What role will AIGC play in the future city?

Original: WeCityX

Source: Tencent Research Institute

Tencent Research Institute & The Paper Research Institute & Long Ying Research Group, School of Architecture, Tsinghua University

Image source: Generated by Unbounded AI tool

We make cities and cities shape us. Just like the recoil of a pistol shapes the gesture of a person pulling the trigger, while new technologies meet visible needs, they will also secretly give birth to new models and rules. This is what cybernetics calls a feedback loop.

Facing the task of designing the cities of the future, we hope to be able to foresee the behavioral patterns that accompany new technologies: how will they occur, and will they persist for a long time, transformed into people's subconscious attitudes and concepts? Will the process of people's adaptation to technology also affect the rules of urban operation? How should cities consciously perceive and respond?

Taking advantage of this round of ChatGPT craze, we made some more specific inquiries.

Many cutting-edge thinkers and practitioners, including architecture and urban planning researchers, human geography scholars, technology historians, Internet law scholars, economists, public management scholars, futurists, government decision-making consulting experts, and urban experts The business managers who serve have also provided their own answers and clues, hoping that our future cities can move forward better.

Technical assistance cannot replace emotions, and should be bounded by "church questions"

In the relationship between people-technology-city, people are the biggest variable. Wu Tinghai, a professor at the School of Architecture of Tsinghua University, said to us: In the face of technological applications, people will choose, judge and adapt, and make a series of behavioral changes. Due to different feedbacks from people, the same technology does not necessarily bring the same results; The biological scale and characteristics of the city determine the final state of the city's constant balance and adaptation—for example, can technological development make people sleepless? If the sleep time is deliberately reduced, the vital body will decline. After all, human beings are carbon-based and cannot be transformed into silicon-based. There may be some subversive and breakthrough advances in technology, but the basic laws of biology must still be respected.

On the other hand, the medium is also an extension of the human being. At present, if the physical body is not loaded with media technology, human beings cannot carry out social life. There are also more and more nerve signals, which can be transmitted through technical simulation, and it does not have to be completed by physical body to physical body. Even if it is a beverage like coffee, its aroma comes from one side of the soil and is affected by the roasting method and brewing method, but these subtle taste differences can still be accurately simulated through technology and signal transmission, not necessarily obtained through tongue tasting. China Association for Science and Technology-Fudan University Institute of Science and Technology Ethics and Human Future Professor Yang Qingfeng said that it is conceivable that people in the metaverse in the future will have more complex feelings such as eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body and mind, which will also be generated and integrated in the chip. transfer.

And the human body will also respond to this change. Professor Yang Qingfeng cited a study as an example: the researchers found that if the subject wears an electronic device as the sixth finger for a long time to replace the work of the little finger and other fingers, then some nerve development corresponding to the original hand will be reduced. will weaken.

Pan Ji, a professor at the School of Journalism at Fudan University, also pointed out that the current popular saying is that technology "enhances" people's abilities, but in fact, it may be more necessary to emphasize the weakening effect of technology on people. In the complex composed of people and technology, the generative interactive connection presupposes a state of independent operation and balanced symbiosis of people and technology. The "weakening" and absorption of people by the technical system may increase the vulnerability of society and civilization as a whole.

So, which human abilities need to be more carefully assisted by machines? First of all, the neurodevelopment that humans can't give up the most is the part in charge of emotion and autonomy. Yang Qingfeng believes that the affection between people cannot be externalized—they cannot actually be measured and calculated, nor can they be represented by machines; other matters that are externalized in life experience can be entrusted to machines to do it for them. For example, in contemporary society, e-mail greetings and blessings during New Years and festivals are sometimes a kind of official business, and some of the blessings can be completed by machines; It is necessary to put yourself in the position and complete every word carefully.

Second, it may be the ability to learn and innovate. Yang Qingfeng said that in the current discussion on ChatGPT, we can always see such words as "technology cannot replace original work", and the narrative seems to have entered a binary framework: "original" and "imitated" - technology does imitation Yes, humans do original creations. In fact, as far as the human learning process is concerned, originality comes from imitation, and imitation is the only way for the development of ability. Where did it come from?

In this regard, Yang Qingfeng proposed that machines such as ChatGPT can be regarded as trainers. For example, children with autism spectrum disorders can take better care of themselves in a structured life. ChatGPT technology can be used to assist in life training. But on the other hand, especially for ordinary students, this type of training can easily be transformed into some kind of rigid and unconscious discipline, in which goal setting is a subtle and crucial part.

