FutureAir

Author: futurea6_new

This is Air

April 2020

‘There are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, “Morning, boys, how’s the water?” And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, “What the hell is water?”‘

David Foster Wallace famously relayed the fish parable during his 2005 commencement speech at Kenyon College. The tale prefaced a lecture arguing against living an oblivious, unconscious life. Now, his most widely read essay, “This is Water”, is a testament of the times; times in which we often chose oblivion over awareness.

Over the course of the past five years, FutureAir has focused on the science of air – examining how and why indoor air is often more dangerous than the air outside – with the goal of improving the air we breathe indoors. The formula is simple: expand awareness of the problem and then provide a solution. We want people to look around and ask “What the hell is indoor air?” and later yell out, “AIR IS ABOUT MORE THAN JUST TEMPERATURE!”

Most of us never thought to question the air in the spaces where we spend most of our time – home, office, school; we didn’t think twice when buildings were sealed and non-operable became the norm. We do not even consider that thermostats should measure more than just temperature; nor can we recall when the first state-wide ban on smoking indoors went into effect (in 1995).

FutureAir’s inquiry into the seemingly common elements that surround us begs the importance of considering “hard-to-see” forces at work around us. FutureAir awakens us to the reality that the systems most familiar to us are often the ones we question the least and the things we take for granted may lead to unforeseen harm. In probing the atmosphere around us, we uncover endless opportunities for improvement.

Read the next segment of our inquiry into the invisible forces around us here.

Wallace, David Foster. This Is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion about Living a Compassionate Life. Little, Brown, 2009.

Written by Mollie Wodenshek for Future Air

This is: Women & Power

April 2020

In light of examining the systems around us, FutureAir founder and CEO, Simone Rothman, recently read Mary Beard’s, Women & Power. The two-part lecture examines women’s voices in Western history.

Beard harks back to antiquity and recalls accounts of women who, one way or another, lost their ability to speak. Odysseus’s wife, Penelope, is silenced by her son; Ponce cuts out Philomela’s tongue; the nymph Echo is only able to repeat the speech of others. Historically and literally, authoritative figures repeatedly silence women. Not only are women excluded from speech, but Greco-Roman texts attribute the capacity for public speech and oration as defining qualities of “maleness”.

The Greco-Roman era may be distant in time, but the traditions of gendered speech make up the foundation of modern speaking:

“Our traditions of debate and public speaking, their conventions, and rules, still lie very much in the shadow of the classical world… Classical traditions have provided us with a powerful template for thinking about public speaking and for deciding what counts as good oratory or bad, persuasive or not, and whose speech is to be given space to be heard; and gender is obviously an important part of that mix.”

Male civilizations of antiquity have heavily influenced the rubric of powerful speech. Those classical actors excluded women’s voices from the tradition of oration. This exclusion, Beard argues, established a Western civilization rhetoric rubric that does not hear authority in women’s voices. So it goes, that women, associated with a lack of authority, find themselves powerless.

Faced with this challenge, women often adopt male rhetoric in order to be included, but ultimately, we feel alienated. The issue here is not the women, but the rhetoric rubric women are expected to adhere to. “We have to be more reflective about what power is, what it is for, and how it is measured. To put it another way, if women are not perceived to be fully within the structures of power, surely it is ‘power’ that we need to redefine rather than ‘women’,” Beard writes.

As a founder of a tech start-up, Simone understands the necessity of powerful speech. But in navigating the invisible world of indoor air, she must also navigate the insidious structures of gender inequality. Having the wherewithal to simultaneously fight for one’s cause and compel people to listen requires twice the effort for considerably less reward.

The systemic forces at work cause an ingrained, historical, inherited sinking feeling of inadequacy for women when speaking in male-dominated spaces. A system that lacks the space for women’s voices reminds me of structural design that lacks the ability to measure indoor air quality. A system with ample examples of male oration and a void where female speech should exist parallels the endless outdoor air research and the lack of indoor air research. The overall non-acknowledgment of women’s speech and indoor air leads me to believe that we at FutureAir are measuring so much more than air. We are establishing visibility for both indoor air and women!

