Michael raises interesting objections to my treatment of "complexity" in my
2011 book "Living with complexity."
I'm not going to go into a lengthy debate here -- we have all seen how a
sensible discussion degrades into endless quibbles on this list. So I'll
simply review and comment on a few themes.
First of all, the diagram that Michael posted is wonderfully complex.
Indeed, despite all its complexity, it misses numerous works: just Google
"complexity studies" and see the wild profusion of issues.
Castellani, B. (2015). Fig. 13. Complexity Map Version 5. Retrieved May 26,
2015
(http://sacswebsite.blogspot.co.uk)
I am fully
aware of most of the items
-
in that delightfully complex diagram, as well as the entire field now
called "Complexity Studies" (
or variants of that phrase). Northwestern University, where I was when I
wrote that book, has an Institute on Complex Systems and I attended some of
their seminars.
And yes, my book ignores all that. (https://www.nico.northwestern.edu/)
--
I focussed on the word "simplicity," and the big debate that was (and
still is) ongoing decrying the complexity of today's technologies and
crying out for "simplicity." Two of our own kind even wrote books on
simplicity:
Mollerup, P. (2015). Simplicity: A matter of design. Amsterdam, The
Netherlands: BIS Publishers.
http://www.bispublishers.com/per-mollerup-simplicity-a-matter-of-design.html
Maeda, J. (2006). The laws of simplicity. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
In my opinion, the Maeda book is, um, simple. The Mollerup book is
profound. My book would have been much improved had I read Mollerup first
Alas, I would have broken a law had i done so (a law of physics, that is:
my book was published in 2011, his in 2015).
--
Now back to Michael's comments. I have no real issue with most of his
comments about complexity. They are correct and i agree with most of them.
What I disagree with is his characterization of the goal of my book. I
never intended to address the field of complexity studies.
The purpose of my book was to address the concept of simplicity. To argue
that the quest for simplicity was ill-advised. That what was really desired
was understanding, and even complex things were often judged to be simple
if they were understandable. I contrasted "complexity" with "complicated,"
where by "complicated" I meant "confusing.".
The word "complicated" was a crappy choice. If I were to rewrite the book
today, I would substitute "confusing" for "complicated." Otherwise, I
would not change most of the book, except to take advantage of Mollerup's
insights and build upon them.
Michael says that my ignoring all the existing studies on complexity
matters. I completely disagree. My ignoring complexity theories was not
out of ignorance. It was because I had a different goal in mind -- arguing
against simplicity. Michael said:
This matters because ‘Living with Complexity’ presents itself as a new,
instructive text on design fundamentals i.e. it prescribes rules for
designers (and design users) to follow. In that situation, one might
reasonably expect the authority of a given rule to rest on the authority of
the case put forward. So, as rule giver, it seems to me the author is more
or less bound to provide good and sufficient context for the case.
No. Not at all. Remember, I am addressing only the meaning of the word
"complexity" as the opposite of "simplicity." There are no new design
rules in the book, nor did I pretend that there were. Yes, this was meant
to be an instructive text, but not for existing designers: it is intended
for design students and for non-designers, especially journalists who
insist on touting the virtues of simplicity. My intent was to explain that
the hope for simplicity is a badly informed, impossible hope, that
complexity is not a bad thing, it is confusion that is bad. And finally,
that a number of well-known design rules and practices are capable of
turning otherwise confusing complex things into wonderfully understandable
complex things, so understandable, that people would call them "simple."
That's all.
==
Of course, in the latter part of his note, Michael takes me to task in
several different ways. I disagree with him there. I know that many of the
readers will agree with him. that is fine. Disagreement can be healthy.
I've made my points earlier, so I will follow my own advice and not
endlessly repeat what has already been said.
I am in favor of things that are understandable, functional, usable,
useful, and beautiful. Complexity isn't relevant to those beliefs. (Which
was the point of the book.)
Don
-
Don Norman
Prof. and Director, DesignLab, UC San Diego
[log in to unmask] designlab.ucsd.edu/ www.jnd.org <http://www.jnd.org/>
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