TTF2020 Remote Fellowship: THE MACRO-ENGINEERING READER
James Boyd (US)
Macro-Engineering is a design field with a colossal range that includes everything from large civil engineering projects and innovative techniques in geoengineering to architectures in orbital space and astroengineering pursuits requiring advanced technological capabilities. The impressive interdisciplinary and multi-scalar portfolio of the field notwithstanding, theoretical work remains to be done in order to effectively admit a project range as such within a coherent field of study with a consistent Methodology.
Methodological divergences tend to increase as one moves toward the astroengineering extrema of macro-engineering. Such works are motivated by science fiction. If astroengineering is to be a part of macro-engineering, however, it must adhere to common design principles. Perhaps in an effort to distance itself from its science fiction origins, astroengineering has become an astrobiological field in which observational studies are conducted in search of human astroengineering designs built by other advanced civilizations. Such an approach is not only absurd, it loses sight of the important promise of (hard) science fiction: the design of new technologies and the application of systematic thinking beyond existing methodologies. If macro-engineering can reconcile engineering and science fiction, perhaps it can develop into a consistent field.
The project was developed during The Terraforming 2020 at the Strelka Institute for Media, Architecture and Design in Moscow, Russia
https://theterraforming.strelka.com/
Program Director: Benjamin H. Bratton
Program Design Tutors: Nicolay Boyadjiev
TTF 2020 Fellowship – The Macro-Engineering Reader