Hi Ben , Terry and others,
The Brain seems to have its own 'grammar' that is different from the
language grammar. More about it can be found in an interesting book by
Ray Jackendoff, "Patterns in the mind - Language and Human Nature", Basic
Books, Harper Collins, New York 1994.
Many researchers have stated that Emotions are not just a phenomena,
or processes but rather the very language of the brain at a very basic
level. For Designers emotions are an important construct in Design
Semantics.For a Designer, it will be far more meaningful to look at emotions not as
just social constructs or language constructs but also as the
'grammar' underlying the brain's thinking and decision making
process. Neuroscientists are also adding to this understanding . Much more is known
about emotions today than a decade ago. Damasio is
basing statements of emotions mainly on the neouroscientists
findings. ( For example see Damasio Antonio R & Damasio Hanna " Brain and
Language, Scientific American Vol 267 No 3, September, 1992.)
The main problem of emotions as constructs for Designers seems to be
that the designer 'has' to use 'his/her' emotions to identify, judge &
transfer emotions of others to artifacts and vis -versa. The issue of
'bias' comes in here. Validating emotional related findings are difficult
but have to be done if we as Designers are to use emotions as designing
constructs.
Designers, instead of insisting on one final defination definetion of emotions,
should be working on making them as useful , efficient, constructs for
designing. Will it ever be possible to understand emotions by a human
without making use of the emotional circuitry of his/her own human brain ?.
In other words can emotions be judged with out involving emotions ? Only
time & progress of science will tell.
Very interesting thread indeed.
Pradeep.
_____________________
Pradeep yammiyavar
Professor - Design Research
Department of Design
Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati. Assam, India.
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