Follow the link here to continue investigating the distribution of visibility with FutureAir.

Beard, Mary. Women & Power: a Manifesto. Profile Books Ltd, 2018.

Image: John William Waterhouse, Echo and Narcissus – Google Art Project

Written by Mollie Wodenshek for FutureAir

This is: Coronavirus

April 2020

The Coronavirus pandemic has taken our world by storm, and it is our responsibility to continue to examine the forces at work that lead to unforeseen harm.

As our “normal” life has come to a halt the invisibility cloak has been lifted. We now see the individuals most at risk, we now see the areas with the most fraught medical infrastructure and their population demographics, we now see those workers deemed essential, we see the people that uphold our daily lives. We also see that visibility does not beget equality, and the distance between visibility and equality is work.

A study from the Center for Disease Control released on April 8, 2020, details how 33% of COVID-19 hospitalized patients are African American descent and the black demographic accounts for 13% of the U.S. population. In comparison, the white demographic, which accounts for 76% of the U.S. population, made up 45% of COVID-19 hospitalizations [NPR]. Evidently, the African American community is disproportionately affected by coronavirus.

Essential workers are required to continue working at no additional compensation for the added risk of contracting coronavirus. Many of these workers are paid minimum wage. The Trump administration recently suggested cutting wages of foreign guest workers on U.S. farms in order to assist the agriculture industry – an industry that received a $9.5 billion disaster aid relief package [Common Dreams]. Vulnerable workers are deemed essential and undercut in one fell swoop.

The New York Times detailed findings from a Harvard study in which higher rates of outdoor air pollution are associated with higher rates of hospitalization from COVID-19. Communities with high rates of PM 2.5 are at greater risk of illness. Those areas with the highest rates of pollution are also home to some of the most vulnerable communities. In New York City, areas of Queens, with numerous polluting power plants, have been hit hardest by the coronavirus, which is home to dense immigrant communities.

How have we played a role in creating these realities?

The evidence goes on. There are countless examples of injustice and inequality throughout our ‘normal’ daily lives, but on any other day, we choose ignorance. Coronavirus has exposed our fraught democratic system and shined a light on the overlooked and marginalized communities within that system. The evidence is more potent and direr than ever, and we must choose to see the forces of inequality, acknowledge the disenfranchised, and we must unlearn ingrained and inherited systems of inequality.

In these trying times, we may not have all the solutions…or any solutions at all. But at this moment, FutureAir is looking for the bright side – read about it here.

Aubrey, Allison, and Joe Neel. “CDC Hospital Data Point To Racial Disparity In COVID-19 Cases.” NPR, NPR, 8 Apr. 2020, www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/04/08/830030932/cdc-hospital-data-point-to-racial-disparity-in-covid-19-cases.

Friedman, Lisa. “New Research Links Air Pollution to Higher Coronavirus Death Rates.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 7 Apr. 2020, www.nytimes.com/2020/04/07/climate/air-pollution-coronavirus-covid.html?referringSource=articleShare.

Johnson, Jake. “’Bullying of Marginalized Workers’: Trump Moves to Slash Pay of Guest Farmworkers Amid Covid-19 Crisis.” Common Dreams, 11 Apr. 2020, www.commondreams.org/news/2020/04/11/bullying-marginalized-workers-trump-moves-slash-pay-guest-farmworkers-amid-covid-19.

Schuessler, Jennifer. “The Overlooked History of Women at Work.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 16 Jan. 2020, www.nytimes.com/2020/01/16/arts/design/womens-work-grolier-club.html.

Written by Mollie Wodenshek for FutureAir

This is: The Upside

April 2020

I always like to compare major events in life to traveling through a tunnel. Although you may not be able to see the end while going through it, you will eventually come out on the other side – that much we can be sure of. The other side often looks different too. It brings you somewhere else, to a new state or new landscape; the tunnel embodies change.

