Dear List

The issues surrounding the academisation of 'design as research' and
the problems of the "presentation of creative practice as research…
under the label of practice-based or practice-led research" (Niedderer
and Roworth-Stokes, 2007, p.1), are IMHO not simply communication
problems based on a lack of explicit statements but part of a
discourse which can have effects on people which can be both
repressive as well as enabling. The process of academisation and the
necessary transformation required by, as Gavin put it, the "shift from
the street to the academy", may also be seen as an instance of a more
general relationship between two modes of formalisation and their
differing methods of deduction; a relationship between two poles of
the science of problems (dialectics), which is not purely
epistemological but whose roots are arguably also social and
pedagogical.

The two poles of the field of the science of problems reflect a fairly
familiar tension within the history of mathematics. Proclus, in his
'Commentary on the First Book of Euclid's Elements' had already
formulated a distinction in classical Greek geometry, between problems
and theorems (Smith, 2006, p. 148). Theorems concern the
demonstration, from axioms or postulates, of the inherent properties
of a figure, whereas problems concern the actual construction of
figures, usually using a straightedge and a compass. At the
theorematic pole, deduction moves from axioms to theorems, and the
figure is defined statically in Platonic fashion, in terms of its
essences and its derived properties. At the problematic pole, by
contrast, a figure is defined dynamically by its "capacity to be
affected" – that is by the events that can befall a figure;
sectioning, cutting, folding, bending, rotating etc (Smith, 2006, p.
149). For example, a circle is defined theorematically as a fixed
essence, whereas roundness is a problematic figure that is inseparable
from the dynamic process of rounding it undergoes.

While both methods of deduction produce the same solution, over time,
theorematics has become more visibly associated with the 'rigor' of
the famous royal scientific societies whereas problematics exists only
in the capacity of 'technologies' or 'applied science'. This is
because problematics does not claim an autonomous power like
theorematic royal science, due to the fact that problematics
subordinates its operations to the sensible and sensitive conditions
of intuition and construction. Problematics is concerned with
inventing problems whose solution is tied to a whole set of
collective, non-scientific activities (such as metallurgy, surveying,
stonecutting and perspective) but whose 'scientific' solution depends,
on the contrary, on the codifying 'law and order' of theorematic royal
science (Deleuze and Guattari, 1980/1987, p. 373-4).

What is crucial is the interaction between the two poles and the
richness and the necessity of the process of translation between them.
Problematics is the cutting edge which continually enriches
theorematics, while theorematics gets rid of the superfluous and puts
the house in order. Theorematics, no less than problematics, is an
inventive and creative activity; it prevents problematics from
escaping in all directions and lays down the official policies of
science. According to Deleuze and Guattari (1980/1987 the translation
of problematics into theorematics is not only inevitable but
scientifically necessary, "What we have, rather, are two formally
different conceptions of science, and, ontologically, a single field
of interaction in which royal science [i.e. theorematics] continually
appropriates the contents of vague or nomad science [i.e.
problematics] while nomad science cuts the contents of royal science
loose (p. 367)." In other words, while 'progress' can be made at the
level of theorematics, it is at the level of problematics that, in
Deleuze's terms, 'becoming' occurs.


The debate between 'creative practice' and 'scholarly research' in
design may reflect the general description concerning the relationship
between the two modes of formalisation presented above. If this is the
case, design research may be diagnosed as currently experiencing a
period of expansion where by the problematic approach of 'creative
practice' is pushing change and the theorematic approach is working
hard to codify it into 'scientific' knowledge.


Best
Luke


Deleuze, G. & Guattari, F. 1987. A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and
Schizophrenia
(B. Massumi, Trans.). Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
(Original work published 1980)

Niedderer, K. and S. Roworth-Stokes. 2007. The Role and Use of
Creative Practice in Research and its Contribution to Knowledge. IASDR
International Conference 2007. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Polytechnic
University. Available at http://www.niedderer.org/IASDR07SRS.pdf (date
accessed 19/09/08)

Smith, D. 2006. 'Axiomatics and Problematics as Two Modes of
Formalisation: Deleuze's Epistemology of Mathematics'. In S. Duffy
(ed.). Virtual mathematics: The Logic of Difference (pp. 145-168).
Manchester: Clinamen Press