More-Than-Human Intelligences: Crossing Human, Machine, and Ecosystem Boundaries
Date & Time: Wednesday, September 17, 16:00–17:30 EEST
Location: Lumituuli Auditorium, Dipoli, Aalto University
Overview
What happens when we recognize the sophisticated capabilities of animals, ecosystems, and multispecies assemblages? This session examines intelligence across boundaries and systems. Presentations demonstrate how understanding relationships between humans, animals leads to improved outcomes.
Session leader: Antti Rannisto, Solita
Presentations
Leveraging Collective Intelligence to Improve River and Coastal Health: Insights from England & Wales
Nicolai Traasdahl Tarp, Qualitative Researcher, Cognizant Ocean
Elisabeth Haaland Sund, Strategic Designer, Cognizant Ocean
This case study demonstrates how collective intelligence can be operationalized to drive meaningful impact in complex systems, providing a holistic approach to designing interventions such as novel AI solutions. River Deep Mountain AI is an innovation project aimed at enhancing the health of rivers and coastal waters by leveraging AI and collaboration. Our ethnographic and participatory practices helped the project navigate complexity, reduce risk, and unlock new pathways for systemic transformation. Impact Case Study
Presenters & Authors
Nicolai Traasdahl Tarp is a qualitative researcher at Cognizant Ocean, working in the intersection between systemic design and technology to address challenges in freshwater ecosystems. He holds a MSc from the IT University of Copenhagen, specialized in Digital Democratic Citizenship.
Elisabeth Haaland Sund is a designer and strategist at Cognizant Ocean, working on leveraging AI technology to restore the health of our aquatic systems. With a background in systemic design, she takes a holistic approach to addressing complex water management challenges. She holds a Master’s in Interaction Design from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU).
Beyond Fetch: Rethinking Intelligence in Animals, AI, and Humans
Interacting with generative AI like ChatGPT may feel revolutionary, but humans have long engaged with other forms of intelligence, most notably the animals around us. This PechaKucha invites us to re-examine our notions about animals’ intelligences by playfully exploring our evolving relationship with pets and drawing parallels with our growing intimacy with AI. PechaKucha
Presenter & Author
Karen Kiss is a consultant applying her expertise in material culture to provide in-depth understanding of human-tech relationships, driving user centred innovation. She’s particularly interested in embodied interactions with technology and how these affect user experience and recently she started to apply an anthropological lens to understanding human-animal relationships.
Two Ethnographies of Holobiontic Intelligences in Hong Kong
Markus Wernli, Research Assistant Professor, School of Design, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Ilpo Koskinen, Professor, Design Next, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
Heidi Paavilainen, Senior University Lecturer, Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture
This paper explores human-nature interactions that are often overlooked in human-only, technology-based, or formal systems. It presents a design ethnography that studies eco-social interdependencies across households, habits, logistics, and life forms, while also building communities. By evidencing human-microbe dynamics and their applicability in small-scale food production, the study contributes empirical insights and methods that support the development of equitable relationships between humans and nonhumans. The paper offers ethnographers a novel perspective that has practical relevance for education, professional development, and non-profit initiatives. Research Case Study
Presenters & Authors
Markus Wernli is a Research Assistant Professor at PolyU School of Design in Hong Kong. As a researcher, educator, and practitioner, Markus works on bioregioning design and collective soil-to-soil economies that contribute both to local communities and ecologies. Here, rebuilding capabilities in local households and industries become manifestations of land-based ecological responses every community can engage in without the need for complex technologies that often come with hidden costs.
Ilpo Koskinen specialises in design research, where his main interests have been in mobile multimedia, social interaction, and methodology. Usually interested in emerging ideas, his work concentrates on the avant-garde end of technology and methodology. He is professor, but he also functions as an editor. Most recently he has been creating very large design courses.
Heidi Paavilainen studies the meanings that designed materials, products or services acquire through the practicalities, mundane and happenstance in the act of everyday using and living with products. As a consequence, the meanings of design are based on how well the product fits into and how the household comes to live and what objects are doing in the home.