"Eyal's account is interesting in the sense that he defines expertise as a
diverse and temporarily-stable network (he borrows a lot from Actor-Network
theory) as opposed to trying to find an elusive entity (be in the knowledge
content, organizational form or something else) that differentiates expert
from non- expert or delineates one turf of expertise from another. To me,
what makes design different from something else (say science) is not a
static , essentialistic entity. It is the processes wherein designers are
engaged in various network building processes with many different actors in
different localities and temporalities."
That is a useful distinction, up to a point. I take this part: "It is the processes wherein designers are
engaged in various network building processes with many different actors in
different localities and temporalities." That describes the *structure* of what is going on, the relationships but underemphasises the subject of that activity which is what I am interested in.
Designers are doing something distinctly different from other activities so long as they are concerned with the effects of form, not as an engineering minimum (so I exclude the engineers) or as an abstract entity (excluding the planners-only). Designers are concerned with the two and three dimensional character of useful objects, and seek to control how the object is perceived (as in "that looks good/nice/fascinating".) They do this by asking themselves "would I draw it like that". The key is the visual.
The tricky part for me is that there is a whole cohort of designers who deal in service design which has a certain aesthetic element but which is on the limit of my rather stingent definition. What do I do with them?
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