mining site.

Due to the complexities arising from the combination of these factors, most mining operations do not successfully reach a final stage of “reclamation.”

There are over 500,000 abandoned mining sites in the United States alone. These mining sites include coal, gold, silver, rare earth elements, copper, lead, zinc, nickel, and uranium. There is no nationalized or overarching program for mining site reclamation.

Several authorities, departments, and agencies address abandoned mining sites as part of broader programs. Funding for remediation projects is spread among separate appropriations for participating departments and agencies. Federal and state agencies are doing more than ever to display their spatial data and exchange information. Data from the former U.S. Bureau of Mining sites and the U.S. Geological Survey provide the foundation of most mining site inventories. There is a “polluter pays” principle that requires the Federal government, where possible, to compel responsible parties to clean up their

sites or help cover the costs. Reclamation priorities focus on water quality and sites involving potential release of hazardous substances.

Mining is an activity predicated on speculation informed by synthesized data. There is no way of knowing exactly the amount of desired minerals and their location of subsurface veins of ore. Core Core sampling integrates with scientifically and historically compiled information about geologic strata offer slivers of “proof of concept” of mineral locations. The understanding of stratified compositions can help approximate where the desired age of mineral lies geographically and the depth relative to the surface horizon.

The igneous carbonate rocks are the deposits that contain the desired rare earth elements. They can be extracted and processed to distill the desired minerals from the excess parts of the carbonatites.

Carbonate era deposits are igneous plugs or patches occurring from lava from volcanic eruptions. These occur within alkalic veins, but are isolated into patches because the carbonatite lava flows are unstable and quickly react to the atmosphere.

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MILL FLOATATION CRACKING ALLOY

GRAVEL SILT MINERAL OXIDE HIGH TECHNOLOGY

MINE

IRON AND LEAD REMOVAL PASTE TAILINGS

MINERAL LIQUID

PASTE FILTER PLANT

EXCESS

CONCENTRATION LEACH MILL

EXCESS

OVERBURDEN 19

EXCESS

MINERALS The mining site is a crucial part of a network of exchange. It generates many everyday technological stylings that we rely on.

The precious ores are extracted from the Earth’s crust and deeper lithosphere. They then undergo a process of transmutation to make them into viable consumer objects. These minerals become everything from jewelry to elements of construction in outer space.

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PATCH DYAMICS In ecology, patch dynamics is a theoretical approach based posited that the structure, function, and dynamics of an ecological system can be understood and predicted from an analysis of its smaller interactive spatial components (patches).

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MINING TECHNIQUES

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MINING STAGES

PRODUCTION EXTRACTION MILLING PROCESSING

EXPLORATION REMOTE SENSING SEISMIC GRAVITY MAGNETIC PROSPECTING

DEVELOPMENT RAISING CAPITAL CONSTRUCTION

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RECLAMATION CLOSE PIT ADD TOPSOIL SOW NATIVE PLANTS + GRASSES PLANTS 2+ TREE TYPES

DISCOVERY MAPPING CORE DRILLING SAMPLE ASSAYS 25

GENEALOGIES [THEMES] FRONTIER SPECULATION EXCESS NIMIETY LIFE CYCLES ENTROPY RISK REWARD

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TRADITIONAL MINING

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SPECULATION The commodification of the mining site’s elements is valued by a market influenced by supply, demand, politics, and logistics.

The dollar sale return is only one of aspects of speculation on the site. All mining sites are developed based off the interpretation of geological mappings and samplings, or vibrational assessments that estimate the potential concentration of elements in a specific area and the viability of the development of a mining site.

rate control for the pricing of the various rare earth elements.

The examination and determination of mineral deposits will only ever reveal an approximation or sliver of the true subsurface condition. Therefore, the development of a site for mining practice is predicated upon speculation. The composite calculation is an approximation and all the funding that goes to construct and operate a mining site will be dictated from this approximation at its onset. The endgame of the mining site, which is to provide an economic return through commodity sales, is also largely a game of speculation. There is no market

3. The market demand for these Elements dictated by their material use. This chart shows some modern utilization of these elements in consumer and industrial products.

Several factors are at play: 1.

The approximate accessible concentrations of these elements in the earth’s crust.

2. The global total of production occurring at mining sites around the world.

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DOLLARS PER KILOPOUND 2000 2010 DOLLARS PER KILOPOUND OXIDES OXIDES

2000

2010

2020

2020

2030

2030

LANTHANUM

CERIUM LANTHANUM PRASEODYMIUM CERIUM NEODYMIUM PRASEODYMIUM SAMARIUM NEODYMIUM EUROPIUM SAMARIUM GADOLINIUM EUROPIUM TERBIUM GADOLINIUM DYSPROSIUM TERBIUM YTTRIUM DYSPROSIUM YTTRIUM

$0

$0

$100

$100

$200

$200

$300

$300

$400

$500

$600

RARE EARTH PRODUCT PRICE PROJECTIONS $400 $500 $600 $700

RARE EARTH PRODUCT PRICE PROJECTIONS

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$700

$800

$800

$900

$900

FRONTIER The frontier is classically defined as a political or geological area near a border or boundary.

The frontier in the American context usually identifies the area just outside the edge of a settlement. Those who stride bravely into this previously uncharted territory are known as the pioneers. The pioneer treads in a foreign territory, where unknown elements, creatures, and people have the “home field” advantage. Pioneers are the first to break new ground, often in the name of planting seeds for the future. Some plants are even known as pioneer species as they are the most resilient varieties and will be the first to colonize a disrupted ecosystem.

At the mining site there are several embodiments of the definition of frontier.

