Is it really healthy to program perception?

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So I recently saw this Ted talk where Blaise Agüera y Arcas shows great improvements the Google teams has made in computers working with neural networks. Basically what the team did was to find a way to interpret an image using neural networks to make an answer, for example take a picture of a bird and the computer could tell you that was a bird and which bird is it. Blaise explained the approach in a mathematical way: X is the picture of the bird, W is the neural network and Y the answer, so if we “multiply” X and W we could get Y. After a brilliant solution to the problem they managed to solve for Y, and that’s how we got Google Photos recognition and so forth.

BUT, then they started solving for the other letters, and that’s when it got weird. So now what they did was to give the computer a word (bird for example) and the picture, and the computer would create the neural network to get there. Same for X, they gave the word and the network and they would create an accurate picture. Still brilliant, bravo. However the conclusion Blaise made was that they could program perception, thus perception is a thing independent from the persons personality and it comes with the brain we all have.

I think this is partially true. Yes perception can be tricked to make people see different things (as perception exercises do) and almost all people fall for the same thing, but the kind of perception that leads to creativity does not work the same way (remember at the start of the talk Blaise said perception leads to creativity). I think, if we could really program perception I would be able to see the same man coming out of the marble as Michelangelo did, and obviously I can’t. If we could “solve” for perception I would get the same idea from a painting that my friend right next to me is getting, and it doesn’t work like that.

In the process of programming perception we are shutting our minds to all the other solutions this mathematical system has, and I fear that people would conform with “the solution” and start trusting only one of the ways of seeing the world as  the only one. I don’t think google will actually do this, but in the seek for coding creativity we’ve just might taken a step back.

Thoughts?

From the major to the world

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Hey there! I wanted to share a thought with the world.

Recently I started working a summer job as a trainee at Innspiral, a consultant company that helps create and manage innovation.

I found out that the things I learnt at the major were by far the most useful as working in innovation, and I’m glad to say that I’ve contributed to my job because of that. I started by doing some design research, then data mining and service prototyping, working with incredibly proficient people that – as the company’s name says – inspire greatness and make you want to innovate even more.

Thanks to all the team at the Engie Factory project for all they’ve taught me, I hope to continue learning even more in the weeks to come.

“The Entrepreneur I don’t want to be” / What would I do with my first million.

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Last Wednesday as part as the ING2030 class, two entrepreneurs came to talk about their businesses, supposedly with the intention of motivating us to begin our own adventure as entrepreneurs. I was really looking forward to this talk, because mainly I have my idea of who I would like to be, and was hoping to start deciding a way to get there.

My hopes weren’t disappointed at all with the talk, but I was. The thing is i didn’t found a way to get to the person I want to be, but I found a path that absolutely wouldn’t take me there, and it was the path that (particularly one) this entrepreneurs took.

The first guy to speak said a lot of really coherent things, that put all together made a really incoherent person, for example: the talk about giving the best you could do to your project, and to be sure you were doing all possible to make it work –including staying late working, or not getting paid, among others–. Then he talked about having fun, and not getting absorbed because of your job, and the way to do so, he said, was to go to bed early, and leave the office on time, maybe delaying some emails in order to get time for yourself. These two made a lot of sense when apart, but for a person to do both at the same time it was a little incoherent, and this made me think about if this entrepreneur that was supposed to clarify things to us had his life even clarified for himself.

The second guy I hated the most. Well, I didn’t hated him, but i did hate the way he talk about his success. He defined his life success as to be able to buy a Porsche with his first million, and luckily he had enough money to buy a bankrupted company to then have even more luck so that three days later, Groupon would buy his company at a 300% the price he payed.  What did he do?, he bought a soccer team.

As he continued to talk about his luck in business, and attributing this luck to talent, I began to understand that I wasn’t jealous of him, instead I felt sorry for him. For guy to have so little ambition that with a million dollars he would buy a Porsche, and with all his luck to have accomplished so little, I then realized that than kind of entrepreneur was exactly the one I didn’t want to be.

I want to be a person that takes the most advantage of the situation he’s into, and tries to use that advantage for a better living, not only for him, but for the rest of the world as well. I want to be a guy that’s passionate about what he does, and not about the money he’s gonna earn for doing it. I want to be a guy that’s a lot more selfless than the entrepreneur in front of me that day, a guy that can inspire people to create, to build, to think, to contribute to the world on the thing they do better.

I don’t know what I would do with my first million, but as sure as hell I wouldn’t buy a Porsche.

This is me.

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As today, November 10th, 2015, I’m starting this blog to archive and tell you all about my works, projects, ambitions, achievements etc as a Mechanical Engineering student, but specially about Design Engineering, my major and my passion.

A little bit about me.

In 2012 i entered the Engineering School at Pontificia Universidad Católica, and was absolutely delighted with the excellency of the place. Everybody was so smart, I was proud to be there.

In 2013 i took a decision that’ll change my life forever: I decided to change curriculum from a knowledge based curriculum, to a proficiency based one with one thing in mind, the Major in Engineering, Design and Innovation. In the major I met Constanza Miranda, Catalina Cortázar and Gabriela García, the three powerpuff girls, the major IDI teachers.

My first course at the major was Visual Thinking, in which I learned about Big Data, Visualizations, data mining, and finally: Arduino Computing. I absolutely loved the course, so much that after a few semesters I became the TA. My final project in the course was a Racing Game based on the oil prices of Chile, divided by regions. The idea of the game was that the players had to choose which region to fill the tank with the same money, and depending on the price the tank will fill more or less. Then they’ll race, and when the gas was spent the cars will stop, and the player that chose the more expensive region will lose the race.

That semester I also took a Design School course called “Models and Prototypes” and found my passion for product design. In the course I learnt about different ways of prototyping, from paper to resin, wire, clay and plastics. I developed lots of small projects, maybe I’ll upload a photo later.

The next semester I took Anthro-Design, a project base course focused on teaching a particular design methodology that will follow me through all my future projects. I learnt about “personas (Kolko)”, “Journey Maps”, “Customer Journey” and a lot other tools that helped me develop a focused ethnographic project for the Santiago Metropolitan Park. Here’s the link to the blog: http://espaciosmet.weebly.com/

The Design School I took that semester was Ergonomics, there I learnt about the different aspects of the discipline, also I worked on a project for a disabled person, that consisted on adapting the house to the special needs of the user.

Last semester I took one of the main courses of the Major: DILAB. DILAB was a course that took the learnings from Anthro-Design and applied them to a full product development project. My project was to design an antiseismic wine fermentation tank rest. The results were great, we developed a tank foot considering a user centered design, and the user needs. You can check out more info about the project in the blog: https://sismotinto.wordpress.com/

The last course from the Design School I’ve taken so far was “Cad/CAM Design Manufacture”. In the course I learnt via projects about Laser Cutting, 3D printing, and CNC Cutting, and i worked creating some great projects like a CNC cut bike, a 3D printed prosthesis, and a lot more. I’ll probably upload photos later.

Right now I’m working as a TA for Visual Thinking and Engineering Challenges, the main starting course for freshmen year. I’m also working as an Associate Instructor for the Major, that meaning I’m in charge of the 3D Printers, the major Dorkshops, and to act as a TA for the major students. I love what i do, and I plan to continue doing it for a while. I’ve applied to the university’s exchange program, and I hope to study Product Design at Lund University, in Sweden.

That’s it for today, I’ll keep you updated!