Hi, Terry,

Tempting as it is, I’m not returning to the thread on wicked problems. I will leave that conversation to Klaus, Stefanie, and others – including those who wrote useful posts in the earlier thread.

Without entering the substance of the discussion on wicked problems, I want to comment on your style of argumentation and the scholarly process involved in recent conversations.

It’s inaccurate and disingenuous to say, “There may be a reason you believe the body of literature you referenced and the last 50 years of ‘belief’ in ‘wicked problems’ should be regarded as exempt from contradiction by evidence. If so, I’d love to hear it.” I said nothing of the kind. My final post in the thread summarized what I set out to say while acknowledging the challenges inherent in the literature of wicked problems.

I stated explicitly that I welcome evidence for your views. You did not provide the evidence.

Instead of an argument and examples, you offered a laundry list of external links.

I understood the claims you put forward and I disagree with your position. I found it simplistic. You recast the literature of wicked problems from Rittel and Webber on as areductionist and mechanistic argument without respect for the genuine problematics involved. In my view, you did not offer an argument, obvious or otherwise. You posted a series of links with the suggestion that the material at the other end of your links would contradict Rittel and Webber.

The reason I found this unsatisfactory is that you did not explain what the examples are or how you use these examples to contradict the views with which you disagree. None of the linked texts addressed the issues in the thread. It was therefore necessary that you show how these examples demonstrate the validity of your claims. You claim to have evidence of contradictions. I’d like to see you state the argument and provide the evidence for your argument rather than providing links that you expect the rest of us to read.

In too many threads now, I’ve spent time reading the lists of links that you provide in place of a reasoned argument. We had this kind of go-round in recent threads on neuroscience, on big data, and on the uses of design history, among others. In the thread on design history, you posted a link to a half-baked working paper on the cliodynamics of Byzantine history from the 500s to the 1400s. The paper in that case was wrong in key scientific respects — and irrelevant to your claims. Why should the rest of us keep reading lists of irrelevant links? If you can state your case through reasoned argument fromevidence, please do. There is no reason for the rest of us to agree with you until you do.

Tim Smithers wrote a post on August 24th titled “Leaving the beach behind...” I’ve come to share his views. (NB. The post is preserved in the list archive. To find it, paste the title words – Leaving the beach behind – into the search box on the PhD-Design web site.)

Terry, you’ve known me for a decade and a half now. You cannot claim that I believe ANYTHING “should be regarded as exempt from contradiction by evidence.” If you believe this to be true, there is no point engaging in conversation. If you don’t believe it, it is a throwaway line and a cheap debating trick.

I will not rejoin the thread on wicked problems. I do want to state my views on the turn the conversation has taken. I’ve done so, and there is no reason to rejoin the thread.

Ken

Professor Ken Friedman, PhD, DSc (hc), FDRS | University Distinguished Professor | Swinburne University of Technology | Melbourne, Australia | [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> | Phone +61 3 9214 6102 | http://www.swinburne.edu.au/design




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