One is based on the value system of economics, operating to inform and shape the currency translation of mineral elements to financial calculations.

Another instance is the pursuit of the techno-industrial future. New tools have been developed for the mining site at an ever-increasing scale.

The propagation of mined minerals allow themselves to be incorporated into newly developing technologies, advancing humanity as a whole.

In the history of the American West, the idea of frontier plays a strong role. The unconquered frontier comes also with a new opportunity for many. Because it is outside of the present societal rules, pioneers can reap great profits that would not be possible in the settled lands.

Because of the lawlessness of the frontier, it becomes an ideal location for pirates, theives, grifters, and predators. It can also be a place of refuge for the persecuted, the “other,” the inventors, and the debtors.

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EXCESS The process of mining generates a mass of excess. Often, the excess accounts for as much as 95% of the material being moved at a mining site. In the industry, this excess is referred to as the “overburden.�

PRE-PRODUCTION

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YEAR 1

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GROUNDWATER POOL MINING BENCHES TRUCK ROADWAY OVERBURDEN

PRODUCTION PROJECTION

YEAR 2

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NIMIETY Rare earth elements are going by an antiquated name. In fact, they are not rare at all, being more common in the Earth’s crust than lead or nitrogen. Cerium is the most abundant, falling at number 25 out of 76 common crust elements. Extractable deposits of the minerals containing rare earth elements are less common. Bastnäsite rock deposits constitute the world’s largest concentrations of rare earth element resources, followed by monazite deposits.

YEAR 10

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YEAR 14

35 GROUNDWATER POOL

LIFE CYCLES Each mining site has a planned life cycle.

Due to financial, environmental, and political hazards, many operations do not make it to their planned closure. These circumstances, combined with a history of lax regulation, has made the United States home to over 500,000 abandoned mining sites. Even properly closed mining sites typically reach a limited definition of reclamation, utilizing topsoil and saplings as a Band-aid over the scarred earth.

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ENTROPY Entropy is directly linked to the thermodynamic properties of a system.

Entropy accounts for the amount of energy that is unavailable to be put into mechanical energy. It is the constitution of the chaos or disorder of a system. Entropy can be seen put to work by Robert Smithson in his earthwork Spiral Jetty. Here, the piece sits in the Great Salt Lake, Utah. Its disappearing and reappearing for long periods of time is due to the fluctuation of the elevation of the lake that cannot be predicted or fully accounted for within its environment. Entropic action is seen in other realms, like in the information erosion in Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49. The track of history is discontinuous and untraceable as the characters try to discover long-lost links to the truth about the systems around them.

Not all entropic action is bad, however. The thermodynamic chaos of mycorrhizal fungi added to abandoned mining sites can provide an activation of a closed system. The root system of the mycorrhizae can multiply the absorptive surface of the mining site pit one hundred times. This allows the former pit to become fertile ground to support plant and animal life.

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There are many elements of risk that play out through the life cycle of a mining site.

One, associated with the business of market speculation, is the economic viability. Finding capital for construction and expansion can be tricky. An ever-changing market value means not knowing if the costs of operations will outweigh the value of the minerals.

It may be risky to operate a mining site for many social reasons.

There are neighbors and residents of lands who may disagree with the land use and employees that may become unsatisfied.

Another arena of risk lies in the physical toxicity of the substances being handled .

The desired minerals or their surroundings may be radioactive, asbestos-like, or churn up metallic dust. During the extraction a danger is the containment and disposal of waste. Tailings, which hold the toxic residues of mining processes, are susceptible to the environmental elements. These waste contents could be introduced into the surrounding ecology through wind, rain, or other erosion if not properly contained.

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Erosion of Tailings Piles t Inspiration Consolidated Copper Co.’s Mine, Keyes, Cornelius M. Environmental Protection Agency, 1972. License: Public Domain

RISK

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REWARD

Bauxite tailings near Stade, Germany Ra Boe / Wikipedia, Lizenz: CC by-sa 3.0

Reward can be defined only through the eyes of those receiving it. A reward at the mining site is anything that is deemed a valuable outcome of the operation. Progress of industry is valuable to some. The financial returns from sales of the minerals may be valuable. The integration of these mineral alloys into new technologies can be valuable to a diversity of industries.

Ownership can be its own reward, especially in America where it is viewed as a status symbol. In the new frontier, like historical American West, there is a lot to be had for very little. Land claims were popular, and many remain on the books today.

The system of value that operates on mining sites dictates that the chunks of property that are extractable and commodifiable are what drives the worth of the entire process.

By applying a different quantifier for value, the same site can be given a second life in a new arena or industry.

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SCENARIOS MODERN

MINING

Mining operates within the realms of speculation, scarcity, risk, reward, frontier, excess, nimiety, life cycles, and entropy. Even as mining changes from its Industrial era iteration, it retains these qualities. Two new versions of mining have entered into our twenty-first century pursuits. One is the digitallydriven Bitcoin mining and, the other, the speculative future of asteroid mining.

Both are speculations of possibility that have value systems defined by scarcity.

still from Life Inside a Secret Chinese Bitcoin Mine 42

BITCOIN MINING

The digital frontier lies expansive, ethereal, and sometimes hard to picture. Bitcoin is a digital asset and payment system, effectively a new currency. It has no tangible presence, but can convert to modern currencies and is readily accepted at a growing number of retailers. Bitcoin’s algorithm has an everincreasing difficulty that will ultimately generate only 21 million Bitcoin. The builtin scarcity of the system provides for a basis of value. The physical infrastructure must still exist even for a currency so intangible.

