Event 4 (Extra Credit)

For my fourth event, I attended a street performance offered by The Laboratory for Embodied Intelligences on June 3, 2017. The theme of the performance is "Trying out Bacterial Behaviors". The performance was to explain the idea that human thought and signals are based on chemical and physical abilities latent in bacteria. Each performer acted as a single bacteria cell and demonstrated that mindness is the internalization of movement.

LEI Performance 

The performance took place in a tunnel and outside the tunnel. The tunnel represents an environment we are familiar with. The performance in the tunnel simulated single cell behavior and multi-cell clusters behavior. For single cells, each "bacteria" could move toward any direction it wanted. They have figured out a way to sense large environment without sending signals to communicate with each other. For the multi-cell clusters, "bacteria" turn on group behaviors. A signal by one cell itself may not be meaningful. They are moving as a group. A successful movement requires all of the cells participating in unison. The kind of junction between individuals indicates the quality of communication between them. Regardless of single cell or multi-cell clusters behavior, the bacteria travel a long distance with a high speed when they sense the right direction. Otherwise, they would just make a small movement with a low speed.

Performance in the tunnel


After that, the performers moved toward the exit of the tunnel and performed on the street. These "bacteria" moved in random directions. It seemed that they did not want to stay together anymore and moved further away from each other. Finally, these performers disappeared at the end of the street. The street or wide field represents an unknown world of bacteria where human beings have not known.

Performance on the street

It was an interesting performance and I would definitely recommend this event to other students. This event showed how art performance can be used to help understand and explore science concepts. The art performance explored science concepts without using advanced technologies. This reminds me of Copernicus's achievement that he found out that the sun locates near the center of the universe, a remarkable discovery at the time when advanced technologies were not available. It was also observed that the performers were sweating during the performance and I could feel that a big amount of energy was consumed while they were just moving a small distance relative to their body size. However, when bacterias are moving, they are moving a much long distance relative to their size, which requires much more energy than human beings do. I realize how powerful they are.

Proof of attendance


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