My project explores the potential of emergent games to foster curiosity-driven learning and facilitate new knowledge alliances in interdisciplinary fields. By combining emergent game design, open process practices, and a feminist ethic of care, my collaborators and I aim to create a platform that promotes curiosity and accountability while exploring politically charged scientific questions.
In one such collaboration, the Industry of Integrations (IOI) project (Nevelsteen 2021) will be applied to scientific databases, known collectively as Open Data Infrastructures (ODIs). We intend to use these ODIs at high levels, and integrate them with Collaborative Data Platforms at more local levels (for example through Citizen Scientists) to create a citizen-driven ecosystem. In this system people can build integrations, bridging scientific ODIs between different disciplines, and integrate with their own citizen contributed data – the scientific equivalent of user generated content (UGC). In addition, we hope to bridge scientific ODIs and game platforms, to allow the incorporation of physical world elements into casual games. In this way, by bridging science and creativity, we can dissolve the boundaries between laypeople and experts, and build new knowledge alliances. And also build super cool games.
interdiscliplinary fields: emergent game design + open process + crisis of expertise/participation
key concepts
- Transformation of expertise; Interoperability of special interest groups (beyond transdisciplinarity), facilitating new knowledge alliances
- Metaverse; emergent games and virtual natural systems, digital twins, intertwining the physical with the virtual, the post-digital – creating dialogue of/with/about the world, through visualising it.
- Applied STS (Science, Technology and Society) “the model doesn’t allow for that” But who built the model? We built the model! We can change it!
- Responsive Infrastructures at Appropriate Scales, subsidiarity
- Open culture, ethic of care, pluralism
Problem Statement
We are experiencing a transformation of expertise (Stampnitzky); what some call a crisis of expertise (Eyal), or a crisis of participation (ref in Sousa). This creates an opportunity for populists and demagogues to misinform and manipulate people without accountability, ultimately risking a crisis to democracy.
Objective
Rather than trying to conserve traditional expertise, explore if (a game-like platform?) can create curiosity in people that can facilitate new knowledge alliances, through employing the lenses of emergent game design, open process practises and a feminist ethic of care.
Explore how to maintain accountability in this game through social and technical means, which could provide insights in maintaining the balance between curiosity and accountability in the wider world.
Boundaries of study
This project is about creating curiousity around politically charged scientific questions (Is climate change real? Was the extreme drought real? ). It is focused on curiosity rather than education, or communication, as these types of questions cannot be addressed head on: The trust in science has been lost and there are multiple layers of values and frameworks represented implicitly that prevent simple answers.
The study and the platform design involves the physical world, as it relates to resource use and the wider earth and climate cycles.
The broad field of Science, Technology and Society (STS) challenge the idea of the technocratic elite, and the superiority of technology (Collins & Evans, 2019). This project applies the analysis and critique of STS, and then seeks to apply it in a serious, emergent game context through the design of a game-like platform.
Yielding to the idea of transformation, or, more broadly the critiques prevalent in STS, without interrogating how to manage these new forms of expertise may increase dangerous consequences.
The purpose of this project is therefore to acknowledge the transformation of expertise, and then through the design of a platform, to facilitate accountability as new ways of engaging with science and technology is explored. This needs two components:
Firstly it needs the social aspect, which is a direct gain from the STS critiques. How do people follow the scientific method? How is critical thinking trained? What meta-skills are required to be able to evaluate statements and evidence, and then act on them in ways that hold accountability to consequences? This used to be the field of the expert elites, but with the digital revolution, we need to consider anyone as a potential expert. In addition, the meta-skills of (emotional maturity), or, conduct through an ethic of care is required (Mitsea et al 2025). We need to acknowledge that experts (traditional and …transformed…) may lack the meta-skills to navigate our complex world. This platform is intended to improve the meta-skills of both types of expert.