Massive warehouses hold networks of processors that will mine for Bitcoin solutions. Like any currency the value fluctuates, but recently was as high as 1 Bitcoin = $415.15 U.S. dollars at the time of publishing.

from Bloomberg News

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BITCOIN MINING SITE

Topography of the Tool Bitcoin mining requires hardware that will house the processors to run the algorithmic calculations.

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PROCESS

The SHA-256 algorithm used for mining is pretty simple and can be done by hand. Of course, this is not even a fraction of the speed of hardware mining.

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ECOLOGIES GEOLOGY

HAZARDS ECOLOGY INFRASTRUCTURE ECONOMY

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ASTEROID MINING Asteroid mining is an active field of research and development. It is driven by the limit of rare earth elements on Earth and the future technologies of space travel. Asteroids, comets, and other near-Earth objects contain high amounts of both rare earth elements and traditionally valuable elements such as gold. An active asteroid mining industry could devalue all the gold and mining exploits on Earth. Presently, there are proposals both to mine in-situ and to pull the objects into Earth’s orbit for harvesting. Both scenarios involve technological development and risk management that are still far from resolution.

from Futurama, Season 6, Episode 26 “Reincarnation�

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ASTEROID SITE

MINING

This is a visual-only grayscale version of the original HAMO DTM. The Dawn mission is equipped with a framingcamera (FC) which was the prime instrument during the HAMO (High Altitude Mapping Orbit) phase.DAWN orbited Vesta during HAMO in 21 cycles between December 2011 and end of April 2012. Dawn orbited Vestaduring HAMO in 6 cycles between end of September end early November 2011. The framing camera took about 2,500clear filter images with a resolution of about 70 m/ pixel during these cycles. This digital terrain model (DTM)was created from 5439 HAMO stereo FC clear filter images at ~92 meters per pixel (48 pixels per degree).The value are in radii given in meters with an +-8 meter mean intersection error.

Reference: Frank Preusker, Frank Scholten, Klaus-Dieter Matz, Frank, Thomas Roatsch, Elke Kersten, C.A. Raymond,C.T. Russell, (2014), Global Shape of Vesta from Dawn FC stereo images. Lunar Planetary Science Conference, Houston, TX, USA. http:// www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/vesta2014/pdf/2027.pdf Reference: Russell, C.T. and Raymond, C.A., Space Sci. Review, 163, DOI 10.1007/s11214-011-9836-2.

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10km

25km

50km

COUNTS/MINUTE 13.1

12.8

RISKS

12.5

The elemental composition of Vesta’s surface was determined from data acquired by Dawn’s Gamma Ray and Neutron Detector (GRaND)in a low altitude mapping orbit. GRaND measures the spectrum of gamma rays and neutrons HIGH-ENERGY HAZARD produced byGAMMA-RAY the interaction ofgalactic cosmic rays with surface materials. Gamma rays are also made by the decay of natural radioelements (K, Th, and U).The emitted radiation can be analyzed to determine surface composition.

Measurements are representative of Vesta’sbulk regolith composition to depths of a few decimeters. Maps have a spatial resolution of about 300 km.

4 VESTA // S-TYPE ASTEROID // MILKY WAY GALAXY

This map displays the variation of high-energy gamma-ray (HEGR) count rate across the surface of Vesta. HEGRsare sensitive to the bulk elemental composition of the near surface material, particularly its heavy major-element content.

CO

Reference: Peplowski P. N., Lawrence D. J., Prettyman T. H., Yamashita N., Bazell D., Feldman W. C., and Reedy R. C.(2013).

Compositional variability on the surface of 4 Vesta revealed through GRaND measurements of high- energy gamma rays.Meteoritics & Planetary Science, 48: 2252-2270. doi:10.1111/maps.12176.

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COUNTS/MINUTE 13.1

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SPECULATION This preliminary global geologic map of Vesta, based on data from the Dawn spacecraft’s HighAltitude Mapping Orbit(HAMO) and informed by Low-Altitude Mapping Orbit (LAMO) data. This map is part of an iterative mapping effort; thegeologic map has been refined with each improvement in resolution. Vesta has a heavilycratered surface, with largecraters evident in numerous locations.

The south pole is dominated by an impact structure identified before Dawn’s arrival.Two large impact structures have been resolved: the younger, larger Rheasilvia structure, and the older, more degraded Veneneiastructure. The surface is also characterized by a system of deep, globe-girdling equatorial troughs and ridges, as well asan older system of troughs and ridges to the north. Troughs and ridges are also evident cutting across, and spiraling arcuatelyfrom, the Rheasilvia central mound. However, no volcanic features have been unequivocally identified.

Reference: Blewett, D.T. and Thomas, P.T. (editors), 2014, Special Issue: The Geology of Vesta, Icarus, Volume 244, Pages 1-166,http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0019-1035(14)00587-9

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PROGRAM REVERSE MINING

The idea of a reverse mining operation is to go beyond the initial moment of human disruption and to generate a new deposit to be mined again in the future. Like the mineral deposits that are sought in traditional mining deposits, we propose a program that will compile data deposits over time. This repository will create a layered and dated reservoir of information. Much of this data will be irrelevant or excessive to the proposed hypotheses that researchers will be testing against the amassed data.

However, the bits of data will be extracted and utilized to further future technological developments.

We are interested in adding to this extracted site of revealed geologic history to not merely return it to a neutral state, but embed it with a rich renewed value that will allow for an endless life cycle.

