Dear Bruce:

I hesitated to answer your post because I was not fully aware of the
significance of "threshold". I found out a double significance. The one I
knew from architecture (threshold of an entrance or door) and threshold as
a relay between pain and reaction to pain. Although the first meaning is
quite accurate on the challenges that design faces nowadays the second
seems very inside the core of this thread of design against fear.
First, I'd like to say that most of our posts about fear were not fully
aware that such a slogan could came out. I think that most of the list
subscribers will think about what they have been posting as something
inside "design against fear". In fact, for the last months, reading
backwards, most of the posts are against fear: great fight about reviewing
and scientific establishment; great fight about cross cultures and
political correctness; great fight about strategic design; great fight
about "consumer analysis" and so on and so on.
I met Ken Friedman and Jean Schneider recently at Porto and at a certain
point we were discussing the cyclic recurrence of themes on the list.
After that, I went to the archives to find out about old/new themes.
Besides coming across with an impressive and comprehensive post from Terry
Love about conferences and lots of other wonderful discussions, some times
recursive, I never found nothing so on the spot like "design against fear".
Your work on the threshold of Homelessness seems to be very much on the
core of design research. At least on the core of recent contributions to
the list:
1- Consumers vs People - You don't need to go to Heidegger to
understand that people have homes and consumers don’t. Consumers are blur
groups with no location (we must give credit to Rosan for that).
2- Mereology vs system theorists – Both views vacillate in the face
of thresholds. Three-dimensional entities inside limit entities are very
hard to deal with. Go home! Should be something that one could say to
facts, elements and events, in order to get coherent world views.
Regrettably there are always some homeless ideas that don’t fit. Those
ideas are, mostly, on the threshold of something.
3- Fear vs Fear itself – This is the most vertical question that was
arose recently.

After September 11 and March 11, fear regained a role on global societies.
Fear is one of those social feelings that you can think of global.
Triggered by emotions, fear is something that you can rely on to diagnosis
social status. I work currently on a research project on hospitals. At a
certain point, the perception of risks defines levels of anxiety that can
be measured and specifically alters sign and written information
interpretation. We have measured increasing of sign interpretation with
rising anxiety and decreasing on written information interpretation for
the same groups of people. Hospitals are very obvious places where you can
sense fear, the same in California, Japan and Azores for earthquakes or
Madrid or New York for terrorist actions.
Fear promotes and is a result of homelessness. People in hospitals that
went there more than 5 times had lower anxiety values. Hospital was
becoming home to them. This explains also why Spanish government rushed to
the conclusion that was ETA who performed the attacks. ETA, for Spanish
people, was home. Facing the facts of an Islamic attack put Spain on the
threshold of something in the same way that hospital patients may be on
the threshold of a mortal disease.

Real homelessness keep people on the threshold of the "homestructured"
societies. Fear de-structures that societies promoting general
homelessness.

Design has been, for ages, a way of building "home" – a virtuous
artificial world where mankind can be at home, safe from fortune
aggressions. Design against fear would mean building a global home,
starting next door (or next threshold).

I don't know if truly understand your point.
At least kept me thinking...

Best,

Eduardo