We will publish the book by Nikos Salingaros, Unified Theory Architectural, in a series of payments, which in made digitally available to students and architects worldwide. This chapter Salingaros moves his focus to our physiological and psychological responses to the built environment, and science of healing spaces. If you missed them, be sure to read the previous installments here
Biophilia :. Our forms Evolved Kinship For biological
The complexity organized objects and buildings, as I described, led to a positive response from users. This is the perception of "life" we feel in some places and structures in the built environment. The physical structure of the world has a massive effect on humans. A crucial task of architectural theory is to explain and predict the impact that life structure - or lack thereof - has on us
Everything lies in a geometry .. certain class of configurations generate stress in the user. Another class of configurations, those we perceive as having life, do not generate stress, and also free us to feel positive feelings. In the second case, we are freer to experience a multitude of healing effects, precisely because we are not dragged down by environmental stress.
Our goal is to discover the specific qualities that a healthy environment has and that make you feel free. This is an environment in which no energy is automatically passed into conflict with producing stress configurations. "The pattern language" Alexander is such a system: (. Alexander et al , 1977). Each pattern is the solution to a conflict in the environment
As long as the configuration is wrong, it continues to generate stress. No amount of superficial "dress" will resolve basic conflicts. That is why my group of friends in Italy and I argue that the money spent "cleaning" of Corviale housing complex is wasted. Painting walls, or the creation of a "contemporary sculpture garden" on his land will not be repaired. Only by changing its monolithic geometry problems encountered by its residents could be resolved, but that is precisely what the Italian architectural creation modern is set on protection: see "Evidence-Based Design," chapter 11 Design for a living planet (Mehaffy & Salingaros, 2015).
What specific geometric qualities of an environment that gives it healing qualities, so that in such environment we feel liberated to live life to their full potential? We have already "self mirror" test, which is very useful for comparing alternatives, but does not respond to this question (see Chapter 9A & Section 9B of the book published on ArchDaily ).
the first step to discovering the geometric qualities we look for is to examine natural environments This leads to the effect of Biophilia. humans feel kinship with other biological entities. the Biophilic effect promotes mental well-being and also helps the physiological healing and recovery. the positive effects are clinically documented biophilia
a view from a hospital bed on a natural scene is to reduce the recovery time and reduce the level of pain medication needed. See "Biophilia," chapter 12 of Design for a living planet ( Mehaffy & Salingaros, 2015). This example of student work Biophilia traditional assessment of the natural environment of "pleasant places to be" the most important "healing place". Indeed, traditional cultures are natural environments associated with healing a lot more than we do in the contemporary West. Yet using biophilia in health care significantly improves the economics of healing patients, which is what our system favors so-called.
It is logical that we feel more comfortable in environments similar to those in which we evolved, and, conversely, feel stressed in environments with exotic qualities . Our neuro-physiological system has been developed specifically to deal with these ancestral natural environments: natural light, fresh air, savannah, open plains, bushes and trees, visual access to water, etc. . Our body has an extremely sophisticated ability to detect environments that are good for us.
Alexander, myself, and our students have gone further, to argue that the effect is not Biophilic a mysterious vitalism property of living organisms biologically, but rather an effect due to their geometry. Therefore, it follows that we can approach the right Biophilic effect inanimate structures. Much of the traditional art and architecture embodies qualities Biophilic intuitively searched by their manufacturers.
The Biophilia and turns the traditional architecture on its head: we are not building just for utilitarian purposes, but we to give as food continues from the result. In short, we have built structures that made us feel good and we healed see "Neuroscience, the natural environment and building design" (Salingaros & Masden, 08) This tradition has continued in the current 20th. century. We have chosen not to receive feedback nourishing environment, like all our ancestors had enjoyed.
food Biophilic Direct has close contact with the plants, animals, natural light, and texture of natural materials. in artificial environments, humans use a variety of design tools to achieve a similar effect. We shape our living spaces according to very specific geometries and use colors, ornamentation and reasons for the food of the similar environment. This process is not the nature of surface imitation, but rather the generation of natural geometry.
Scientists are beginning to document how environmental factors, including information from the environment, affecting our physiological well -étant. It seems that the geometric characteristics found in traditional architectures, such as ornamentation and fractal structures cause a positive reaction to our neurophysiology. And this reaction gets incorporated into our body.
My former student Yannick Joye discovered that fractals and organized complex models responsible for Biophilic effect are somehow integrated into our cognitive system (fractals are described in detail in "Turning wide and Fractals ", chapter 6 (Mehaffy & Salingaros, 2015), and" fractal art and architecture reduce physiological stress, "included in chapter 26 of the printed version of this book) . Our reaction is emotional and visceral rather than intellectual. architects can offer all intellectual arguments they want, favoring a minimalist or high-tech design, but those will not affect how we physically react to forms and environments.
Application biophilia design involves natural intimate fusion with artificial structures. in practical terms, this means building with intricate borders meanders intertwine buildings and natural growth. Plants incorporated in environments become part of complex ecosystems green, non monofunctional. It also involves focusing on intimate human ladders, rather than only the larger scale.