When we are forced to slow down and question the things that we are most comfortable with we have to be open to change. It is one thing to acknowledge the systems at work and their shortcomings but it is another thing to welcome something different in its place.

A piece from Dutch author, Matthias Horx titled, “The Post Corona World” reflects on the impact of coronavirus from a point in the future – from the other end of the tunnel. He calls this RE-gnosis. He writes, “paradoxically, the physical distance that the virus forced upon us also created new closeness.” It is precisely that closeness that FutureAir seeks. Closeness to our community, our environment, and ourselves. A closeness that allows us to acknowledge the invisible, make it visible, and then make a change.

However, our new normal will not come to be simply through observation and awareness. This process takes work. For those of us experiencing the slowed-down nature of our current global situation, we have the opportunity to be deliberate with our actions – we have the opportunity to pay attention.

Horx, Matthias. “48 – The Post Corona World.” Matthias Horx, 16 Mar. 2020, www.horx.com/en/48-the-post-corona-world/.

© imagoimages

Written by Mollie Wodenshek for FutureAir

Work Fatigue: Testing Indoor Air Quality at the Office

June 2019

Harvard Study shows a link between cognitive functioning and indoor air quality in office environments

The Harvard study “Associations of Cognitive Function Scores with Carbon Dioxide, Ventilation, and Volatile Organic Compound Exposures in Office Workers: A Controlled Exposure Study of Green and Conventional Office Environments” outlines the relationship between indoor air composition and cognitive function. Unlike various other biased studies done on indoor air quality, where test subjects were often told of the poor air quality before taking or participating in the experiment, Joseph G. Allen and his team designed their experiment to be as fair as possible, citing their goal to “objectively quantify the impact of indoor environment on higher order cognitive function.”

Allen and his team ran an experiment that isolated the effects of poor indoor air quality on office workers, using the Strategic Management Simulation (SMS) computer-based cognitive test, two identical office spaces, and different kinds of air pollutants. When introducing participants to the study, it was essential that Allen and his team not reveal the status of the indoor environment, as it might influence the subjects’ behavior. The participant pool was comprised of 24 professional-grade employees who were instructed to arrive at 9 a.m. on 3 specific days for two consecutive weeks. Participants were encouraged to perform their usual work until 3 p.m., when they would be given the SMS test. Behind the scenes, however, Allen and his team were artificially controlling the levels of outdoor air, CO2, and VOCs in the offices. Air movement throughout the office was kept constant at 40 cfm/person, but the amount of outdoor air flowing through the ventilation system, CO2, and VOCs were variable and manipulated throughout the test.

Allen and his team used different amounts of outdoor air, CO2, and VOCs for each of the days, experimenting with “Conventional” office levels, “Green” office levels, and optimal concentrations they called “Green+” office levels.

Since the SMS test could be objectively scored with a numeric value, Allen and his team were able to normalize the scores across the test sections into coherent charts. As shown in the graph, tests taken in the “Conventional” office environment were consistently the lowest in every category. The largest differences between the “Conventional” and the other, more optimal office settings can be seen in the categories, “Crisis Response,” “Information Seeking,” and “Strategy.” Allen and his team confirmed that the results of five of the nine total functions tested in the SMS were statistically significant.

The results, while not conclusive, do demonstrate a correlation between certain cognitive functions and the environment in which one works. Studies such as this one are useful because they help make lesser known issues like indoor air quality more mainstream in the scientific community, which increases the chance that future studies will come up with a solution that ends the problem.

Written by Ryo Shimada for FutureAir.

Dumb and Dumb Air

May 2019

A recent article from The New York Times suggests that the conversation about indoor air quality has entered the collective consciousness. That is to say, beyond physical health risks, indoor air quality effects on our mental capabilities as well.

For the last fifty years, builders and contractors have focused on eliminating the threats of outdoor air pollution while inside. Building codes require sealing that reduce the amount of air flow in exchange for better greater efficiency for heating and cooling systems. However, these sealing processes have created dangerous indoor climates. When we sit in sealed room toxins from chemical product treatments and our own human breath build up and create harmful environments.