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KNOWN UNKNOWN: Genetic Dispersion: DNA + Neural Data Bank FRONTIER: Uninhabited planets LIFE CYCLES: Traits pass through generations MINING: Decoding DNA

CURRENTLY: It has always been in the our nature to seek new frontiers that could be explored and inhabited by humans. A few thousands years ago our early human species were standing at the bank of Nile River unable to cross it. We evolved into today’s humans and Christopher Columbus was standing at the beach of the Atlantic Ocean wondering what was on the other end.

Now is not exception, as we are standing at the edge of the new frontier of privatized space travel. We are curious about what and who else is out there. It is in our nature to build a boat, or in this case a ship that will take us to discover a new, ultimate frontier.

The scale challenge that we are facing this time is forcing us into a completely new approach. There have been a new planets discovered in so called habitable zones of other stars. The newest planet, Kepler-186f, was just discovered a few months ago.

However, it is so great a distance that it will be not possible for people to reach there within one life span of a human being.

PROPOSED: It seems that the only one way to inhabit another planet is to start life from the scratch. We ship earth’s life in forms of DNA sampling archive, a starter set containing the “seeds”of life, to be planted on a new planet. Human thoughts are electrical impulses very similar to those that today’s hard drives use to save data. Recorded memories in the form of electrical impulses will be saved on bioengineered memory chips.

This will serve as a library of the memories, thoughts, and dreams of the deceased. As we are still learning about the systems of the human mind, all its outputs will be important data to extract understandings of its functions. These sets of knowledge of the nuances of humanity can be compounded with recorded history of society. This provides the foundational knowledge for intelligence to be established on a new planet. We create an open system on a new planet that behaves in ways that are self-organizing and that are to some extent unpredictable. The nature is built into living samples which are characterized in part uncertainty and dynamism. A program will provide controls for ecological systems by modeling after human and other species as they existed on Earth, with integrated adaptability for the destination planet.

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FRONTIER: Alternate realities LIFE CYCLES: Recurring circadian rhythms MINING: Nuanced metaphorical Jungian symbolic psychology CURRENTLY: One horizon to cross to the frontier of knowledge is the boundary of the body itself. The human consciousness is still not biologically understood today.

Paradigms and dreamscapes shape our lives, but we do not understand the driving logics of these operations. We do know that human thoughts are electrical impulses that can be recorded in a manner very similar to those today’s hard drive uses to record data.

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KNOWN UNKNOWN: Endless Stories: Consciousness Archive

PROPOSED: Visitors to the site, will participate in sleep studies. These recordings will give a various set of data that examine the functions of human brain. Generating a library of these recordings will create a site of information that can be sorted, compiled, and extracted. This information will map understandings of our immanent human nature.

KNOWN UNKNOWN: Genetic Dispersion: DNA + Neural Data Bank

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Genes encode proteins and proteins dictate cell function. Therefore, the thousands of genes expressed in a particular cell determine what that cell can do. Moreover, each step in the flow of information from DNA to RNA to protein provides the cell with a potential control point for self-regulating its functions by adjusting the amount and type of proteins it manufactures. In prokaryotes, regulatory proteins are often controlled by nutrient availability. This allows organisms such as bacteria to rapidly adjust their transcription patterns in response to environmental conditions. Regulatory sites on prokaryotic DNA are typically located close to transcription promoter site - and this plays an important part in gene expression.

In the Archean structures, layers similar to those seen in living stromatolites are evident, and secondary structures interpreted as simple filamentous microfossils have been recovered from the layers. The biotic origin of the structures has, however, been questioned. Both the supposed Archean stromatolites and the microfossils may have been produced by inorganic processes.

Regardless, uncontested microfossils and chemical traces of life were present at least by 2.7 billion years ago. Stromatolites that were produced by microorganisms are abundant later in the Archean and throughout the Proterozoic.

These sedimentary structures, formed by organic processes, provide important evidence of early life. At present, we can say with certainty that life The Hydra is an ancient serpentine marine had evolved by 2.7 billion years ago, and monster, a fearsome beast in Greek possibly as early as 3.5 billion years ago. mythology who grew two heads for each one removed by a valiant warrior. Its real Work on cloning techniques has advanced life equivalent, a freshwater polyp no longer our basic understanding of developmental than a centimeter (0.4 inches), is far less biology in humans. Observing human frightening but still quite remarkable – it is pluripotent stem cells grown in culture able to regenerate its entire body from any provides great insight into human embryo tiny fragment of itself. This little critter can development, which otherwise cannot be actually modify its genetic coding to suit its seen. ScIentists are now able to better needs, sending certain cells into overdrive in define steps of early human development. order to perform additional functions. Their Studying signal transduction along with regenerative abilities have long puzzled genetic manipulation within the early biologists, who cannot understand how they human embryo has the potential to provide can do it even when they lack neurons or answers to many developmental diseases and defects. even stem cells.

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KNOWN UNKNOWN: Consciousness Archive

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Quantum code. An international team of scientists in Europe has created a silicon chip designed to function like a human brain. With 200,000 neurons linked up by 50 million synaptic connections, the chip is able to mimic the brain’s ability to learn more closely than any other machine.

The hope is that recreating the structure of the brain in computer form may help to further our understanding of how to develop massively parallel, powerful new computers. Although the chip has a fraction of the number of neurons or connections found in a brain, its design allows it to be scaled up. This is not the first time someone has tried to recreate the workings of the brain. One effort called the Blue Brain project, run by Henry Markram at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, in Switzerland, has been using vast databases of biological data recorded by neurologists to create a hugely complex and realistic simulation of thebrain on an IBM supercomputer.

