The Probability Engine

The Probability Engine (2024) is an artwork embodying a speculative technology that allows viewers to travel to alternate realities and explore potential futures of climate justice. The artwork was inspired by the machine to travel to alternative quantum realities that micha cárdenas imagined in her novel, Atoms Never Touch (2023).

The Probability Engine is guided by scientific studies predicting that a 1.5°C increase in global warming could trigger several global tipping points. (Armstrong McKay et. al, 2022) The research questions guiding the project include: how can we build resilience to climate change among communities affected by climate tipping points by using climate fiction, AR and 3D printing to envision climate change futures? Additionally, we ask, can we build resilience to sea level rise for coastal communities by making climate tipping points, and their possible solutions, tangible? We created 3 sculptures using 3D printing with recycled materials, and one large scale, seventeen foot long, sculpture of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC).

The Probability Engine: Atlantic Overturning (2024) is a large sculpture and poem which depict the AMOC, the Atlantic Ocean current which is in danger of being disrupted by global warming. The poem "we will be the tipping point" is part of Atlantic Overturning.

The artwork is by micha cárdenas, Ian Costello, Ryan Li Dahlstrom, Tamara Duplantis, Star Hagen-Esquerra, Marcelo Diaz Viana Neto and Madison Mccartha.

We will be the tipping point
From a world where
only a few matter
only a few are cared for
From a world where children in Gaza are bombed in schools and hospitals
Ocean will show us the way
A global current
made up of local eddies, whirling, dancing, self organizing,
is being pushed down by melting arctic ice,
is overturning
and we will, we must
overturn
as well
to a world
where those who are in the most need
will receive the most care
because we take care of us
and in solidarity, we care for others
To a world where every child has a quiet, soft place to
grow and learn and love
We will be the tipping point
We must
overturn

— micha cárdenas, from We will be the tipping point