Dear Don and Birger and all,

Thank you for an interesting and useful discussion.

An alternative explanation of science was given to me when I was young that
matches with the historical evidence and seems to offer in many ways a
better explanation than most. It provides an understanding that goes beyond
the commonly held view of science dominated by the approaches used in
'physics'.

A simplified picture of this view of science goes like this:

In the Greek political public decision-making process, it proved beneficial
to some to develop and refine powerful skills to persuade others to hold the
same opinions as oneself. This body of skills and knowledge became called
'rhetoric'.

Some key figures in Greek thinking identified that in many cases this did
not produce the best outcomes and often did not produce the outcomes that
people had been persuaded to believe via rhetoric.

Some of these key figures in Greek thinking identified that various issues
needed to be addressed to ensure that outcomes were as expected and to
develop approaches by which  the best outcomes could be predicted. This was
seen as an approach to develop 'knowledge that is of better quality and more
reliable'.

The issues that needed to be addressed included:

*   Ensuring that observations about the world were accurate and reliable
(and hence trustworthy).

*   Ensuring that any reasoning was sound,  and free of personal bias and
manipulation.

*   Ensuring that situations in which multiple possible explanations were
possible were identified.

*   Developing a meta-level knowledge of the approaches and methods useful
to develop this 'knowledge that is of better quality and more reliable'.

*   Developing a special way of communicating that is better suited to
identifying, expressing and reasoning with this knowledge that is of better
quality and more reliable.

The scope of this endeavour to develop knowledge that is of better quality
and more reliable is extensive as it covers the natural, 'philosophical',
social, political  and meta-physical realms.

This generic approach to develop knowledge that is of better quality and
more reliable is what became called 'science'.

The endeavour has required  the development of approaches that address the
above issues. In particular, specific approaches were developed to address
the problems of faulty empirical evidence, bias and false reasoning.

A special characteristic of the endeavour is that these 'specific
approaches' are tested as to their validity in addressing the issues in the
above list. Taken together, once validated, these are commonly nowadays
known as 'research methods'.

The special way of 'communicating' this 'knowledge that is of better quality
and more reliable' has involved the identification of carefully defined
concepts and ways of combining them such that they closely represent the
world's behaviour. This offers prediction of  outcomes across all areas of
interest to humans, including design. Often this is done via a language
intended for this purpose called mathematics.

The advantages of this 'picture' of  'science' and  'research' include that
it applies similarly across all arenas of interest to humans, such as
design. It also provides a touchstone for assessing the usefulness and
validity of all the approaches developed in design for creating knowledge
that is of better quality and more reliable.

Best wishes,
Terry
____________________
Dr. Terence Love, FDRS, AMIMechE, PMACM, MISI
Mob: 0434 975 848, Fax +61(0)8 9305 7629, [log in to unmask]

Senior Lecturer
Researcher, Social Program Evaluation Research Unit
Edith Cowan University, Perth, Western Australia

Senior Lecturer, Dept of Design
Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia

Director, Design Out Crime Research Centre
Member of Management Panel IMechE (WA)
Honorary Fellow, Institute of Entrepreneurship and Enterprise Development
Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK
____________________


-----Original Message-----
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related
research in Design [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Don
Norman
Sent: Saturday, 11 February 2012 12:51 AM
To: Dr Terence Love
Subject: Where science fails

I thought it might be both useful to look briefly at several places where
science fails. In my attempts to understand phenomena and fields, I always
prefer a balanced approach, one that looks at the strengths and weaknesses,
at the virtues and the flaws.