Past Talks and Colloquia
May 14 10 12:00am - Jan 09 11 12:00am
Why Design Now
Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum

Why Design Now? is the fourth installation in the National Design Triennial exhibition series launched by Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum in 2000. The Triennial provides a sample of contemporary innovation, looking at what progressive designers, engineers, entrepreneurs, and citizens are doing in diverse fields and at different scales around the world. Included are practical solutions already in use as well as experimental ideas designed to inspire further research. A few projects will provoke controversy, answering some questions while raising others.

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May 07 10 12:00pm - 1:00pm
Host/Chair:
Mitchel Resnick
May 05 10 2:30pm - 5:00pm

Speakers include:

Speaker: Judy Brown (MIT / Wellesley)
Miller Puckette (UCSD / PD)
Brian Whitman (The Echo Nest)
Dan Ellis (Columbia University)
Michael Casey (Dartmouth)
Richard Boulanger (Berklee / CSound)
Youngmoo Kim (Drexel)
Paris Smaragdis (Adobe)
Mihir Sarkar (MIT)

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May 03 10 4:00pm - 6:00pm

So far, almost all space programs have been led by governments, usually as part of their military programs. Very seldom were these initiatives developed by amateurs. Individual fantasies were often used and fostered by governmental institutions. It’s time to establish a private connection between "I and Universe."

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Apr 27 10 3:00pm - 5:00pm
Host/Chair:
Alex 'Sandy' Pentland

The human problem solution process has attracted an increasing amount of interest by educators, managers, computer scientists, and others. However, it has suffered from the lack of stochastic tools to quantitatively capture both the fine steps of the problem solution process and the diversity of human thinking.

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Apr 26 10 2:00pm - 6:30pm
Xconomy
Apr 22 10 10:00am - 12:00pm
Host/Chair:
Cynthia Breazeal

From an early age, humans are able to use intentions and beliefs to understand the behavior of others. While these qualities are not directly observable, they can be inferred from observable behavior and carry great predictive power. This thesis presents a robotic architecture designed to work with the concepts of intentions and beliefs to more efficiently and naturally interact with humans, both by modeling the intentions and beliefs of the human, and by being aware of how the human is also doing the same about other agents including the robot itself.

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Apr 13 10 3:00pm - 4:30pm
Host/Chair:
Deb Roy

The lecture will start with a presentation of the non-linear graphic language "Elephant's Memory" and its core feature—an associative grammar dubbed "molecular." A series of illustrated and animated examples will attempt to accustom the audience with its basics. Several exercises may involve audience participation.

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Apr 13 10 12:00am - May 14 10 12:00am
Host/Chair:
Ramesh Raskar
Apr 09 10 12:00pm - 1:00pm
Host/Chair:
Mitchel Resnick

All around us people are learning with the aid of new technologies: children are playing complex video games, workers are taking online courses to get an advanced degree, students are taking courses at commercial learning centers to prepare for tests, adults are consulting Wikipedia, etc. These new learning niches enable people of all ages to pursue learning on their own terms.

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