Dr Steve North
EASE Postdoctoral Research Fellow (Anthrozoology)
Steve is a Research Fellow in Computational Anthrozoology with the Exeter Anthrozoology as Symbiotic Ethics (EASE) working group.
Described in the media as ‘The Digital Horse Whisperer’, Steve is a Computer Science researcher, mainly working in Computational Anthrozoology and Animal-Computer Interaction (ACI). Through the HABIT (Horse Automated Behaviour Identification) project, he studied Horse-Computer Interaction, focusing on automated behavior identification from video. This involved the development of software for AI, machine learning and computer vision. Steve is also a qualified ‘natural horsemanship’ instructor, with animal behaviour, ethology and horse training experience.
His recent projects include:
Digi Tails: Auto-Prediction of Street Dog Emotions
Research group links
Research interests
Steve's research crosses the methodological boundaries, using quantitative, qualitative and descriptive approaches, as appropriate. More recently, he has been exploring the more esoteric avenues of: nonhuman animal somatechnics, autoethnography, design / speculative fiction, ethnographic science fiction, literary animal studies and imaginary studies. He is also interested in ‘roboethics’ (robot ethics), particularly as it applies to our treatment of robotic non-humans (real and fictional). This applies both in terms of their ethical significance as potential ‘beings able to understand their own suffering’ and as a mirror to our treatment of carbon-based non-humans.
Research supervision
Steve supervises student dissertations on the MA Anthrozoology by distance learning for the Dissertation Module ANTM904.
Other information
Grants
Name of the awarding body: The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) via a parent platform grant 'Living with Digital Ubiquity ' - EPSRC ref. EP/M000877/1), held by the University of Nottingham
Name(s) of grantholder(s): The applicant (for the exploratory project)
Title of project: HABIT (Horse Automated Behaviour Identification Tool)
Amount awarded: £30,000
Applicant’s role in the project: Project Lead
Start date of support: May 2014
End date of support: October 2014
Name of the awarding body: NASA (Agent-Based Spacecraft Autonomy Team, Advanced Architectures and Automation Branch)
Name(s) of grantholder(s): applicant
Title of project: PlAudit: visualizing decision-making behaviours in agent-based autonomous spacecraft
Amount awarded: £75,000
Applicant’s role in the project: awardee and Project Lead
Start date of support: January 2003
End date of support: December 2003
Name of the awarding body: The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)
Name(s) of grantholder(s): Ms. A. Fatah gen Schieck & Professor A. Penn
Title of project: ‘Screens in the Wild’ - exploring the potential of networked urban screens for communities and culture (EPSRC ref. EP/I031839/1)
Amount awarded: £234,000
Applicant’s role in the project: Postdoc researcher and developer
Start date of support: Nov 2011
End date of support: July 2013
Name of the awarding body: The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)
Name(s) of grantholder(s): Professor G.M. Winch, Professor A. Penn and Professor A.J.D. Edkins
Title of project: THE VIRTUAL CONSTRUCTION SITE: A DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM FOR CONSTRUCTION PLANNING (EPSRC grant reference: GR/N00876)
Amount awarded: £80,485.00
Applicant’s role in the project: Researcher and lead software system developer
Start date of support: Sept 2001
End date of support: Feb 3003
At completion the reviewers rated this project as:
Research Quality: Internationally Leading
Research Planning: Tending to Internationally Leading
Potential Impact: Tending to Internationally Leading
Research Staff: Tending to Outstanding
Communication: Tending to Outstanding
Potential Benefits: Good
Cost Effectiveness: Good
Name of the awarding body: Research Councils UK (RCUK)
Name(s) of grantholder(s): Dr Ian Anderson, School of Humanities, University of Glasgow
Title of project: ‘Multidimensional Visualisation of Archival Finding Aids’ (RCUK ref: 119340/1)
Amount awarded: £42,354
Applicant’s role in the project: Postdoc research fellow and lead software developer
Start date of support: May 2006
End date of support: June 2007
Modules taught
- ANTM110 - The Horse-Human Dyad