Dear Ken

oh dear. oh dear. that is NOT what I meant. i just what to discover or invent
any contribution the discipline of design can make to the world via making a
contribution to knowledge.

when i started my phd studies, i looked at existing doctoral dissertations for
inspriations. and i was feeling lost. i was not attracted to the idea of
observing and studying how designers design. (and i am glad others are doing
it). i was not attracted to study how women are being presented in magazine
covers. (and i am glad others are doing it).

then i was given Clive Dilnot's article "The Science of Uncertainty: the
potential contribution of design to knowledge" to read. i read it once, twice,
three times and finally i got something important (to me) out of it. it made me
feel that i am into something very exciting. that somehow through the activity
of design, we can fill some gaps that scientists and scholars leave open.

i have been searching for filling a small gap ever since. and what i said in my
last post to you was a result of wanting to find a gap. it may have sounded like
a dismissal of explanatory theories, but it really was a search of an inadequacy
of it so that i could fill a gap.

i buy into one of Dick Buchanan's ideas very much and believe that we must bring
'making' into our intellectual life. i am inspired by Klaus Krippendorf's idea
of design research being 'pro-search', and that it should prescribe changes. i
have an infinity with David Sless's pragmatics, and am interested in
knowledge-in-use. i have a leaning toward Wolfgang Jonas's interest in research
through design and try to discern a way to do so.

the above are all distinct ideas but they have all contributed to my way of
thinking. they give me ground to believe that there is something distinctive
about design research and design knowledge. that we go beyond describing and
explaining the world.  i am just toying with the idea that making explanatory
theories useful through the practice of design can be a way of constructing
design knowledge.

hope this clarifies any misundertanding.
regards rosan


Ken Friedman wrote:

> Forgetting Wittgenstein for a moment, you will find arguments were made
> about all of these people and their ideas in terms of uselessness ("even if
> it is true, it is useless") as well as other kinds of arguments being
> offered on issues of error.
>
>

--
Rosan Chow
Sessional Instructor

University of Alberta
Department of Art and Design
3-98 Fine Arts Building
Edmonton, Alberta
Canada T6G 2C9

Tel:1-780-492-7877
Fax: 1-780-492-7870