Studies have demonstrated the detrimental effects that indoor air toxins pose to brain function. In 2009, William Fisk, a mechanical engineer at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, experimented with indoor air pollution and found that people performed far worse when exposed to levels of carbon dioxide at 2,500ppm than those exposed to 1,000ppm of carbon dioxide. The New York Times stated that these levels are not usual in crowded spaces.

Since Dr. Fisk’s study, other scientists have taken up the issue of indoor air pollution. A Harvard study tracked its participants over a six-day period. They found that over the time span, as the levels of carbon dioxide grew from 500 ppm to 1,400 ppm, participants test score plummeted. The scientists were stunned by the results, not because of the decline in mental functions, but because the carbon dioxide levels they experimented with were not unusual. The levels of carbon dioxide they tested could be found in most indoor settings.

Although these studies demonstrate a negative relationship between indoor air quality and cognitive performance, the evidence is still far and few between. As The Times pointe out, other experiments have not met the same conclusion. The truth is that if you’re not looking for the effects of indoor air pollution, then you will not find them. Indoor air pollution is a silent killer.

Ultimately, we spend most of our times indoors and most of the time, our most important decisions are made indoors, often in small rooms with no ventilation. The New York Times’ article, “Is Conference Room Air Making You Dumber?” begs the question.

Other evidence suggests, “increasing the ventilation rate in schools can raise children’s scores on tests and speed at tasks, and reduce absences.” If we are already designing spaces for maximum performance and productivity, then these studies suggest going the extra mile to account for the factors that we cannot see.

The article concluded, “without a specialized sensor, you can’t really know how much carbon dioxide is building up while you hunker down in a small room for a long meeting.” If we only change the things that we can see and measure (think heating and cooling efficiency) than it is imminent that we invest in tools to make the invisible visible. Accounting for air quality in the spaces we spend the most time in will improve our health, cognitive functions, and our peace of mind.

“Is Conference Room Air Making You Dumber?” The New York Times

Written for FutureAir by Mollie Wodenshek

Image Credit: Hanna Barczyk

The FutureAir Mission

March 2019

Musings on Language and Culture

I remember a time in college when I believed that language could change the world. I thought if we altered our vocabulary we could alter our perspectives. A sort of reverse brain wiring. Although the relationship between language and brain development has been hotly contested, especially amongst psychoanalysts, I still believed in the power of language to shape perspective and culture. By now, I have come to accept language as a tool rather than the end. So, how do we choose words to reflect the future culture we want to see. How do we build the world we want to live in through language?

In working with FutureAir, I have come to recognize the importance of the moment we are in. FutureAir is more than a startup company designing a product to offer a solution to a problem. Beyond FutureAir’s utilitarian value, we are creating awareness. We are opening a door. Perhaps we are opening Pandora’s box, but it is a risk we are willing to take.

The idea of FutureAir is to reevaluate the spaces we spend the most time in and explore the effect of those environments on our health. As a society, since the post-Vietnam war era, we have turned attention toward outdoor air pollution. We have created ways to mitigate the human effect on air pollution. We have enacted measures and plans to counteract the effects of carbon emissions in the air. However, all the while we have been caring for the health of our planet, we have neglected to observe environmental issues closest to home–those within the home. How do the microclimates affect our human health?

What is Clean Indoor Air?

FutureAir is focused on indoor air. In fact, FutureAir hopes to consider indoor air as a resource like outdoor air, water, fossil fuels, etc. In considering indoor air a resource it becomes a part of the common.

In the capitalist American society we live and work in, the common has often become privatized to make a quick buck off exploiting people’s needs while simultaneously excluding low socioeconomic communities from access to resources. FutureAir does not claim to solve this ingrained issue, but we do profess to be a socially-conscious company.

With FutureAir, we are introducing a new resource to the market. The question is: how can we market and brand FutureAir to acknowledge the failures of modern architecture and the dangers of indoor air, while also making the company, and the resource of clean indoor air, inclusive?

