DELEUZE AND THE USE OF THE GENETIC ALGORITHM IN ARCHITECTURE Manuel DeLanda ‘The computer simulation of evolutionary processes is already a well-established technique forthe study of biological dynamics, (One can unleash within a digital environment population of vtual plants or animals and keep track of the way in which these creatures change as they mate and pass theirvirtual genelic materials to ther offspring. The hard work goes into defining the relation between the virtual genes and the virtual bodily traits that they generate; everything else ~ keeping track cof who mated with whom, assigning fess values fo each new form, determining how gene spreads through a population over many generations ~ is a task performed automaticaly by certain computer programs known collec tively as ‘genetic algorithms. The study of the formal and functional properties ofthis type of ‘software has now become a field in itself, quite separate from the applications in biological research which these simulations may have. In this chepter | will deal nether with the eomputer sclence aspects of genetic algorithms (as & special case of ‘search algorithms’) nor with their use in biology, but focus instead on the applications that these techniques may have 8s aids in atitic design. Ina sense evolutionary simulations replace design, since artists can use this software to breed nov forms rather than specifically design them. This is basically corect but, as | argue blow, there isa part of the process in which deliberate design is stil a crucial component ‘though the software itsef is relatively well known and easily avaible, so that users may {get the impression that breeding new forms has become a matte of routine, the space of possible ‘designs that the algorithm searches needs to be sufficient rich forthe evolutionary results to be truly surprising. As an aid in design these tech- niques would be quite useless if the designer could easly foresee what forms will be bred. (Only if vieual evolution can be used to explore & ‘space rich enough so that all the possibilities cannot be considered in advance by the designer, only if what results shocks ora least surprises, can genetic algorithms be considered useful visualisation tools. And inthe task of designing rich search spaces certain philosophical ‘eas, nbich may be traced to the work of Gilles Deleuze, play & very important ol. wil argue = that the productive use of genetic algorithms implies the deployment of three forms of pilo- ephical thinking (eopultionl intensive end topological thinking) which were nat invented by Deleuze but which he has brought together for the fist ime and made the basis fora brand- new conception of the genesis of fxm. “To be abe to apaly the genetic algorithm at al.a articular eld of at neods frst to sohe the problem of ow to represent te final product {@ painting, a song, a building) in terms of the process that generated i and then, how 19 fepresert this process itself as @ well-defined Sequence of operations. tis this sequence oF rather, the computer code thet specifies i that becomes the genetic materia ofthe panting song or building in question. n the case of trehiects using compuleraided desien (CAD) this problem becomes greatly simpiiied given that CAD model ofan architectural structure is already given by a series of operations. A round column for example, is produced by # series Such 2 this: 1 daw ane defining the pole Gf the column; 2) rotate this ne tovyiot a surlace of revolution; 8) perioem a few ‘Boolean subtractions to carve out some detail inthe ‘body of the column, Some software packages sfote this sequence and may even make oval able the actual computer code corespanding to i that this code now becomes the tual DNA of the column. similar procedure is followed to ceate each of he other structural and omametal eloments of a bung [this point we need to bing in ne ofthe ptilosophical resources | mentioned earlier to Understand what happens next: population {hinking, This style of reasoning was created in the 1990s by the biologists wh brought together Darwin's and Mendel theories and sythesised the modern version af evolutionary theory na nutshell, what characterises this style may be phrased as ‘never tink in terms of ‘Adam and Eve but always in terms of laigerreproductive communities More technically the idea is that despite the fact that at any one time an evolved form is realised in indivcual organ- sms, the population, nat the individual is the + mattxfor the production of form. A given animal or plant architecture evokes slowly as genes propagate in a population, at different rates and at different times, so that the new form is slowly synthesised within the larger reproductive ‘community’ The lesson for computer design is simply that once the relationship between the virtual genes and the virtual bodily tats of 2 CAD building has been worked out, as just described, an entire population of such buildings reeds to be unleashed within the computer, not just a couple of them. To the CAD sequence of ‘operations the architect must add points at wich spontaneous mutations may occur (in the column example: the relative proportions of the intial line; the centre of rotation; the shape with wich the Boolean subtraction is performed) and then let these mutant instructions propagate and interact in a collectivity over many generations. To population thinking Deleuze adds another cognitive style which in ts present form is rived trom thermodynamics but which, as he realises, has rots as far back as late medieval philosophy: intensive thinking, The modern definition af an intensive quantity is given by contrast with its opposite, an extensive quantity The latter refers to the magnitudes with which architects are most familar: lengths, areas, volumes. These are defined as magnitudes vihieh can be spatially subdividectf one takes a volume of water, for example, and divides it in two halves, one ends up with two half volumes. ‘The term ‘intensive’, on the other hand, refers to quantties such temperature, pressure or speed, hich cannot be so suodividee: if a volume of water at 90 degrees of temperature is divided in half, one does not end up with two half volumes at 45 degrees but with two halves atthe onginal 90 degrees. Although for Deleuze this lack of Aiisiblly Is important, he also stresses another feature of intensive quantities: a difference of intensity spontaneously tends to cancel itseli but and, in the process, it dives fluxes of matter and energy. lather words, diferences of intensity are productive differences since they drive processes in which the diversity of actual forms is produced: For example the process of ‘embryogenesis, which praduces a human body out of a fertlsed egg is a process even by diferences of intensity (terences of chemical concertraton, of density, of surace tension) What doos this mean forthe architect? That ness ne brings into a CAD model he intense blemerts of structural engineering — basicaly, dfstibutions of stress ~ a vital Suling wil not evche as a bung In other words ifthe olurmn | described above i not ined tothe rest of the bulking asa load-bearing element, by the third or fourth generation this colimn may be paced in such a way that it can no longer perform is funtion of caryng loads in compression The only way cf main sure that structural elements do not ose ther function and hence atthe overall bullng doesnot lose vabity 25a stable structures o some- how represent the dsirbuton cf sresses, a8 wall as what typeof concentrations of stress endanger a sinctue'sintegty as part of the process that ransats vital ganés into bodies. inthe cas of real organisms, if developing embry becomes sicily unviable it wont ven ge o reproductive age to be sorted out by natural selection It gets selected out prorto that. A simlar process woul have to be simu lated inthe computer to make sie tat the products of viral evolution ae vale in terms of structural engineering prior to being selected by the designeria terms af treiraesthetic Ft- Now lets asume that these requirements have indeed been met, pethaps by an architect hacker wo takes existing software (a CAD fackage and a structural engineering packeg®) tnd wites some code to bring the two together ithe or she naw sets out to use Witval evolution» aa design tool, it may be disappointing fo tease the fac that the ony rl let form human is fo be the judge of aesthetc fines in every generation (hati 0 let buicings ce that 9 net look aesthetically promising and et those ‘hat do mata) The role of design has now been» transformed into (some would sey degraded down to) the equivalent ofa prizedog ora race- horse breeder, There clo isan aesthebe Component nthe later wo activites ~ ene in ‘way, scupting| dage or horses ~ but hardy the kind of cretvty that one identifies withthe development ofa personal artiste ste. [Although today slogans abot the ceath ofthe author and atttudes aganst the romantic vew