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Terry, What a great vitae!

But I would like to debate a point you made.

On 2/26/05 11:14 AM, "Terence Love" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> The body-based craft skills don't smoothly transform to design skills.
> They are functionally different.

My view is that these both involve processes that become represented in the
mind as neural structures. As information embodied in neural networks thay
need not be forever or exclusively tied to the bodily movements or the
specific design situation in which they were or might be activated. Such
mental models of processes can be mapped onto one another, as for example,
when one mentally simulates climbing a wall in order to design where
footholds should go. Watching a six year old jump around as he describes the
movement of his action hero also suggests strong linkages between what the
body does and what the mind imagines can be done. Hand skills probably don't
transfer directly to mind skills until they have been translated into a
mental model that can be reinterpreted in another context. What do you
think? Also given the amazing range of your practical experience aren't
there many instances where you were guided during design by a process model
based on prior physical experience? I know my experiences building things
has shaped the way I think about design details and how the things I design
get put together. Sir Christopher Frayling at the RCA (quoting Henry Cole I
think) said "design is a matter of the hand, the heart, and the head." I
think they got it right and our job is to find out how to integrate
information from these sources (and the environment) even as we
differentiate what they involve.

Best,

Chuck