Ultimately, everyone deserves access to clean indoor air and FutureAir’s Smart Air Manager™
will allow consumers to monitor the quality of air within their homes. However, FutureAir also hopes to share knowledge, generate awareness, and create behavior change. Perhaps the latter will be met through the language we utilize to shape our mission.

The Dictatorship on Words

On the morning of Martin Luther King Day 2019, I sat down to my computer to address some language choice issues on FutureAir’s one sheet. Co-founder and CEO, Simone Rothman, her daughter, Tess Gruenberg, and I were struggling over how to properly define the mission of FutureAir. We set out to figure out how FutureAir relates to indoor air. Initially, we called clean indoor air a luxury resource, however, luxury necessitated exclusivity, which is counter to the foundation of FutureAir. So, we discussed the novel idea of clean indoor air as, simply, a resource.

I came to realize that clean indoor air was indeed a resource like any other (i.e. air, water, solar, etc.). A resource is defined as a stock or supply of assets that can be drawn on to function effectively. Research has demonstrated the value of clean indoor air as a means for greater health and productivity amongst a workforce. Therefore, clean indoor air is something we need to function effectively. However, the difference between clean indoor air and other common resources listed before is the descriptive word “clean”.

The fact is, clean indoor air is not currently a given. Additionally, clean indoor air is limited. Workplaces, institutions, homes and other buildings have neglected to consider indoor air quality in building infrastructure at least since the 80s. Only in the 2010s have we seen a reversal of this negligent thinking. In FutureAir’s endeavor to bring awareness to the polluted nature of indoor air and provide a means to clean it, we are creating a resource that does not currently exist. It is a resource that comes out of deterioration and reckless development. It is a resource that comes out of decay; perhaps it rises from the ashes.

So the question remains, how do we frame clean indoor air as a resource when it is born from decay and not inherently abundant? How do we frame clean indoor air as a resource when it is a result of the man-made built environment? This brought an even deeper question: how do we, as a society, recognize nature as ubiquitous and not mutually exclusive from the man-made environment?

Ontologically…

As we parsed words on Martin Luther King day, I began to think about Martin Luther King, the master orator, and a MLK scholar I had seen speak at Colorado College in 2017, Russell Rickford. Rickford recited a poetic analysis of the “true” Martin Luther King versus the “King” that is socially acceptable, force-fed to us to the point of regurgitation.

The former King spoke of nonviolence but his orations threatened the status quo of society. He spoke of things that divided people in order to uplift Black Americans who had been oppressed and pushed to the fringes of society. He adamantly spoke out against imperialism and the war in Vietnam. He valued protest.

The latter King is white-washed and passive. He believes in love as the driving force behind unity. He is nonviolent to the point of non-threatening. He is the King we are enticed to remember in order to keep the rest of us silent.

The latter King is palatable, easy to digest for the people in society who benefit from capitalism, imperialism, and oppression. The latter King makes it seem as if equality has been achieved, and we all stand equal in society. The latter King paints a picture of inclusivity without one actually existing.

In Conclusion

The connection between MLK day and the word choice debacle with FutureAir is not to say that FutureAir’s issues are comparable to the Civil Rights Movement. But the lesson to be learned from King is about who dictates history. The people who write history are most often the ones who benefit from it.

In developing the FutureAir brand and creating a new resource of clean indoor air, we are in effect writing history. We are not alone in this process either. Other companies are also serving to create clean indoor air. In this crucial environmental moment, we have a choice between accessibility and exclusivity.

So much of the sustainable movement has been commodified. This is not to say that commodification is unnecessary or bad. However, commodification can result in exclusivity that makes the common inaccessible. Think bottled water. The difference between water and clean indoor air is that although both are currently limited, clean indoor air has the potential to be abundant.

Air, as a natural resource, affects us in the manufactured domain in the form of indoor air. In its current state, indoor air is polluted. Thus, clean indoor air is, in theory, a new resource. As a resource, it is by nature, common. FutureAir and others are working to introduce the importance of clean indoor air into society’s environmental consciousness so everyone has the opportunity to benefit from it.