For the first time, Australian engineers have demonstrated that they can write and manipulate the quantum version of computer code on a silicon microchip. This was done by entangling two quantum bits with the highest accuracy ever recorded, and it means that we can now start to program for the super-powerful quantum computers of the future. Engineers code regular computers using traditional bits, which can be in one of two states: 1 or 0. Together, two bits create code words that can be used to program complex instructions. But in quantum computing language there’s also the possibility for bits to be in superposition, which means they can be 1 and 0 at the same time. This opens up a vastly more powerful programming language, but until now researchers haven’t been able to figure out how to write it.

The mind-control technology that researchers are working on today got its start in the 1920’s, when researchers discovered the electrical activity of the human brain and developed electroencephalography (EEG), the practice of recording that electrical activity along the scalp.

Researchers discovered that neurons convey information via electrical “spikes,” which can be recorded with a thin metal wire, or electrode. By 1969, a researcher named Eberhard Fetz had connected a single neuron in a monkey’s brain to a dial the animal could see. The monkey learned to make the neuron fire faster to move the dial in order to get a reward, and while Fetz didn’t realize it at the time, he had created the first brain-machine interface.

Exoskeletons. For decades, engineers and neuroscientists have been teaming up to build better, smarter wearable robots for paraplegics. Here’s how it works: A cap lined with electroencephalography (EEG) sensors picks up nerve signals across the brain through the skull. EEG can’t target specific areas of the brain, but a finely tuned computer algorithm can zero in on the brain signal that’s saying “walk forward” or “turn left.” These signals are translated into electronic commands that trigger movement in the exoskeleton, and so move the limbs of the person wearing it.

Nanoscience and nanotechnology involve the ability to see and to control individual atoms and molecules.

Everything on Earth is made up of atoms — the food we eat, the clothes we wear, the buildings and houses we live in, and our own bodies. Although modern nanoscience and nanotechnology are quite new, nanoscale materials were used for centuries. Alternate-sized gold and silver particles created colors in the stained glass windows of medieval churches hundreds of years ago. The artists back then just didn’t know that the process they used to create these beautiful works of art actually led to changes in the composition of the materials they were working with.

Today’s scientists and engineers are finding a wide variety of ways to deliberately make materials at the nanoscale to take advantage of their nhanced properties such as higher strength, lighter weight, increased control of light spectrum, and greater chemical reactivity than their largerscale counterparts.

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TRANSIT METHOD OF PLANET FINDING. When we see a planet pass in front of its parent star it blocks friction of the light from the star.

KEPLER MISSION. Kepler mission gathered data of planets orbiting in the habitable zones od Sun like stars. The nearest such planet may be 12 light years away.

EXOPLANET Kepler-438b. It is the most Earth like planet known to date.

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SKIES OF NORTHERN CHILE. The best in the world for astronomy are skies of Northern Chile.

CIRCUMSTELLAR HABITABLE ZONE (CHZ).

Habitable zone, is the region around a star within which planetarymass objects with sufficient atmospheric pressure can support liquid water at their surfaces.

UNKNOWN UNKNOWN: The Universe as We Don’t Yet Know It: Cosmos Observatory FRONTIER: Outer space LIFE CYCLES: By examining the past (i.e. signals from millions of light-years away) MINING: Data collection that must be pored over and examining sited to find bits of relevant information CURRENTLY: We have been looking for answers about our past and future for centuries.

Through detailed geological studies and preliminary analysis of our galaxy, we have discovered that planet Earth is not much different that many other planets in our solar system. Scientists discovered remnants of water on other planets and their geological studies prove that all planets are basically made of similar geological strata.

All data suggests that there might have been life at one time on Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune and others. All of the planets except the Earth are dead now and the possibility that Earth will face the same fate is almost certain, losing completely its water and killing its life in the process. We have been mining stratas of knowledge about life from depths of this planet and there is only so much we can learn from one source.

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PROPOSED: Looking into the space and analyzing distant planets is a source of infinite data that can be extracted, processed and stored for enrichment of collective learning. The program will be possible by new observational techniques using remote sensing and geographic information systems to map and model complex data.

From the depth of the abandoned mining pit, we propose astronomical observatory which will process and store huge amounts of information extracted from outer space.

The pit will enter its new infinite ecological cycle of mining knowledge from galaxies embedded in light, magnetic fields, radiations, geological strata of other planets, asteroids, stars, and comets. All data is stored in the void left after mining process of valuable minerals was finished.

SITES TOQUEPALA MINE / TACNA // PERU The Toquepala mining site is a large copper mining site in the Tacna Province, Tacna Department, Peru. The mining site is an open-pit mining site producing copper, molybdenum, rhenium and silver with minor gold and zinc.

This site is notable for its protests. In October 2000, there was an uprising with 50 mutineers who occupied Toquepala town for nine hours, taking four hostages. It was in protest at the corruption of Alberto Fujimori and his advisor Vladimiro Montesinos in their last days in power. All hostages were freed, without bloodshed.

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PASCUA LAMA MINE // CHILE / ARGENTINA Pascua-Lama is an open pit mining project of gold, silver, copper and other minerals.

It is located in the Southern reaches of the Atacama Desert at an altitude of 4,500 in the Andes Mountains. This mining project is less than three decades old. It is also the site of a major environmental debate. Because of the adjacency to the glacial range that separates Argentina and Chile, this is a controversial location in the wake of global warming.

Many Chileans, especially, believe that the mining is environmentally threatening to an already stressed ecosystem.

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MOUNTAIN PASS MINE // CALIFORNIA // U.S.A. This is the only active rare earth elements mining site in the United States. It is responsible for 7% of the world’s Rare Earth Elements on the market last year (as opposed to China’s 90%.)

