Description

The built environment is increasingly reliant on information technology in all the stages of its life cycle. Design is informed by large data sets and conducted with digital design tools. Design documentation in Building Information Models is supporting construction and during the operational phase of buildings artificial intelligence in Building Management Systems optimises the building's performance. This infusion with information technology has led to notions of smart, intelligent and cognitive buildings that adapt to their users' needs and reduce overall energy consumption.

The use of artificial intelligence however to operate a building has hardly an effect on the overall building design. And how could it, because intelligence itself is an abstract notion, whereas building design deals with concrete aspects such as a building's materiality, geometry and organisation. This thesis proposes a new theoretical position on artificial intelligence in buildings, based on theories of enactive cognition that have roots in the development of embodied robotics.
Based on the researcher's past experience as a design engineer of some of the world's most complex movable building structures, the concrete lens of kinetic architecture is chosen to investigate this position. Through a combination of case study analysis and research by design, a framework is presented that interprets movement in buildings as a critical aspect of cognition.
The contribution challenges current ideas of how IT infrastructures, services, and building functionality in intelligent buildings can be understood and presents a complementary view that promotes a form of intelligence that is specific for buildings. The implication is that artificial intelligence becomes a tangible aspect that can be added to the palette of engineers and architects involved in integrative design of buildings.