Orambra's Tensegrity Systems
Orambra's (the Office for Robotic Architectural Media & the Bureau for Responsive Architecture) responsive tensegrity structure has actuated tensile members for control. The structural redundancy of tensegrity structures echo's Rodney Brook's arguments in his publication 'Cambrian Intelligence', and leads to highly adaptive and robust systems.
However, central control (as opposed to a distributed bottom-top approach) reduces this robustness from a cybernetic point of view. In an architectural setting, where components are routinely maintained and replaced, can we afford a central 'brain'? Or shall we choreograph a population of 'smaller brains', in order to increase robustness?
In parallel to Buckminster Fuller's definition of tensegrity structures as 'compressive members in a sea of tension', shall we view tensegrity robots as 'actuators in a sea of network intelligence' ?