"In this sense, people's ability to ask questions to ChatGPT becomes extremely important. After people are guided to learn to ask questions, this item of machine assistance should be removed." Yang Qingfeng emphasized.

"If we think that the way of thinking can be trained, then the training of behavior patterns can also be imagined." So, can people's ability to ask questions be really trained through technologies such as ChatGPT? This question may not have a simple answer. Perhaps after a period of practice, the path of cooperation between people and technology will reveal a clearer clue. Regardless, the future of technology is here to stay. But from the perspective of the operation of the human brain, neither emotion, autonomy nor the ability to ask questions exist in isolation. They are closely related to embodied cognition and spatial thinking.

The virtual world will eventually come, and technology will be more deeply involved in life. The ubiquitous and ever-present operation of digital technology will cause fundamental changes in the rhythm, frequency, distance, and breadth of time and space in the management system and social operation of traditional industrial society. In the face of specific educated people, we may have to seize the opportunity now to improve the fundamental abilities of the educated people.

"The discrete, short-term, and multi-threaded world is one system. The knowledge system that is continuous in industrial society, emphasizes rational logic, and focuses on focus is another system. Then, the ability to be able to communicate between the two knowledge systems Those who can smoothly convert and accommodate the time will be able to seize the future." Pan Ji said. Borrowing the concept of "structural hole" in sociology, the point that can grasp and connect the heterogeneous knowledge systems on both sides is the gathering point of various possibilities-this is also the point where parents still need to improve their children. reason for concentration.

Expand your comfort zone with gamification

On the other hand, in order to be able to quickly adapt to different scenarios, a certain gamified psychological structure may become a more common state of existence in cities. That is to say, it seems to regard oneself as a role in the game of life, and it is not "I" but an "other" who is in the corresponding situation. In this way, people can switch channels psychologically at any time to avoid directly facing unbearable shocks, and avoid falling into an information cocoon for comfort and safety.

The surging information flow in the city seems to connect people. However, as the flow of information accelerates, people often feel that the understanding between each other has not deepened, that it is more difficult to communicate joys and sorrows, and even more hostility arises. In this regard, Pan Ji believes that the problem lies in psychological expectations: "If you always want to transmit your own meaning structure and will to the other party, in fact, it often produces infinite violence, rather than a real but limited understanding."

Pan Ji pointed out that the intention to understand or make the other party understand should never be the engulfment of one meaning structure by another. Instead, in a metaphorical way, one's own meaning structure should be projected into the meaning structure of the other party. If the two meaning structures can resonate and resonate, then, to a certain extent, the understanding of the other is realized.

Science fiction writer Chen Qiufan looked at it from the perspective of the receiver of the information. He believes that in a real connection, the purpose of not pleasing users is often unpleasant, but it is also a real experience. In fact, painful feelings are what make people grow. The reason why many people cannot grow is because they are only willing to stay in their comfort zone and are unwilling to accept challenges. The real connection is the original state of meeting and communicating between people in the city.

It is not difficult to understand that when people sit face to face, keep a distance between the subjects, and project the structure of meaning through conversation, it will be easier to interact with the structure in which the other is in, without blindly occupying the meaning of the other .

Just like the current ChatGPT, the algorithm needs to become smarter, add more variables, and be able to learn and evolve by itself. But the most important question is whether enough real connections can be built. This kind of connection is not recommended by the algorithm, but by chance and randomness. Chen Qiufan emphasized.

And in the virtual digital environment, how should the projection of this meaning structure happen? That is to say, how can both parties be convinced that a new resonance has been generated through digital means?

Pan Ji believes that in the future world where the virtual and the real are combined, the resonance formed in the semantic and grammatical structure, and the "synaesthesia" generated by the connection of sensory experience through digital media may allow us to understand the real world in a specific scene and at a specific point. The meaning structure in which the other is in, obtains a limited understanding. Specifically, if the two parties can exchange identities to think through a gamified narrative, they may be able to better understand each other's meaning structure. In the current virtual space, this way of thinking about exchanging positions through gamification can be better practiced and learned.

Chen Qiufan also had similar expectations. He believes that technological applications need to continuously expand everyone's comfort zone and gradually provide some challenges. For example, using gamification to help people's minds and emotions, social relationships and roles grow and expand continuously, so that people can more and more adapt to the drastic changes and uncertainties of the external environment. Chen Qiufan believes that this may be an ideal co-evolutionary state that can be achieved between humans and technology.

Between virtual and real, there is an effect that cannot be translated

Yang Qingfeng mentioned to us that the concept of digital twins is not applicable in some virtual spaces. For example, the virtual space formed by language is not translated from the physical space.