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Situated between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, the mining site is nestled into the Mountain Pass of the Clark Mountains along Interstate 15. The frontier history of American West contains strong cultural ideals driven by dreams and desire. Many individual and collective value systems have shaped the modern understanding of this landscape. Mining site claims speckle the desert, driven by dreams of wealth and prosperity. New solar farms glimmer in the sand, driven by dreams of self-sufficiency.

Pilgrimages to both cities are undertaken driven by dreams of fame and hedonism.

It is a site shaped by physical actions to achieve speculative futures.

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• • • • • • • •

Cerium Lanthanum Neodymium Praseodymium Samarium Gadolinium Europium Others

50.0% 34.0% 11.0% 4.0% 0.5% 0.2% 0.1% 0.2%

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MATERIAL

This is acrylic model representing layered strata and embdedded pockets of matter.

This image shows the traces of the pieces of matter as they are extracted through tunneling.

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EMBEDDEDNESS

The quality of being firmly and deeply ingrained or fixed in place: the cultural embeddedness of economic and political practices The seventeen elements referred to as Rare Earth Elements are actually quite commonly occurring in the earth’s crust. However, for the purposes of extraction, high concentrations are needed. Worldwide, these only occur in the 300 carbonatite localities that were formed at least 1380 million years old. The embeddedness of the desired elements is so extreme and their consistency so unstable that extraction can take hundreds of steps to produce a final powder oxide to be turned into metal alloys.

These models are plaster casts of milled site topography with walls to create reservoirs.

These basins are filled with various concentrations of matter that become bonded and embedded. The aftermath of attempted extraction of from the site can be seen in the photographs in the right column.

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REFLEXIVITY

(Of a relation) always holding between a term and itself This model is a silicone cast of a milled model of the an open-pit mine. The ability to invert and deform the existing form allows us to study possibilities for fluid transformations of existing geometries.

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MINERALS We studied the growth of various minerals found at the Mojave Desert site. These are grown in a silicate solution. This gave insight into the inherent structural logic of the minerals that make up the land.

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METALS These metal casts are created by allowing the molten metal to find pathways through a secondary material. Each cast is a solidified moment of flow. The metal hardens, embedding some of the surrounding material as it does.

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ALUMINUM + COPPER 81

SALT CRYSTALS 82

ALUMINUM 83

ALUMINUM 84

ALUMINUM 85

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY 12 Monkeys. 1996. Directed by Terry Gilliam. Story by Chris Marker. Universal City, CA: Universal Studios Home Entertainment, 2005, DVD.

12 Monkeys is a modern remake of Chris Marker’s La Jetée. The film follows Bruce Willis as James Cole on a series of exploits into the past, specifically 1996, where he is looking to piece together the clues as to how humanity ended up living underground. Plagued by this task and incited to stay in the past for his true love, James is a portrayal of the human search for authenticity in a world where his past is unknown, but so the future has already happened. In his characters words, “I want the future to be unknown. I want to become a whole person.”

By the end of the film, James proves to be incapable of altering the passage and the path of time and completes his cyclical destiny in which we assume he is doomed to repeat. In a style that Terry Gilliam is famous for, the viewer is invited into a dystopian future-present as we piece together how it is that we arrived to be there.

Gilliam’s tale is a suspenseful, but fun, romp through a series of possible links that could cause humanity’s great extinction. We are brought to question not only the feasibility of physical passageways for a dangerous toxin to cross, but also the complicated human motives and networks that could allow it to happen.

Cole travels from the apocalyptic present to the past multiple times, searching for clues as to the precise events leading up to The End Of The World. He soon realizes that only messages may travel through time, not objects. To test this rule of Can’t Take Anything With You, he swallowed a spider in an attempt to carry it inside his body back to the future.

Cole is trapped in a looping storyline. He has flashbacks from his youth to a traumatic event of his past: seeing a man shot in an airport. As he follows through his quest to track the virus origin, he finds that he, from the future, is the man shot in the airport. He cannot alter the past, and is interminably, inextricably doomed to repeat his passage, whether framed in terms of past, present, or future.

Butler, Octavia E. 2005. “Bloodchild.” In Bloodchild and Other Stories, 3-32. New York: Seven Stories Press.

In “Bloodchild”, humans called Terrans have escaped their home planet and reside among a group of aliens called the Tlic. The events that unfold describe a rite of passage that takes place in a society where these two different species must depend on one another in order to survive. The Tlic are completely dependent on the Terran – without the Terran they would not be able to procreate and would die out as a species. This dependence on Terran suggests the Terran would have the power; after all, the Tlic need the Terran to survive.

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In her short story “Bloodchild,” Octavia Butler presents a dystopian society in which humans draw little agency. Humans are deprived of their humanity and reduced to a function. At one point in the story Gan narrates, “She parceled us out to the desperate and sold us to the rich and powerful for their political support. Thus, we ALUMINUM were necessities, status symbols, and an independent people”. Here, humans are reduced to a commodity and a bargaining point. However, more critically, humans are reduced to simply a birthing vessel for the Tlic.

Similarly, humans in the modern nations need technology. Can you imagine a bank or grocery store or college running without computers, phones, and other technologies? From this lens, humans are cast as the Tlic and technology as the Terrans in “Bloodchild.” This interpretation of Octavia Butler’s “Bloodchild” is really interesting. It shows a deeper bond between humans and technology. That is, do humans develop feelings and love for their own technological tools? Just as the baby Tlic need the Terran body for nourishment in developing, this human baby needs technology (a phone and a bluetooth device) for his nourishment. This depiction brings up an interesting question: is the relationship between humans and technology simply one of dependence? Do we just use technology for our own advancement or do we develop feelings and a bond with the technology we need so much?

