Continue.
You say that a predictive design theory may have to be on a different level of abstraction. This is a cheap rhetorical move. Designs always needs to work in all details, not in the ads tract
Sent from my iPhone
> On Feb 21, 2016, at 3:42 AM, Terence Love <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Dear Klaus,
>
> Thank you for your message. I appreciate you taking the trouble to comment.
>
> I understand your position and agree on the way culture and learning shape
> the way our bodies shape what and how we self-reflectively perceive things
> like colours.
>
> As I see it, there is no obvious reason why predicting the outcomes of
> innovative designs using new forms of design theories/models will
> necessarily reinforce the existing, unless on makes the models so
> restrictive.
>
> I suggest that in fact such predictive design theories/models are more
> likely to identify innovative possibilities that we cannot because of the
> limitations of our innovative thinking that in us humans naturally tends to
> be fixated and conservative.
>
> I agree with you about Google.
>
> By the way, it would be more accurate for yourself and David to suggest my
> perspective is post-positivist/ post-empiricist (Popper, Giddens) rather
> than positivist, with a perspective on emotion/intuition shaped by Damasio,
> Darwin, Bastick and others, a view of mind and self-perception as a
> secondary illusory construct of human animal behaviour.
>
> In contrast, Ken's position is positivist, as seen by his view on evidence.
>
> Oh, and it's not true that ' for a theory to be predictable requires the
> pattern that the theory aims to describe to continues as observed in the
> past.' At very least the introduction of a design will result in change and
> predicting the consequences of that change is the central challenge such
> design theory must address. A key decision will of course be the level of
> abstraction at which it is addressed.
>
> Best wishes,
> Terence
>
> ---
> Dr Terence Love
> PhD(UWA), BA(Hons) Engin. PGCEd, FDRS, PMACM, MISI
> Love Services Pty Ltd
> PO Box 226, Quinns Rocks
> Western Australia 6030
> Tel: +61 (0)4 3497 5848
> [log in to unmask]
> www.loveservices.com.au
> --
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [log in to unmask]
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Klaus Krippendorff
> Sent: Sunday, 21 February 2016 3:01 PM
> To: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related
> research in Design <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: Assume fixed number of colours in design?
>
> Terry
> I wanted to say something on color perception. I was taught by former
> Bauhaus teachers but became exposed to experiments in social perception
> which taught me the tremendous cultural differences in perception, including
> of colors. I worked for a year in an institute for visual perception and
> presented my views in writing, but recently discovered evidence that color
> perception certainly is triggered by physical stimuli but the do not explain
> our culturally coherent sense of colors.
>
> However, now that you clarified your aim of developing a predictive design
> theory I need to respond differently.
>
> First I side with Davis sless who suggested that your aim is thoroughly (not
> his word) positivist
>
> Second, for a theory to be predictable requires the pattern that the theory
> aims to describe to continues as observed in the past. To me design is by
> definition innovative, ideally transformative (ranging from changing
> everyday practices to transforming social structures). A design theory that
> predicts the consequences of a design contradicts (my conception of) the
> mission of design to introduce unexpected changes in the world. Such a
> predictive theory can only encourage strengthening what is already know, not
> to change it.
>
> Third, I am of course cognizant if the need for designers to justify their
> design to clients, all kinds of stakeholders, including users and advocates
> for the environment. I my opinion, a predictive theory would not be
> convincing. What could inspire the stakeholders of a design to become
> enrolled In a project of realizing it are plausible arguments. In the
> semantic turn I have explored several rhetorical strategies They include
> experiments on sub-populations as well as self-fulfilling prophesies.
>
> Science fiction, futuristic novels, as well as ethnographic accounts of how
> people are struggling in life may well inspire designers. But Google
> searches provide mostly data of what their authors want you to know exists.
> They rarely predict the innovations introduced that designers introduce.
>
> Klaus
>
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
>> On Feb 21, 2016, at 12:25 AM, Terence Love <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>
>> Hi Don and all,
>>
>> For design research, one of the biggest and most important challenges, is
> developing a body of theory for predicting the outcomes in the world of the
> effects of individual designs.
>>
>> It's in this context I raised a relatively abstract meta-analytical
> question about design theory making, relating to decisions about the
> character of variety in how we represent factors that are elements of
> design theories. This is an issue important to both predictive design
> theories themselves and the representation of concpets and factors that we
> use as professional designers
>>
>> There are advantages and disadvantages of 'fixed and known' variety
> versus 'infinite variety in representing the factors used in creating
> predictive theory about the consequences of designs in the world. I've
> copied the original post below.