Indeed, the role of media on people today has already appeared in daily life. Chen Qiufan also gave an example that the emoticons used for chatting every day have also changed people's understanding of concepts, and even the same emoticon has different understandings in different people. Different circles have their own discourse system. The system will continue to strengthen itself.

In general, people are constantly fed what the algorithm thinks they should be interested in, and a lot of autonomy and possibility is cut off. Chen Qiufan mentioned that compared with being in a classroom with real classmates and teachers, the level of engagement in online classes will be much lower. Because body communication, sound and breath express very subtle emotions, as part of the meaning structure, it is difficult to be virtualized at this stage.

Cultures contain various language systems. Thinking further, even if these embodied meaning structures can be refined and restored using chips as the medium, they will gradually accumulate in the digital virtual world and become rituals that are different from those in the real world. For example, tactile perception can be realized in the virtual world in the future, but what may happen is that due to technological path dependence, the ritual of meeting people is no longer a handshake and shoulder clap in the real world, but a voice reminding you to go online.

Based on the above possibilities, Yang Qingfeng also pointed out that for a city that combines virtuality and reality, it is hopeless to construct a digital outside world just for people; a valuable approach is to digitize people's experience and create a real virtual world.

As mentioned earlier, encouraging people to step out of the information cocoon is to enhance communication, but it also needs to deal with potential violent situations. In this regard, although the above-mentioned gamification thinking method can be adopted to adjust, it is still necessary to realize that the virtual space is different from the real space. Yang Qingfeng mentioned that, for example, beatings in the virtual space may not cause physical pain. But being beaten in full view, this kind of humiliation may be something that people have never experienced in a physical space. For virtual spaces, it may be necessary to think specially about how to resolve negative emotions, or give countermeasures against violent incidents. The current frequent occurrence of cyber violence incidents can be regarded as a reminder of similar scenarios in the future.

How to build a database at the moment may be another question close to the essence for the future cities where virtual and real coexist. If the data is used as a commodity for long-term bidding rankings, etc., rather than as a corpus for training an algorithm, then the difference in the accumulated data will lead to differences in the final training results of the entire model. Yang Qingfeng also expressed some concerns about this.

On the other hand, when technology promotes new intelligent forms to participate in the creation of urban culture, how to sign the creation is also something that future cities need to seriously consider. Pan Ji believes that many academic research or works of art will become a collaborative product of individuals and technology. This means that the newly created knowledge will be integrated into the grand process of digital operation, and the identity of the author will be lost in the process of intelligent network automation and re-creation more and more quickly.

The key to the mapping of real space is empowerment

Digital technology can instantly summon the experience of time and space far away. In this sense, unlike the previous history that was precipitated by architecture, the city where the virtual and the real coexist will become the scene of the evolution of time and space, and a new cultural memory will be born from this. "The history and memory of the city are embedded in discrete spaces everywhere and can be used at any time. It is necessary to consider how digital technology and the historical memory of a specific city, the accumulation of symbols, and even the current economic and cultural context are formed. Creative resonance, giving birth to a new urban civilization."

Realistic urban spaces will also have new scenarios. Zhang Yuxing, a researcher at the School of Architecture and Urban Planning of Shenzhen University, believes that this is similar to the collage concept of postmodernism. In the next stage, the operation of virtual space will have a great impact on people's values. He imagined that in the future, a group of people might enter the so-called metaverse in a specific space. A space that can adapt to the demands of the metaverse may not have requirements for vision, but it does have requirements for hearing, smell, etc. In addition, the virtual space also has a negative impact on the physical space, and it is likely to be constructed and mapped in the real space.

Chen Qiufan mentioned that it is necessary to figure out which part is better in virtual space and which part is better in physical space, and combine the two. The commercial districts of the current city are converging, which makes people feel monotonous. The space that combines virtual and real may lead to diversity. For example, when people go to a cafe, they can use AR or VR to make the place the style they want. As a result, cities can use technology to expand their tolerance for multiculturalism.

Zhang Yuxing cited three kinds of virtual and real resonances in the city. The first is the consumer side. The current value system of the city has changed. In the past, buildings were evaluated based on location, quality, safety, sturdiness, and functionality, but now they are evaluated in terms of comfort, attractiveness, whether there are interesting people, whether they are online celebrity check-in points, whether there are enough stories, and whether they can be exposed to new Lifestyle and more business types are considered. Modern planners and architects are also influenced by the Internet and become designers of new lifestyles.

