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Emerge: Artists + Scientists Redesign the Future
March 1–3, 2012
Arizona State University
What it means to be human is changing. Emerging technologies are transforming our minds, our relationships, everything we own and the very landscapes in which we live. What kinds of humans will we become? What kinds of humans should we become?
These singular questions will be explored on March 1–3, 2012, when Arizona State University hosts Emerge–an unparalleled campus–wide event uniting artists, engineers, bio scientists, social scientists, story–tellers and designers to build, draw, write and rethink the future of the human species and the environments that we share. And then we’ll celebrate. Arizona State University, the nations’s largest university, is determined to break down the barriers between those making the future and those thinking about what it all means.
Global leaders from industry and creative practice will join distinguished ASU faculty and talented students for hands-on workshops as well as the Digital Culture Festival which includes exhibits, interactive shows and live presentations. ASU and Emerge are proud to present a line-up of world class keynote speakers for the conference-closing Keynotes Session (March 3, open to the public) including noted writers, designers and futurists such as Stewart Brand (The Whole Earth Discipline), Bruce Sterling (The Difference Engine, Beyond the Beyond), Sherry Turkle (Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other), Bruce Mau (Incomplete Manifesto for Growth, Massive Change Network), Neal Stephenson (Snow Crash, The Diamond Age, Reamde) and ASU President Michael Crow.
Emerge aims to present some of the futures being created in ASU labs and use these as the fuel for reflecting on what kind of future do we want to make? This is our exciting, mind-boggling question. Faced with the accelerating pace of change in our lives, Emerge asks: In what directions are science and technology heading? What kinds of societies, cities, homes, even people will they lead to? And, most important, is that what we – the people – want?
What can scientists and engineers tell us about emerging possibilities? Can storytellers help us think about the scenarios for our lives? How do we make those futures democratic and ensure that science is kept accountable? Artists and designers need to challenge our assumptions, offer new perspectives and immerse us in startling possibilities. We’ll combine cutting-edge theory with experimental practice and science, future studies, participatory democracy and design. Emerge is focused on building teams around problem solving not specialties.
Emerge will feature leaders of the “Design Fiction” movement and other creatives running hands-on workshops. Together, participants will create provocative and evocative stories, games, performances and objects from which a vision of our future emerges.
The developers of Emerge are Thanassis Rikakis (Director of the Herberger Institute School of Art, Media + Engineering and the Herberger Institute Digital Culture Initiative), Joel Garreau (Lincoln Professor of Law, Culture and Values at the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law; Director, “The Prevail Project: Wise Governance for Challenging Futures”), Cynthia Selin (ASU School of Sustainability; the Center for Nanotechnology in Society) and – the inspiration for this event – the best-selling future-fiction author, “design fiction“ evangelist and provocateur, Bruce Sterling.
