Built for living

Here is a blog piece that I put together about a recent report on designing buildings to respond to, and to shape, the behaviour of their users. I was on the steering group of the report, which surveyed the research and evidence available on how buildings and the built environment can be designed to conserve energy and water; create healthy users and improve productivity and performance. In this piece I talk about the wide range of research that is relevant to understand how we live in and use buildings - and how much our behaviour is likely to change in response to design. This is not just about utilising the social sciences, but extends into history and other disciplines that track the norms and other cultural and social factors that shape and catalyse change in our ways of living.

http://blog.britac.ac.uk/built-for-living-how-understanding-of-humans-and-cultures-from-behavioural-sciences-to-the-humanities-are-key-to-creating-buildings-that-work/

Philosophy and Engineering: Reflections on Practice, Principles and Process

Diane Michelfelder, David Goldberg and I have put together a volume of papers exploring engineering and philosophy from a wide range of viewpoints and experiences. What makes me proud of this volume is that it has been a conscious effort not to follow fixed academic rules about what a philosophy paper should be, but has provided a forum for a range of writers to express well-developed, experience and evidence-based views on engineering in context.

Published last month by Springer, Philosophy and Engineering: Reflections on Practice, Principles and Process looks at engineering and technology from the point of view of ethics, education, creation and practice. The contributors are global and the perspective broad. I hope you enjoy it.

Philosophy and Engineering: Reflections on Practice, Principles and Process

Innovation or invention?

I joined Battle of Ideas at Jaguar Land Rover this week, when JLR opened up two hours of their day of judging and presenting awards for innovation to a debate on what innovation really is. Sitting on a panel with Andrew Nahum, Kerry Kirwan, Tony Harper, Norman Lewis and Chaired by Claire Fox, I gave the view that innovation needs both hard work and focus, but a broad interdisciplinary approach. As a panel we worried that real innovation is becoming rare, that we do not have an innovation culture, that we don't celebrate technology. We worried that innovations in technology are creating lazy brains and resulting in a lack of ambition.

But what was also clear was that technology always cuts both ways. Innovation in the delivery of education (MOOCS), ways of manufacturing (AM and 3d printing) and in frugality and sustainability (JLR's own work on lightweighting and fuel efficiency) really are offering promise. It's good to celebrate technology if that creates an innovation culture - but it is even better to debate it.

Science, Technology, Engineering and Public Policy

Science, Technology, Engineering and Public Policy: spot the odd one out? The policy issues of the 21st century demand response from scientists and engineers and require a blend of technological, policy and social solutions. But, policymakers do not always engage well enough with scientists, engineers and designers, nor vice versa.

Do clashes in culture make the relationship hard? Ways of speaking, ways of thinking? A new department has opened at UCL to help create better relationships, better ways of working and to get scientists, engineers and decision makers speaking the same language.

UCL STEaPP is an innovative, interdisciplinary department tackling, and preparing future leaders to tackle, global challenges from climate change to rapid growth of cities. I have joined UCL STEaPP to set up a professional masters course to build a new generation of interdisciplinary policy professionals who can really leverage technical evidence and expertise. Join us!

Extreme space weather!

Engineers will save the planet! The Royal Academy of Engineering (and the Daily Mail) say so!

We published our report on what a solar superstorm could do to engineering infrastructure from satellites to the electricity grid - and what engineers and policymakers can do to protect us. Read it: be afraid, but not too afraid…

Battle of Ideas

After a long 'rest' while I had a baby, I am speaking at the forthcoming Battle of Ideas conference on "Innovative engineering: within limits?" on October 31st in London. Details here: http://www.battleofideas.org.uk/index.php/2010/session_detail/4113/

Autonomous Systems - Social, Legal and Ethical Issues

A report on the social, legal and ethical issues generated by the design, development and use of autonomous systems was published by the Royal Academy of Engineering last month. I produced the report based on presentations and discussions at a workshop at the Academy, where a number of experts in fields likely to employ autonomous systems discussed the timescales for their introduction, their potential impacts and the wider issues that they might give rise to. Participants were from the fields of defence and aerospace, AI and IT, surgery and healthcare, and transport. The final report focusses on the use of autonomous systems in the form of driverless vehicles and smart homes - two areas where the deployment of autonomous systems is likely to be imminent and to have a significant effect on peoples' lives. It calls for debate into the acceptability of these technologies, and the best ways to garner their benefits while minimising risks.

There was a lot of press interest in the report, with stories from the BBC, The Daily Mail, The Guardian, The Telegraph, Reuters, The Engineer, New Scientist and the Economist.