That is to say, it is human nature to want to and to successfully merge with tools and technologies.

“Bloodchild” puts a critical spin on this concept. “Bloodchild” demonstrates when the binary between being a technology and being a human who uses technology is broken. The story speculates human relation to alien or foreign technology. Yet this reduction of humans to a function is also an essentially human and modern condition.

“Bloodchild” ultimately presents a dystopia of the present day.

The rules of the “game” being played in “Bloodchild” are akin to the rules that our own society abides by.

They are rules handed down from generation to generation in a codex of civilization and law. The differing element to the world depicted in “Bloodchild” is the number of intelligent species. The Tlics and the Terrans have a delicate relationship based on mutual satisfaction and mutual concession. The closest comparison to the inhabitants of our Earth is the interaction of differing nations who may not occupy the same land, but share resources, transportation networks, and communications.

There exists a hierarchy of species in the “Bloodchild” story, as does on our Earth. The Tlic are the natives and the Terrans are the alien refugees. They have developed a relationship (through a series of initial errors) that provides for certain rights for both species. On Earth, we do not have the same amalgam of rights provided for species outside of the human race. Occasionally, species may be protected from direct harm by labeling them “endangered.”

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Dark City. 1998. Directed by Alex Proyas. Australia: New Line Cinema.

The world of Dark City is operated by rules that are unseen to its inhabitants. This is an easy parallel to urban life, although with the ever-presence of the Internet, there is a growing transparency is government and infrastructural operations. The most vital rule of the film is not in the technicality of its citizens, but is part of the characteristics of one faction of the characters. These characters are known only as “The Strangers” and they have an ability to “tune” their environment. This is a powerful telekinesis that, when utilized collectively and the Strangers can make entire buildings come into being with their concentration.

The roles that characters play are also important. Only one character as broken the rules laid out by the invasion of the Strangers. It is John Murdoch and his power to tune, a power he only acquired through the contact with the Strangers. It appears as a sort of evolution, something similar to the way that vaccinations help a body grow a strength against a viral attack by familiarizing itself with a low level of the virus. This happened unknowingly of the game being played by the Strangers.

There are a few characters who knew of the rules of the game, but who did not have the wherewithal to break them. The Scientist had too much interest in the scientific approach to keep himself out of the mix, although you could tell there was much guilt occurring in him conscious, and he continued to try to help John fully grasp the game. In the end, it is only through his teaching of the rules that John is able to fully comprehend the situation in a timely enough manner to act. Another character who became aware of the rules is the former police investigator who has gone mad. He knows the rules of the game the Strangers practice, but he does not have the ability to break the cycle of their nocturnal tuning. He is aware that John has powers to potentially combat the Strangers, but he himself is too weak. He’s sees only one way to end the game, and that is through suicide. (not exactly casting a strong vote for John’s capabilities, as he hops in front of the train that John exits.)

The Strangers are displayed as psychonic humanoids for nearly all the film. Only in the last few moments are the true bodies of The Strangers visible as they retreat to another planet. It is discovered that The Strangers have been occupying human host bodies. It is unexplained whether this is part of the studying that The Strangers had been undertaking of humanity or if it is a disguise to allow them to walk amongst the humans.

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Lem, Stanislaw. 1970. Solaris. New York: Walker.

The planet Solaris is uninhabited, except for the scientists from Earth who operate a small research station.

When cryptic events start taking place among the researchers, and the only possible explanation is that the ocean is responsible. The Solarian ocean, in fact, is found to be a sentient being, capable of reading the human mind and creating, apparently out of its own substance, exact copies of persons from one’s past.

In probing and examining the oceanic surface of the planet Solaris from a hovering research station the human scientists are, in turn, being studied by the sentient planet itself, which probes for and examining sites the thoughts of the human beings who are analyzing it.

Lem’s novel centers upon the themes of the nature of human memory, experience and the ultimate futility of attempting to communicate with extra-terrestrial life on a far-distant planet. The planet is almost completely covered with an ocean that is revealed to be a single, planet-encompassing organism, with whom scientists are attempting communication. What appear to be waves on its surface are later revealed to be the equivalents of muscle contractions. The Solarian globe was not just any sphere surrounded by some jelly - it was an active being. It neither built nor created anything translatable into our language that could have been explained. Hence a description had to be replaced by analysis of the internal workings of the Ocean’s ego.

Author asks, what would happen if an encounter with intelligent alien life took place on a biological level beyond our comprehension? What if the life form was so different that it no longer matched our preconceptions of how organisms look and act? Can a geographic fact, a part of the landscape, really be a life form? Or can some other explanation be found?

Of course there is irony here in that this is thematically the problem Lem identifies in the novel. He suggests that we don’t really want new worlds, we are always searching for “an ideal image of our own world.” So whenever we encounter something that is indeed foreign, our first tendency is to recast the experience into a narrative of our own making. Genuine contact between humans and a nonhuman intelligence or civilization is, by definition, impossible. Snow tells Kelvin that all space travel is nothing more than the attempt to define the entire cosmos in the terms of Earth: “We are only seeking Man.... We don’t know what to do with other worlds. A single world, our own, suffices us; but we can’t accept it for what it is.” Lem’s thesis is that all attempts to define reality, on earth or in space, are inevitably anthropocentric.

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Oblivion. Directed by Kosinski Joseph. 19 April 201. Relativity Media, Universal Pictures, 2013. DVD.

Oblivion a science fiction movie pictures the survival of humanity in an environment controlled by technology.

