Project Overview
Summary
For this endeavor, we are developing an innovative, interactive, AI-generated immersive experience slated for presentation at LIB, designed to invoke transformative states of awe among participants. I, Amanda Gregory, am a multimedia performer, opera singer, neuro music composer, and psychoacoustic sound artist blending opera with visual elements, am collaborating with an international cadre of experts in machine learning, biometric technologies, scientific research, and spatial sound engineering.
By harnessing the most advanced stable diffusion and gestural control technologies, we are crafting a 30-minute, time-lapsed voyage through the universe. Our goal is to kindle inspiration for a dynamically collaborative and regenerative future, spotlighting the profound potential we hold as creators in this world. This project would combine AI-generated music, AI-generated visuals, 3D sound, motion tracking, gesture control of synchronized sound and visual parameters, vocal cymatics and psychoacoustic, offering a unique, immersive experience that highlights the transformative power of AI in fostering deep, emotional, and cognitive engagements with art.
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Time-lapsed Narrative
The visual journey begins with the Big Bang, swiftly transitioning into a time-lapse of galaxies forming, culminating in Earth's formation. The focus narrows to Earth, capturing its transition through time until the emergence of life, zooming into hot springs and the primordial microbial soup where life first sparked. The narrative then dives into a microscopic view, where colliding DNA organelles and proteins organize into a single cell, before zooming further into this cell.
From this microscopic perspective, the scene transitions into a time-lapse of evolutionary biology, tracing the lineage of human ancestry from a single cell through various organisms still residing in the ocean. The viewpoint shifts to a first-person perspective, following organisms as they venture onto land, evolving limbs and hands, then broadening to showcase the dynamic landscape of nature and the transformation of plant life over eons.
The narrative returns to the early mammals in human ancestry, presenting a panoramic view of nature's time-lapse across different global environments. A creative twist introduces a grid of windows, reminiscent of a Zoom meeting, each displaying a stable diffusion time-lapse of different evolutionary branches - reptiles branching into birds, mammals, and other species. These windows eventually merge into a cohesive scene depicting humans, animals, and nature evolving together across continents and environments through ancient history to the present.
The focus then zooms into a human cell, gradually zooming out to artistically visualize the electromagnetic activity at each scale, eventually revealing a community of organisms. This expands into a concentric circle of people engaged in a monkey chant, evolving into ecstatic dance with silent disco headphones. This visualization highlights the interconnected human biofields with the electromagnetic fields of the surrounding trees and atmosphere, observing the synergetic exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide between trees and animals, including humans. Projecting potential futures of harmonious coexistence with nature, the narrative integrates advancements in synthetic biology and artificial intelligence, culminating in a reflection on the interconnectedness of all beings and a rapid montage of inspiring future world/reality depictions.
Zooming out further, the entire biosphere comes into view, showcasing the elemental dance of water, fire, earth, and air, drawing parallels between the systems of the human body and the biosphere. The scene then zooms out to the sun at the center, with orbiting planets visualized in spiraling geometric patterns and trails of movement, before expanding to showcase a nebula. The screen transitions rapidly between various nebulae, emphasizing the diversity and beauty of these celestial structures, highlighting the fractal parallels between nebulas and cells.
The narrative continues to zoom out, revealing galaxies in a manner akin to observing how cells form an organ system, eventually showing the universe and then the concept of the multiverse. The journey concludes by tying back to the concept of infinite Big Bangs, creating a cyclical narrative that connects the macrocosm of the universe to the microcosm of cellular life, and ultimately, to the ongoing cycles of creation and existence.
Artistic Vision and Scientific Inspiration
Audiovisualization of Neurobiology and Theories of Consciousness
Moreover, the narrative weaves in scientific theories on consciousness, such as Jonathan Schooler’s Nested Observer Window Theory, offering audiences a fractal journey from the minutiae of subatomic particles to the vastness of the multiverse, exploring the interconnected streams of consciousness. In partnership with visual artist and TouchDesigner programmer Scott Gregory, we employ specific gestures to modulate visuals that map elements and parameters of Schooler’s Three Dimensions of Time Theory. The accompanying soundscapes are designed to highlight consciousness "windows" across different scales, with tempo variations symbolizing the dynamic flux in subjective time experiences across diverse species. In later stages, the visuals present a tapestry of parallel potential realities, illustrating Schooler’s theory on alternative dimensions of time. Here is a link to explore his theory.
Science of the Imagination
The visual narrative will also depict how human imagination has intertwined with the material world throughout history, progressing into a sequence where a blossoming montage of thousands of AI-generated images envision a more beautiful world. These images are created from text prompts sourced in collaboration with the Buckminster Fuller Institute, Design Science Studio, and the Arthur C. Clarke Institute for the Imagination. This element of the project includes collaboration with Roxi Shohadaee, the director of the Design Science Studio; researcher Zoë Fowler; and Cassandra Vieten, Ph.D., a renowned expert in consciousness studies and founder of the Science of the Imagination conference. As the Director of Research at the Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination, and having been the CEO/President of the Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS), Cassie has much experience merging scientific inquiry with technology, humanities, and the arts to explore the potential of imagination.
Similarly, Zoë Fowler has made significant contributions to research that aligns with our project's core motivations, especially regarding how the vivid visualizations of imagination can be materialized and enhanced through collaborative efforts. Zoë's pioneering research provides insights into how shared imagination can not only anticipate the future but also reinforce social connections in the present.
Recent collaborator Kyle Fiore Law, has conducted research involving eight studies with 9,570 US participants, revealing that self-oriented prospection—imagining oneself in the future—strengthens our sense of responsibility towards future generations. It demonstrates that seeing our present and future selves as connected (Future Self-Continuity) and considering how our actions impact our future (Consideration of Future Consequences) boosts our sense of responsibility, efficacy, and identification with future generations. Our collaboration aims to prime audiences to envision themselves in these future scenarios, adopting roles like congress members to foster behavior change towards long-term collective welfare. By integrating these insights, we aim to inspire actions that benefit future generations, leveraging the power of AI to create images that represent not only a more optimistic future but also motivate individuals to contribute to its realization.
Through collaboration with multiple organizations, we plan to amalgamate thousands of optimistic visions from around the world, creating AI-generated visualizations of a world that is harmonious, mutually rewarding, technologically advanced, sustainably biodiverse, exponentially regenerative, just and creative. We acknowledge that this endeavor is ambitious. Nonetheless, we are hopeful that the performance experience will not only be personally transformative and offer psychophysiological benefits, but will also enhance the potential for humanity's highest aspirational realities to unfold.