Biophilia also requires the partial replacement of industrial materials with natural materials, and the reintroduction of the ornament using industrial materials. The latter practice was widespread in the late 19th - early 20th century, but soon stopped. From a certain point onwards, industrial materials were used exclusively a fetishistic way to communicate a "look" harsh industrial. Since the beginning of modernism of the early 20th century, architecture was focused on abstract and formal notions of space, shapes and materials. human physiological and psychological responses played no role in this reflection, and the same approach continues today: see "Modernism Got Square", Chapter 3 of Design for a Living Planet (Mehaffy & Salingaros, 2015) . While some architects have recently rediscovered the need for plants and nature, uniting the structures Biophilic connection with humans and with nature is not always obvious to the entire profession.
As a world based on impersonal images has been substituted for the real world of emotions, two separate but related views have shaped our built environment. First it was the mental association of polished industrial metal, porcelain, flat glass, and plastic surfaces with antiseptic environment. This despite the fact that the "hospital look" is not necessarily cleaner or more from one environment to the former more "disorder" germ-free built using natural materials.
Second, the architects for some reason locked on the slogan "honest tectonic expression," to involve the moral superiority when it is just another fetish with industrial materials. There is no "morality" in a physical structure. As a result, however, we are now surrounded by surfaces called "honest" are not simply indifferent to biophilia but deliberately try to avoid Biophilic effect. Brutalist concrete surfaces are against nature and hostile. If there is a moral judgment to be learned here, it is that these architects act against human nature. One might think that letting go of the personal ego and focusing on the mental and physical well being of the user, an architect constantly defend exotic forms and becomes a better person ethics.
empirical data collected around biophilia helps explain the "self mirror" test, which uses the body as a stress sensor in the environment. Now we understand that source of these constraints is due to departures from a very specific geometry that is similar to the complex geometry of natural structures. architects of the 21st century and 20th deliberately celebrated shapes and surfaces that have industrial air because they contrast with natural forms, so that the built environment generates stress.
specifically, minimalist environments often favored in styles with industrial aspect are related to warning signals in our body. surfaces and colorless, dull and monotonous spaces reproduce the clinical symptoms of diseases and conditions of the eye-brain system. Naturally, when the environment gives us the same signals, our body thinks it breaks downwards, and reacts with stress.
The interesting research Judith Heerwagen found that zoo animals kept in minimalist environments exposed neurotic behavior, aberrant, and antisocial. their return to a more stimulating and naturalistic environment led to more normal patterns and healthier behaviors. Some of the winning zoos built in a modernist style of the 20th century proved to be terrible for their residents, and finally, zookeepers were allowed to shape the environment of animals by introducing complexity.
As zoo animals, children are also affected by their habitat, but can not articulate why. The removal of the Biophilic food during the development of our children has considerably negative effects. The need for information during stimulation of the growth of a child can no longer be questioned. We can use laboratory animals studies to draw conclusions by extension. Young animals have shown up to a 20% increase in the size and intelligence of the brain when they are raised in environments rich in information. If we are interested in continuing the human race and to optimize the intelligence of our children, we must pay special attention to these effects. (The mechanism linking information, human intelligence, and the ornament will be described later in Chapter 12 of this book online) .
A final specific issues of value tests where subjects were asked their preferences minimalist compared to organized complex environments. Many of these investigations were conducted with only a moderate preference for the latter, or with very different results that were inconclusive study. Nevertheless, the latest laboratory experiments using body monitors showed dramatic preferences for organized complexity. The subjects do not express a preference when asked; but their body made. Physiological responses to our environment are thus found to be innate, and, in addition, be largely decoupled from personal preferences. What we "like" has nothing to do with what is good for us.
As noted above, our likes and dislikes are conditioned learning, media influences, preconceived ideas, and the psychology of crowds (where we are forced to agree with the majority, to avoid cognitive dissonance). What we think with our mind is not what we feel physically. A building may seem interesting, but not agree with what is felt during the experience. People not listen to their own bodies, if it prevents them from "fitting" with a social position.
Another complicating factor is human nature itself, who seeks thrills from experiences that are near damaging. We human beings have always been fascinated by things that frighten us, precisely because those who generate a distress - the adrenaline rush that followed created a "high" feeling. The experience must be carefully balanced so that we feel in danger and safely together. For this reason, people watch horror movies, go to dizzying amusement-park rides, visit the "Haunted House", extreme sports, racecars, and go skydiving. Japanese businessmen eat Sushi made almost poisonous flesh of blowfish, and so on. An architecture that stresses our bodies draw us for exactly the same reason. But obviously such excitement transgressive does not heal.
Order the international edition of theory unified architecture here, and the American edition here.
Further Reading:
- Christopher Alexander, "The impact of life Structure on human life, "chapter 10 the phenomenon of life: book 1 of the Nature of the Order , Center for environmental Structure, Berkeley, California, 01.
- Christopher Alexander, S. Ishikawa, Mr. Silverstein, Mr. Jacobson, I. Fiksdahl-king & S. Angel (1977) a Pattern Language , Oxford University Press, New York.
- Michael Mehaffy & Nikos Salingaros (2015) Design for a living planet sustasis Press, Portland, Oregon.
- Nikos Salingaros (2014) " cognitive dissonance and non-adaptive architecture "(in English and Turkish), Doxa, number 11, Norgunk Publishing House, Istanbul, pages 100-117
- Nikos Salingaros & Masden Kenneth G. (08)" Neuroscience, environment natural, and Building design ", chapter 5 of Biophilic design: theory, practice and science. to bring the buildings to life, edited by Stephen R. Kellert, Judith Heerwagen & Martin Mador, John Wiley, New York.
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