Tools and means to achieve clean indoor air may be a luxury, but it is important to remember that knowledge itself does not have to be commodified. With FutureAir, we hope to choose words that express the common nature of clean indoor air, and more importantly, how critical clean indoor air is to human health. FutureAir’s Smart Air Manager™ is a tool, but it is not the end. At FutureAir we are creating a means to achieve the next indispensable resource: clean indoor air.

Written by Mollie Wodenshek for FutureAir

References
Rickford, Russell, “It’s time to reclaim the true Martin Luther King,” Washington Post, 2018.

Measure Air, Change Air

March 2019

During the Industrial Revolution, humanity adopted the mantra, “Ignorance is bliss.” Collateral damage went unobserved. Side effects were not on the radar. We built this world inconsequentially.

In the modern age, societally, we have turned towards awareness. Droves of people have come to the forefront of development in order to remedy years of ignorance that have led to a sickening of humanity and our one and only Planet. Perhaps, we were truly ignorant in the past, or perhaps, we can forgo our ignorant perspective because now we have the means to change. But, how do we enact this change?

Public Health Policy & Law

Research from Jamie Chriqui, Jean O’Connor, and Frank Chaloupka, produced in 2011, evaluated the necessity of policy for public health awareness. Their article, “What Gets Measured Gets Changed: Evaluating Law and Policy for Maximum Impact,” uses examples of tobacco, obesity, and vaccination policy to demonstrate how change takes effect. In their review, they noted the importance of public health policy and law surveillance. In order to enforce behavioral change the “policy inputs” must be measured. In-depth analysis of policy provides information about what does and does not work.

A critical focus of the article concerned the “feedback loop” in making law and policy. In a sense, policy making is a bit of trial and error. Public health policy and law are the tools for change. The results of the implemented policy affect the on-going modification of that very policy. It is important to remember that policies evolve over time.

Ultimately, it is not enough to simply observe a problem, enforce a policy like a bandage, and call it a day. Implementing change is only half the battle. “We must ‘measure’ or evaluate the nuances of a given policy by evaluating its breadth and depth in a systematic and reliable fashion,” write the authors. Continuous surveillance allows policymakers to recognize where policy is successful and where it needs improvement.

Smart Air Manager

In the modern age of awareness, we need to evaluate the spaces where we spend our time as components of health. What’s more, we need to observe the invisible forces at work that affect our lives. We spend 90% of our time indoors, and yet there is little research on how indoor climates affect our health. FutureAir is designing a product to observe our indoor air. This monitoring system will allow us to work smarter to protect our health.

SAM™ is FutureAir’s Smart Air Manager that measures and reports air quality information in real time. SAM™ reports the levels of carbon dioxide (CO₂), particulate matter (PM), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), carbon monoxide (CO), methane (CH₄), temperature, and humidity. We already know that these chemicals can create toxic environments. SAM™ tells us when these components reach harmful levels, and it initiates action to improve air quality.

The dashboard above is an overview of a complete week of data generated by SAM™. The bottom axis represents the day of the week, and the line graphs the particles per million of each element in the air (or, in the case of temperature and humidity, the graph shows the degrees and percentage respectively). The graph is also color coordinated for easy reading of the air. When the line is red, the air quality is dangerous–blue indicates air within the normal parameters, as defined by international agencies such as the EPA. The gray shadow map represents the previous day’s measurements for easy comparison.

On this particular graph, the VOC’s and CO levels were hazardously high during the latter half of the week.

SAM is a real-time air quality manager that brings awareness to the invisible problem of indoor air pollution and our health. One day, SAM’s measurements could affect policy and law change.

FutureAir is a means to policy and lawmaking. FutureAir is an investment in public health. Only through opening the door of the great unknown can we change it. “What gets measured gets changed” is the adage for the modern age.