Secondly, accountability needs a technical framework. What data is available, how it is shared, contributed and maintained is important and increasingly contested. Several initiatives are working on the responsible management of data. This platform needs to integrate and highlight best practices, with a particular focus on open processes, and data structuring through for example through the Resource Description Framework (RDF) approach.
more in draft;
1.a Interoperability of special interest groups (beyond transdisciplinarity)
1b. Facilitating new knowledge alliances
1c. Maintaining accountability
2. Game design
(what is game design in a nutshell)
There is an important difference to consider when working with specialists who are 1) trained in a certain way of thinking and 2) willing to sit through poor products to get what they need, versus people who will leave if something isn’t engaging enough. This links with how to lead volunteer groups, too, or any group where you do not have money, or power, to direct them to stay. In the context of transformation of expertise or participation, taking care to account for the accessibility of a platform becomes of primary concern.
2a. Emergent game design: The Metaverse
(what is an emergent game in a nutshell)
2b. Emergent serious game design
(what is a serious game in a nutshell)
Serious games (SGs) are primarily aimed at promoting learning, skills training, and rehabilitation.
Promising for Meta-Skills Training: Mitsea et al 2025
Potential collaboration with platform:
5. Open culture, ethic of care, pluralism
Meta-skills are the overarching skills required for thriving in an era of rapid change, complexity, and innovation. Μeta-skills can be defined as a set of higher-order skills that incorporate metacognitive, meta-emotional, and meta-motivational attributes, enabling one to be mindful, self-motivated, self-regulated, and flexible in different circumstances.
5a. Open process
I learnt about open process specifically in a talk by Brian Nosek, founder of the Open Science Foundation (OSF) (slides)
“it’s not about being right, but how people approach getting there, that builds trust”
and the difference between an open or closed process:
- closed model: opaque, glimpse in time, dichotomous, final.
- open model: transparent, lifecycle, many evaluations, versioned
5b Training an ethic of care
5c. Decentralisation? No, subsidiarity, and pluralism
risks/ things to consider
- How to maintain accountability,
- Trading off accountability with control, becoming a power struggle of who controls the narrative
- Difficulty in communicating across special interest groups, or areas of expertise (beyond transdisciplinarity), and across levels of expertise
- An overly technocratic approach that designs AT the people, not WITH the people. This is what STS approaches critique.
addressing these risks
- Visually – moving from board games as used in serious game designs (Sousa) to the spatial web, which can be seen as a prototype of the Metaverse. Create dialogue of/with/about the world, through visualising it.
- Curation – through game design principles (consider the game master approach) – the links to serious games, but diverge from this in the emergent nature.
- Reframe “giving up control” or “losing control” through the open culture approach, understanding that open does not mean welcome to everyone, hence, rather than aiming to minic open culture, learn from and be inspired from it (e.g. open process, transparancy), but aim for a better approach.
- Reframe “losing control” to consider instead having levels of “control” through the subsidiarity approach, which aims to provide structure about at what levels need control and how the interactions are packaged to be able to interoperate.
- Considering the feminist ethic of care and the political approach of pluralism (Moeffe)
- Consider STS critique (at a specific level) and apply a better method.
methodology
- Design a prototype game, that interfaces physical world elements with fantasy elements. Consider how they interrelate. How to allow play, experimentation and curiosity for all player types (including the killers/destroyers) while still ensuring the integrity of the overall project.
- Test through a complex case – but we are not wanting to solve a problem! How do we “test” if people have more curiousity? How do we measure the creation of new knowledge alliances? That’s a diversity of network effect.
- Methodology of managing conflicts between Science, Technology, and Society, considering social approaches (like ethic of care, active listening), as well as technology approaches, like data structuring (RDF)
value of research
This research contributes to the use of games to improve society.
Openness is underexplored in general society. This research contributes to a better understanding of openness, beyond the applications in software, or digital approaches.
relevance of my background to this research
Community contributor to open source software since 2015.
Volunteer in a wide range of initiatives, ranging from recreational to industry bodies.
Academic background in systems-level thinking around urban resource management and complex, wicked problems.
Other stuff
Transformed lens
Slide 21 in Brian Nosek’s talk says “Researchers need infrastructure, training, and a supportive system to show their work and demonstrate trustworthiness.”
I would say, in the context of transformation of expertise and participation, Researchers People (a certain type of person? An engaged person?) need infrastructure, training a user-centric platform (this is inspired by game design; Training in casual games is near invisible, through an engaging tutorial), and a supportive system to show their work and demonstrate trustworthiness.