In science, holes
in hypotheses lead to
new questions, new
hypotheses, new
science—and when we
are fortunate—new
understanding and
new capabilities.
September + October 2011
interactions
asked whether he considers himself
to be using magical realism in his
writing, he replied, “I wouldn’t call it
that; I would call it ‘going deep’” [ 19].
Engage senses and emotions in
Gaian pursuits. Computer scientist
Sean White recently worked on
the Electronic Field Guide (EFG), a
large-scale collaboration between
Columbia, the Smithsonian, and the
University of Maryland. The vision
for the project was to explore new
forms of field guides that enhance
cognition and memory. The project’s explicit purpose was to serve
botanists and other scientists in
identifying plants and observing
or visualizing some of the relationships at work in their ecosystems.
As White explains, “If a botanist is
studying a caterpillar, they may not
be able to identify the species of
plants that it eats. The system will
help them create an ecological web
of relationships and perhaps even
help build a semantic web for further eco-informatic study” [ 20].
The EFG experimented with
multiple cameras and sensors as
inputs and with hardened tablets,
augmented-reality displays, and
mobile phones as UI devices. White
observed an interesting difference
between scientists using tablets
and those using head-mounted AR
displays. Those using tablets typi-
cally conceived of the process as
data coming from a sensor near
the plant, transmitted to the com-
puter, which represents it on the
tablet display. Scientists using AR
displays were more likely to con-
struct the interaction as the data
coming from the plant. In this case,
the AR display (and its particular
sensory qualities) effectively col-
lapsed the cognitive mediating
distance between the plant and
the scientist. This effect was par-
ticular evidence that White was
meeting his goal “to support being
in the world and part of the world.”
Indeed, some scientists expressed
a sense of being physically part
of the environment, no longer
bounded by their physical bodies.