It is set in 2077 after alien power destroyed Earth’s moon, leading to cataclysmic floods and earthquakes that have ravaged Earth. In the movie humans and the planet was in the process of dying out in complete annihilation and extinction. The Earth is depicted as a mostly devastated environment where everything that lived is long gone, buried under layers of dust and rubble. At that point Earth is only distant memory of the space that human used to inhabit before attack of alien power and its technology. There is a hidden place of natural picturesque scenery.

Where Jack, one of the scientists, built a house on the lake. The place seems to be untouched by the war and invasion of the technology. Except for the a few solar panels and an old analog turntable which Jack used to play old classics record from 1960s. It is an idyllic world that takes viewer of the movie for another trip back in time, away from radiation and destruction that Earth had suffered. Different model of living triggers one’s reflections about what kind of living model a humanity should pursue. Is technological advancement going to save people or destroy them? We cake so much from natural environment and we destroy it beyond reversible point.

Many of us in our 20s and 30s want analog but we live in a digital world. This practice of aggressively marketing analog, or organic, or vinyl, or nature is only possible in a mostly artificial environment - it’s the market economy re appropriating what we used to just take for granted and selling it back to us. Specifically, the film raises themes of existence, what does it mean to exist and raises this issue specifically in the context of a relationship.

Reticulating Infrastructures. 2015. Dariusz Kulinksi and Skye Ruozzi. Digital Video. https://youtu. be/9k8TdJczD5k

Reticulating Infrastructures is an examination of the many forms of passenger and cargo transportation that merge at the hub of Port Newark/Port Elizabeth in New Jersey. One of less than a dozen major international import/ export locations in the U.S. Newark’s Port is a teeming network of planes, trains, ships, and trucks. Whereas these are often seen as discrete systems, it is here that all of the pathways begin to run in adjacent, or even at moments cross to create a seamless coordinated exchange. The ships can pull alongside man-made piers to have their cargo unloaded by machinery, transported by a tertiary equipment, and placed atop a freight train or as the trailer on a tractor-trailer. More fragmented units can ride inside cargo planes that taxi on the runways in parallel to the northsouth train traffic and the main entry road to the port.

The site’s verdant past is equally as complex as its fuel-based present. The port was a former wetland of Newark Bay, and has been dredged and built up so that only a fraction of its original inhabiting species remain able to subsist in the present day.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY The Ballad of Genesis and Lady Jaye. 2012. Directed by Marie Losier. New Yorker Video, 2012. DVD. Berger, Alan. 2002. Reclaiming the American West. New York: Princeton Architectural Press.

Berger, Alan, ed. 2008. Designing the Reclaimed Landscape. New York: Taylor & Francis.

Bonanza! 2015. Dariusz Kulinksi and Skye Ruozzi. Digital Video. https://youtu.be/Sf5ZYmVIo0U Deterritorialisations . . . Revisioning Landscapes and Politics. 2003. Edited by Mark Dorrian and Gillian Rose. London; New York: Black Dog Publishing.

Crandall, William BC. 2009. “Enabling Profitable Asteroid Mining.” presented to the Review of the United State Human Space Flight Plans Committee. Abundant Planet 501(c)3. https://www.nasa.gov/pdf/383154main_53%20 -%2020090803.7.toAugustineCommittee-2009-08-03.pdf The Game. 1997. Directed by David Fincher. Starring Michael Douglas, Sean Penn. Presented by Polygram Filmed Entertainment. DVD. Le Guin, Ursula K. 1969. The Left Hand of Darkness. New York: Walker and Company.

Liu, Alec. 2013. “A Guide to Bitcoin Mining: Why Someone Bought a $1,500 Bitcoin Miner on eBay for $20,600.”

Motherboard: Vice. http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/a-guide-to-bitcoin-mining-why-someone-bought-a-1500bitcoin-miner-on-ebay-for-20600 Manufactured Landscapes. 2006. Starring Edward Burtynsky. Presented by Mercury Films, Foundry Films. CoProduced by the National Film Board of Canada, TVOntario. Directed by Jennifer Baichwal. Produced by Nick de Pencier, Daniel Iron, Jennifer Baichwal. 2007. DVD. Motherboard. 2015. “Life Inside a Secret Chinese Bitcoin Mining site.” Editor-in-chief Derek Mead. Translators Claire Xu and Dylan O’Connor. Vice. https://youtu.be/K8kua5B5K3I Nakamoto, Satoshi. 2008. “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System.” https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf 91

Olmstead, Frederick Law. 1900. The California Frontier, 1863-1865. Edited by Victoria Post Ranney. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Ostro, Steven J. and Carl Sagan. 1997. “Cosmic Collission and the Longevity of Non-Spacefaring Galactic Civilizations.” NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. http://trs-new.jpl.nasa.gov/dspace/ bitstream/2014/19498/1/98-0908.pdf Pauli, Lori. 2003. Manufactured Landscapes: The Photographs of Edward Burtynsky. Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada in association with Yale University Press.

Pynchon, Thomas. 1965. The Crying of Lot 49. New York: Bantam Books.

Rare Earth Minerals: Chemistry, Origin, and Ore Deposits. 1996. Edited by Adrian P. Jones, Francis Wall and C. Terry Williams. The Mineralogy Society. Series #7.

Ross, Shane D. 2001. “Near-Earth Asteroid Mining.” Space Industry Report. http://www.nss.org/settlement/ asteroids/NearEarthAsteroidMining(Ross2001).pdf Stross, Charles. 2005. Accelerando. New York: Penguin Group.

Szoka, Berin and James Dunstan, 2012. “Space Law: Is Asteroid Mining Legal?” Wired. http://www.wired. com/2012/05/opinion-asteroid-mining/

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