Dear Terry,
Thanks for your note.
In my view, you make statements and raise issues that do not fit your earlier claims and arguments. To explain this requires a careful and closely reasoned argument. I do not have the time to write it out today. A reply will take several days.
The reason I entered this thread is that you addressed a reply to me specifically. It may be that you see this as “humour.” I don’t.
Working through this material is difficult and somewhat tedious. It requires restating simple premises in post after post to keep matters clear and perspicuous. You have in your latest post [below] forgotten what you previously wrote while neglecting key issues in my earlier replies to your claims.
This began with your claim that “all theories (any discipline) can be wholly and exactly represented as mathematical functions.” You claimed that you could wholly and exactly represent all design theories as mathematical functions.
If you make this claim, it is inappropriate to overlook key objections to your arguments. If people take you seriously enough to debate with you, you should yourself take your own claims seriously enough to respond to reasoned objections. This kind of slippery and irresponsible debate is why I have been avoiding debates on discussion lists. Even though you addressed your formalization to me, I probably should not have answered.
Despite you frequent objections to what you label “rhetoric,” your posts often contain sly asides or rhetorically loaded comments. In a debate, I prefer plain speech.
If I want humour, I’ll go to the masters.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X-84jOEmCf4
Yours,
Ken
Ken Friedman, PhD, DSc (hc), FDRS | University Distinguished Professor | Swinburne University of Technology | Melbourne, Australia | University email [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> | Private email [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> | Mobile +61 404 830 462 | Academia Page http://swinburne.academia.edu/KenFriedman
Guest Professor | College of Design and Innovation | Tongji University | Shanghai, China ||| Adjunct Professor | School of Creative Arts | James Cook University | Townsville, Australia
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Terry Love wrote:
Dear Ken,
The ten attributes given by R&W do not define what a wicked problem is. They merely describe characteristics of it.
Characteristics do not define entities. They merely provide boundaries to the space within which an entity may be defined. In theory there is a potentially infinite number of variations of kinds of entity in the space bounded by R&W’s attributes (or any other attributes) that could be called a wicked problem. I suggest almost any open ended design problem would align with R&W’s ‘wicked problem’ attributes. How about, what is the best power system for an aircraft? Or ‘What is the best layout for am offshore oil processing rig? Or what is the best arrangement for the UK’s wavepower electricity supply? Keith’s question, which I interpret as, ‘How should we make decisions today about tomorrow?’ is similar.
The mathematical representation I used as an illustration starts to reveal the varieties of different kinds of real and theoretical entities, relationships, bounds and criteria that need to be addressed individually and together to understand and critique an idea such as R&B’s wicked problem
concept.
Your reduction to a simple logic alternative in a previous post loses that ability to improve the precision of the analysis.
From what I read of your posts, it seems that you don’t understand the use of mathematics representations to unpack the hidden epistemological dimensions of a concept. It is possible to do the same with words, using maths is simply more effective. It’s completely different to making a mathematical representation of the *functioning* of a theory.
Regards with humour,
Terry
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