As I was browsing past Looking Outward posts, this one by Liz Maday about the 9/11 memorial caught my eye. I had no idea that the names on the memorial were organized in such a thoughtful and calculated way. The project was done by Jer Thorp, and he created an algorithm that would cluster names based on adjacency and relationships.
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Liz mentioned that she thought “this is an amazing example of how a program is able to reflect very human emotions and intentions while also utilizing a precision and complexity that is above human ability,” and I completely agree. I think it’s amazing that we are able to use technology to determine such personal connections, and create something so meaningful. Before seeing this project, I never imagined that something like this was possible–I never thought relationships between humans could be computed in any way.