Sacred Tech
Former senior researcher at Xerox PARC, Ranjit Makkuni is using sophisticated technology to change how we interact with computers. In the process, he's taking traditional Indian beliefs back to the future
A collection of small charkhas (yarn-spinning wheels historically associated with Gandhi) presented in an interlocking pattern to suggest togetherness. Sacred World Research Laboratory
A group of children hold hands around the Harijan Pillar in the Eternal Gandhi Multimedia Museum. Sacred World Research Laboratory
Installation in the Eternal Gandhi Multimedia Musuem: a harp plays Indian freedom songs. Sacred World Research Laboratory
Ranjit Makkuni's day starts around 7 a.m. with two hours of sitar practice—he's getting ready for a concert performance—an hour of yoga, and an hour of meditation. By 11 a.m., he's in his workshop in the Indian capital of New Delhi. His tools are a jumble of the old and new: clay pots, traditional paintings, and sculptures mixed in with microchips and motion sensors. Makkuni spent nearly two decades as a senior researcher at the legendary Xerox PARC in Palo Alto, California, where he was part of a team widely credited with developing the first GUI, or graphical user interface; he then went on to break new ground in tactile interfaces. Now, Makkuni has returned to his native India and founded the Sacred World Foundation, an organization whose mission is to revolutionize interaction between humans and computers by bringing together the ancient traditions of India and the innovations of Silicon Valley.
One of the traditions Makkuni is exploring at the moment is the mudra system of hand positions associated with Buddhist and Hindu philosophies. The Dhyana mudra, for example, entails placing both hands in one's lap so that the thumb and middle finger of each gently touch, an act that conveys to other followers that a person is meditating. The Dhyana mudra also involves positioning the body in a way that invites enlightenment. Makkuni is working with software that can recognize mudras and respond by playing a video or audio file, for example, or simply shut down. "What if, instead of using a mouse, we used hand positions that not only help us get work done, but generate creativity and compassion?" he asks. "It seems to me that if you're going to interact with a machine for 8 or 10 hours a day, it had better generate well-being for you."
Much of Makkuni's research is focused on freeing us from what might be called the modern posture: slumped with belly sagging, eyes restlessly scanning the screen, fingers twitching on computer keys. This posture is a result of the western paradigm in which data comes in through the eyes, makes a loop through the head, and exits through the mouth or fingers. We might as well be brains in jars, at least for the duration of the workday. In many eastern traditions, however, it is believed that intelligence is distributed throughout the body, and that thinking and moving are inextricably connected. Or, to paraphrase Makkuni, if the Dhyana mudra invites enlightenment, what kind of thinking does sitting slumped in a chair all day invite? "I am trying to understand the mental and physical connections that have been encoded in various traditions so that our interaction with information is not restricted to keyboard and screen," he says.
Makkuni's longtime boss at Xerox, former chief scientist John Seely Brown, describes Makkuni's influence on the lab as both profound and lighthearted—he could calm a stressful situation just by entering the room. "The East and West have deeply ingrained and profoundly different traditions for communicating knowledge," says Brown. "What makes Ranjit's work so exciting is that he explores traditions that could take human-computer interaction along entirely different trajectories, if they are allowed to."
Makkuni's largest project to date is the Eternal Gandhi Multimedia Museum, which opened in March 2005 at Birla House in New Delhi, the site where Mahatma Gandhi spent the last few months of his life and where he was assassinated in 1948. The goal of the exhibition is to bring Gandhi's message to a new generation by engaging them both intellectually and physically. To activate the Harijan Pillar installation, visitors hold hands around an intricately carved column; when the circle is complete, the installation begins to glow from within. To get a group of Indians—men and women, Hindu and Muslim—to all hold hands is no small feat, and the installation mirrors Gandhi's efforts to overcome prejudice.