The geometry of other people

In the past 40 years, research has shown that figurative language is not just poetic or fanciful, it actually shapes our thoughts and speech patterns.

• Love is a 'journey'
• truth is something that is 'seen clearly'
• extroverted people are described as 'lighting up the room' - which all activate the same brain regions as the actual experiences.

Our body plays a key role in how we understand abstract ideas. The same part of our brain that perceives light is used to imagine a person as 'bright'.

In essence, our thoughts are using our body's operations to make sense of the world.

• Cognitive scientists found that our social perceptions greatly impact our behavior, specifically in regard to our mental distances vs physical distances.
• We tend to draw ourselves closer to individuals we label as "friends" and increase the distance between ourselves and those we consider "strangers".
• It's also been observed that individuals with negative opinions of other cultures may overestimate the physical distance between them and that culture's cities.
• Our social world has a significant influence on how we interact with others and perceive our surroundings.

• Some scientists propose that social cognition evolved as an "exaptation" of spatial cognition, repurposing existing neural mechanisms to navigate social hierarchies.
• This theory offers a compelling explanation for how our brains process social information in a spatially organized manner.

Other research from social psychology has demonstrated that our mental representations of people are multimodal.

They include :

• emotional associations
• declarative knowledge
• and episodic memories, among other content.

Can the design of physical spaces influence political thought?

Architects have the power to shape our social interactions by creating spaces that can be tall, wide, open, confined, with or without views.

This is why winners stand on the highest podium, bosses occupy large offices, and heads of families sleep in master bedrooms and sit at the head of the table.

Let's think:

• How does the design of physical spaces impact our social dynamics?
• What are some ways that power is manifested in different spatial configurations?
• Can we intentionally design spaces to create more egalitarian social structures?

• Advocates for social progress often employ spatial metaphors to challenge inequality and oppression.
• Virginia Woolf's "A Room of One’s Own" symbolizes women's intellectual agency, while the "glass ceiling" represents invisible barriers for women in the corporate world.
• LGBTQ+ individuals "coming out of the closet" and chants like "Whose streets? Our streets!" at protests serve as spatial metaphors for breaking societal constraints.
• Even the political spectrum can be reimagined, with "partisan" and "extremist" positions represented on a horseshoe shape.

• The shapes of social thought are vast, yet spatial metaphors can limit it.
• Phrases like "Left-Right spectrum" or "President" can tilt our mental perceptions.
• Time to listen out for architectural metaphors constraining our political discourse and interpersonal relations.
• For instance, Trump's proposal for a border wall signifies a shift towards isolationism in foreign and immigration policies.
• Instead, we must challenge these metaphors to prevent divisions between social groups.

• Architecture has a powerful influence on our social experiences and movements, conveying messages of social power.
• Recent research highlights the cognitive effects of architecture and how we can use this understanding as architects of our own collective experiences.

- Architects design buildings to reflect social power.

- Social and architectural metaphors shape our social experiences and desires.

- Neuroscientific research reveals the neurobiological basis of these effects.

- Becoming architects of our collective experiences allows us to shape others' spatial relationships.