Dear Erik

This is a very good way to put it. In the first position, the theory  
is like a "Spotlight" that illuminates to contours and features of 
design as an activity that may be located in a particular context. In 
the second, it is like a "Tool" that enables or supports design action 
in any context being a facilitating explanation or procedure.

So a theory has two faces at least, Janus like, as Arthur Koestler 
would have us believe (Ghost in the Machine - Mind), and this is a 
property of a system as well, so are all theory a form of system that 
can be seen from what is within and from what is without?? Any 
comments.

M P Ranjan
from my office at NID
1 December 2005 at 9.05 pm IST

Prof M P Ranjan
Faculty of Design
Head, NID Centre for Bamboo Applications
Faculty Member on Governing Council (2003 - 2005)
National Institute of Design
Paldi
Ahmedabad 380 007 India

Tel: (off) 91 79 26639692 ext 1090
Tel: (res) 91 79 26610054
Fax: 91 79 26605242

email: [log in to unmask]
web site: http://homepage.mac.com/ranjanmp/

On 01-Dec-05, at 8:12 PM, Erik Stolterman wrote:

> Dear Chuck and Klaus
>
> I really like your debate over the definition of theory. I would like 
> to support the side of Chuck in this case. For me, theory, can of 
> course be defined in so many ways. And they are all closely related to 
> intention. If the intention is to reveal reality in a fundamental way, 
> the intention is to reach truth and leads to a definition that will 
> guide all our research attempt in such a way that we over time will 
> reach that goal. If the intention is to provide theories that will 
> support designers doing design, we can think about theory a bit 
> differently. Fo me this means we can in design research both strive 
> for theory that (in the first meaning) explains design as a human 
> activity (in all its richness and complexity) and we can strive for 
> theory that (in the second meaning) will be useful in a practical way 
> for the field of design. Both are worth working on, both are valuable 
> in their own right, but they are very different in how they should be 
> measured or evaluated (general and true versus useful in the 
> particular).
>
> [At another level, (and maybe this is what Klaus are refeering to), 
> more ontological and epistemological, a distinction like this will 
> probably be impossible to uphold. The philosophers Richard Rorty and 
> Bruno Latour have shown, at least to me, that this deeper distinction 
> (that I am promoting here) is actually impossible. But, I can live 
> with that as a design researcher. And I can purposefully choose when 
> to work with theory development either in relation to intention or in 
> relation to epistemological foundations.]
>
> Best wishes
> Erik
>
>
> -----------------------------------------
> Erik Stolterman, Ph.D.
> Professor of Informatics
> Director of HCID Program
> School of Informatics
> Indiana University
> Bloomington, IN
>
> My Blog: http://transground.blogspot.com/
> Phone: (812) 856 5803
> Fax: (812) 856 1995
>
>
>
> 1 dec 2005 kl. 09.14 skrev Charles Burnette:
>
>> Klaus
>>
>> On 11/30/05 11:42 PM, "Klaus Krippendorff" 
>> <[log in to unmask]>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> chuck,
>>> your proposal to define theory as

>>> SNIP SNIP