>>
>> I used colour as an example of such a factor. First, because it is well
> understood phenomenon on this list (or so I thought), and hence wouldn't
> need to be explained. Second, colour is clearly a phenomenon that, like any
> phenomenon, we can represent as an approximation via either a continuous
> function or discrete stepped function. Also, I thought that double aspect of
> the representation of colour wouldn't need to be explained as we clearly use
> both in design.
>>
>> None of the above, I suggest, is contentious. It is taken for granted and
> straightforward in much of the discourse.
>>
>> The real challenge is to look at possible approaches to creating design
> theories that predict design outcomes as the consequences of design in the
> world.
>>
>> These kinds of design theories are difficult predictive models. The most
> immediate ambition is to make useful projections into the future of the
> consequences of individual designs. It is not expected that these theories
> will provide definitive predictions, rather that they will be usefully
> correct, at a level sufficient to aid with design decision making. Some
> simplified predictive design theory models are already possible and in use,
> for example in the realm of environmental and life cycle costs.
>>
>> It requires new sorts of design theories, however, to extend the ability
> to predict the consequences of individual designs more fully into other
> realms such as social analysis, lifestyle change, future innovation,
> politics, planning, economics, security and geopolitics.
>>
>> The variety characteristics of factors used in constructing and describing
> designs is obviously a key issue (e.g. in the manner Purma described about
> colour).
>>
>> We have a choice to include any design-related factor in predictive
>> design theories via either continuous or discrete representations or
>> some combination. In the case of colour we have a choice of either
>>
>> In the post, I asked for comments about which people felt was going to
> work better in the development of new predictive design theories that
> identified the consequences of designs.
>>
>> If we choose to represent design factors and their variety as continuous
> functions, then the predictive structures embodied in design theories will
> need to accommodate this. It drives representation of the design theories
> into, for example, the realms of non-linear n-order calculus, which on one
> hand offers potential benefits in identifying optimal positions in
> m-dimensional design space. On the other hand it presents significant
> challenges to solve the functions in creating such theories in which n and m
> are large.
>>
>> In contrast, if we choose to represent design factors and their variety as
> discrete functions (identified via just noticeable difference or the
> several other measures of limits of discrimination (which as far as I can
> see combine vectorially)), then the predictive structures embodied in the
> design theories can be chosen to accommodate this in a different manner to
> addressing continuous functions. Rather differently to the above, it enables
> the structure of design theories to move, for example, into vector space
> with predictive projection based on matrix-based analyses, and time
> projections based on finite difference or time step methods. The predictive
> processing is easier to compute, but identifying optimal directions and
> points in the design space is less easy. The challenges are in creating such
> predictive design theories in which n and m are large are less.
>>
>> I'm aware many will regard these as relatively new areas of design
> research. In fact, they originated in the earlier parts of the last century
> and were the foundational issues on which design research was developed.
> They can be seen as the central concerns of Rittel, Zwicky, Jones,
> Bertalanffy, systems research, behavioural science, operational research
> and many others. I would tentatively suggest that the underlying aim of most
> research in areas such as the perception of colour is to contribute to this
> larger and as yet not well addressed aim of developing theory to be better
> able to predict the outcomes of designs in the world.
>>
>> Again, I hope that clarifies my original post... but I'm aware people
> might be much more interested in colour theory!
>>
>> Warm regards,
>> Terry
>>
>> ---
>> Dr Terence Love
>> PhD(UWA), BA(Hons) Engin. PGCEd, FDRS, PMACM, MISI Love Services Pty
>> Ltd PO Box 226, Quinns Rocks Western Australia 6030
>> Tel: +61 (0)4 3497 5848
>> [log in to unmask]
>> www.loveservices.com.au
>> --
>>
>> Original post
>>
>> 'Is it better to assume as an axiom in making design theory that colour
> always comprises a set of fixed colours rather than assuming colour as
> being a continuous spectrum? There seem to be strong reasons in theory and
> practice to make this assumption, and that it is possible calculate exactly
> how big the set is (i.e exactly how many different colours) for each design
> scenario. The advantage in design theory and research is between fixed and
> known variety and 'infinite' variety.
>>
>>
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