The second is aesthetic standards. Many aesthetic standards were established in the modernist revolution. In Le Corbusier's "Towards a New Architecture", "Glorious City" and other books, he started from aesthetics rather than production efficiency, and believed that machines, cars, and ships were the most beautiful, which moved that generation. The collage form that appears on the Internet today will continue to change and affect the existing urban architectural space if we give you a more in-depth description.

The third is to return to the production side, that is, whether the production efficiency can be improved. In other words, technology should answer the most essential needs of people, for example, whether housing prices can be reduced and more living space can be provided for everyone. This is the last answer of Le Corbusier in "Towards a New Architecture". Mechanization has improved efficiency. With the help of modernist architecture, houses can be mass-produced on a large scale, and everyone can live in them. This promise was very attractive to people at the time. Then, if modern digital technology claims that the combination of ICT and existing construction technology can provide everyone with a house and solve the problem of home ownership, it will inevitably affect the entire social system.

In Zhang Yuxing's view, the essence of ICT is virtual time and space, and everyone can independently create their own information space. If this system is highly matched with the physical space system, the two can be better compatible. In the future, it is possible for everyone to build a house in the virtual space. On the premise of meeting the requirements of hardware facilities and structure, it is possible to convert it into the real space, and then truly realize the resonance of virtual and real.

Leading fair development with consensus

Real technology will definitely widen the gap between classes. According to Hegel's logic, because they do not have the conditions and ability to master and apply technology, some people are like flowers in the progress of the wheel of spirit, and they will be crushed on the way. We don't want to be like that, and we don't want others to be like that. But objectively, there must be such a group of people.

Technology is about the possibility of equitable development. In terms of urban and rural development, Lu Bin, a professor at the School of Urban and Environmental Sciences at Peking University, put forward the idea that technology can be actively used to empower the disadvantaged. For example, you can try to use the blockchain model to solve the problem of tourism development. Nowadays, tourist destinations are distributed in mountains and rivers, and local villagers often do not have the ability to package products; and professional planning teams often have difficulty coordinating with the local area in terms of benefit distribution and management. Adopting the blockchain model can allow villagers and operators to form a community of interests, solve trust problems, and share development prospects.

To a certain extent, helping others to help themselves will create consensus and lead to higher goals. For example, environmental issues could be targeted. Chen Qiufan once imagined in a novel that Brisbane, Australia adopts a new currency system in the virtual world to promote the protection of the Great Barrier Reef. This kind of currency has spiritual incentive properties, similar to social currency, encouraging people to contribute to the community, complete self-realization and pursuit, and guide young people to do public welfare. Including volunteering to take care of the elderly, picking up plastic waste, etc. Chen Qiufan believes that our cities can also use gamification to set up such tasks.

In other words, it is not just a one-time act of donating money, but to guide people's consciousness change in urban life. We cannot just please people blindly, but we need to change our concepts and awareness in order to truly empower people and create a fairer city. Only by establishing a positive incentive mechanism can we work together to achieve public and benevolent goals and operate sustainably. This is in line with the concept of responsible public welfare.

"If you don't adapt to these changes, digital technology will not defeat you in the end, but will make you isolated, and no one will respond to you." Pan Ji mentioned to us that as a consequence, once excluded from the digital space-time Outside the technological social system, the entire city may become an "abandoned land". Although there may still be some resources in the local time and space, which can continue to operate, the impact is irrelevant.

Summarize

The future city is actually a fusion of physical space, social space and information space, breaking the boundary barrier between physical space and social space, and reorganizing and interweaving. This new way of organizing space is beyond our experience. After AIGC realized the emergence of intelligence, we found that in just a few years, the production and transfer methods of matter, energy and information in the human world have undergone revolutionary changes, which will inevitably bring about a new round of urban revolution. Therefore, it is necessary for us to explore the mechanism by which digital technology acts on physical space and social space at this point in time, and how to adjust the original system to adapt to new technology.

The greatest complexity of a city comes from people and society. For this Morton system, human-machine cooperation and collaboration are particularly important. On the one hand, we can already see that AI will learn a large number of jobs that human intelligence is good at in a short period of time, and the liberated people may engage in more advanced jobs; A tool platform that facilitates participation in urban decision-making. With the trend of digital and real integration, the boundaries between games and reality are gradually blurring.

To this end, we have also compiled and released the "Future City Manual" together with Teiduhui, explaining our understanding of the future city, and hope to discuss and form a consensus with you. We look forward to thinking and co-creating with us at WecityX.tencent.com.