Written by Mollie Wodenshek for FutureAir

References
Chriqui, James, O’Connor, Jean, and Chaloupka, Frank, “What Gets Measured Gets Changed: Evaluating Law and Policy for Maximum Impact,” Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics, 2011.

The Future of Work

February 2019

These days, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and robotic technology are nearly omnipresent. Systems, that one time seemed like a sci-fi vision of the future, are beginning to (somewhat) seamlessly integrate into our daily lives. Fortunately for us, these systems are not intended to take over the world, but rather, to make us, as humans, better at living our lives.

As with previous technological revolutions, however, there are costs and benefits to the implementation of new technology. There are different moral quandaries we face in the process of developing and using technology.

Thursday, February 28th, The Cooper Union and IEEE TechEthics co-hosted a panel discussion called, “Shaping the Future Workforce: Transformative Impacts of Emerging Technology.” The Cooper Union is a private institution that focuses on the advancement of art and science. IEEE, referred to as I-triple-E, is the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.

The purpose of the panel was to discuss the prevalence of automated intelligence systems and their impact on the workforce. The panel was moderated by Mark A. Vasquez of IEEE and featured: Brigitte Andersen of the Big Innovation Centre; Joanna Bryson, a professor at University of Bath; Michael Chui from McKinsey & Company, an international management consulting company; and Vinicius Pinheiro, a Deputy Director of the International Labour Organization for the UN.

Vasquez began the panel by introducing his colleagues and stating the purpose of the panel as a discussion about the different ways in which automation may change the way we work. He defined automation as “any technology that in essence replaces anything a human might perform.” In other words, automation is the transformation of a human function into a non-human function.

The panel began with each member sharing their opinions on the pros and cons of workforce automation. The initial motion debunked the theory that AI will take our jobs. In fact, the reality is quite the opposite; by automating certain work tasks we have more jobs than we have ever had before. Chui posed the question, “How much time do people spend doing what their job description says they should be doing?” With automation, the mundane, repetitive tasks are eliminated and more value-added jobs are created. However, as members of the workforce, we must be prepared to adapt and change with technology, because ultimately, the organization of work is going to look much different, Andersen warned.

The reorganization of the workforce comes with inequality. Bryson noted that communities have always built themselves around private knowledge. A community exists and functions because each individual offers unique intelligence. Each community also exists as a unit because it stands in competition to adjacent communities. However, in transitioning human tasks into automated ones there is the risk of destroying community intelligence by making it replaceable. Bryson said the structure of the community can “be deconstructed and rebuilt anytime” with AI.

The thing about this “second industrial revolution,” as Pinheiro called it, is not that we will face the stereotypical “robopocolypse,” or that technology will determine our lives, but that ultimately, we do not know the effects it will have. We need to make technology work for us so we can continue economic growth and further inclusivity. This means we must educate ourselves and adapt at the same pace that technology is developing. Technology offers great opportunity but with that opportunity comes great risk, Vasquez added.

One of the most compelling points of the night came from Anderson in regards to tech giants and personal, virtual data. Tech giants such as Uber, Facebook, and Amazon have, in many ways, monopolized the tech industry. They have done so by constantly collecting data from individuals.

Data rights currently exist as individual rights rather than community rights. As of now, only a few companies have access to our private data. (This is why when you enter other sites they have to ask to use cookies which then gather your data.) Anderson argued that creating a communal data pool could actually change the competition. If we open up access to private information we could potentially destabilize tech monopolies. Maybe this is our chance to rewrite the tragedy of the commons.

Overall, the panel was incredibly thought-provoking, informative, and at times contentious. However, that contention seems to be a good thing. The automation revolution is going to affect us all, and differently. Rather than resist the changing landscape we must be prepared for change. And, as always, be critical of emerging technologies, but more importantly, be critical of how it is used and who it affects.

Reference & Photo
“Shaping the Future Workforce” a panel discussion hosted by The Cooper Union and IEEE

Fashion and Sustainability

February 2019

Fashion is a Waste Industry

New York Fashion Week is officially over (and so is the Westminster Dog Show). New York can return to its normal chaos and enjoy fewer crowds…for the time being.

