Practice-Based PhD · Committee: Marcelo Stamm (chair), Paul Kelsch, Mintai Kim, Shaun Rosier
This dissertation argues that computation does not merely support adaptive design practice — it changes the nature of what adaptive design means. Drawing on a decade of practice engaging ecological complexity, embedded sensing, and generational robotics, it develops a theory of adaptive epistemology: the proposition that design operates as a form of knowledge production conducted through iterative, feedback-based, in-situ inquiry rather than predictive control.
Design propositions as hypotheses tested in situ. Iterative, feedback-based knowledge production vs. predictive control.
The political and spatial implications of sensing networks. Who and what gets measured determines who gets protected.
Biological autonomy as a design medium. Maintenance and growth as agents rather than as managed outputs.
Territories as assemblages of biology, computation, and infrastructure. Cyborg ecologies and wetware coupling.
A design disposition: provisional, adaptive, justice-conscious practice that stays accountable to what systems reveal over time.
Territories that emerge from the intersection of biological autonomy and computational mediation — neither purely natural nor purely designed.
Pre-defense: March 13, 2026 · Final defense: April 24, 2026 · Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University