Whenever fashion week arrives, on the street or the Instagram feed, the waste is palpable. The excess of the fashion industry is on full display. Each runway show hands out goodie bags of individually packaged items. Brands display their wares down the runway as the symbolic marker of another season of fast fashion and mass production. Plastic water bottles litter the street. With over 230,000 attendees and 300 shows in one week, sustainability is the last thought during fashion week, if a thought at all.

However, the fashion industry is one of the largest, albeit understated, culprits of waste in the United States. According to the EPA, discarded clothes are the main textiles found in Municipal Solid Waste (MSW)–aka landfill waste. In 2015, about 16 million tons of textiles were produced. 65% of those textiles ended up in a landfill.

Not to mention that plastics from clothing fibers often end up in what becomes polluted oceans. Additionally, clothing donations get dropped in developing countries like bombs to sit for years emitting toxic gases. Global clothing production has increased two-fold over the past two decades, which means the detrimental effects increase as well.

That is not to say that fashion is, hard line, bad. Fashion is representative, it’s cultural, it makes us feel good! However, we must hold the fashion industry to the same sustainability standards we ask of our food and energy producers. And we must reorient our relationship to the fashion we choose to wear by investing in durable items form conscientious brands.

Sustainable Fashion Day

This past fashion week, Planet Fashion TV hosted a Sustainable Fashion Day event. The night showcased a range of innovative designers and producers at the forefront of the sustainable fashion movement.

The night began with a panel session between Planet Fashion producer, Celia Evans and Kat Maryfield. Maryfield is the owner of Kat’s Naturals, an organic cosmetic line that pairs the beneficial power of CBD with the skins natural chemicals for enhancing results. And of course, everyone present got to take home a sample.

The next panel featured clothing designer Bridgett Artise, and Angela Clark, a jewelry designer who salvages old stones and gems. Artise uses old clothes, from thrift stores or personal donations, and amends the items using stitch and patchwork. This process, which maintains the original article of clothing but gives it new life, is known as upcycling. Similarly, Clark keeps found gems and stones in their original condition because, as she says, it has already lasted so long! Both women focused on repurposing items already in existence to reduce waste in the fashion industry.

The final panel featured Stacy Change of Veerah shoes and Oliver Tolentino, a high-end fashion designer. Veerah uses organic materials such as apple skins and algae foam to make elegant footwear. Stacy began her shoe line because she wanted to “align her values with her closet.”

Tolentino, a local LA designer, displayed his eco gown line at his first ever fashion week appearance. For his eco line, Tolentino, remarkably, uses pineapple fibers to weave the fabrics that form his gowns. The end result is completely compostable! Tolentino derives the pineapple fiber and weaving techniques from Philippine tradition. Thus, his product is sustainable two times over: he uses natural materials and traditional techniques that sustain economic growth in small villages.

After the panel discussions concluded the audience had a chance to ask questions which made the experience feel collaborative–as if we were all there to reach a solution together. Then for the main event, the fashion show! It was amazing to see what sustainable fashion looked like: beautiful, original, and overall, not that different from physically “new” fashion. The main difference being that you can feel better wearing it.

Future of Fashion

Hopefully, Sustainable Fashion Day is the beginning of a new trend. Sustainable clothing is marketable and fashionable! It is time to revert back to longevity and turn away from fast fashion. However, there is still a long way to go. The fashion industry is also responsible for criminal workforce practices, toxic levels of carbon dioxide production, and the list goes on. The important message to take away from Sustainable Fashion Day is that environmental degradation infiltrates all sectors of our lives. There is always room for us to make more informed and sustainable decisions to protect our planet and ourselves.

Written by Mollie Wodenshek for FutureAir

Reference
Cooper, Kelly-Leigh, “Fast fashion: Inside the fight to end the silence on waste,” BBC: News.
EPA, “Textiles: Material-Specific Data,” United States Environmental Protection Agency.

Photo
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