Terence Love wrote:
> A designer does not do these things  by  thinking. They temporarily usurp
> the bodies homeostasis processes to represent complex dimensions of problem
> and solutions physically in the body by small shifts in hormone levels,
> posture etc (secondarily represented in the brain). 
I'm grateful to Terry for spelling out a position that he often hints at.

My problem with this approach is that I can see what Terry is getting at 
but cannot see what to do with it.

My colleagues Jeff Baggott and Nick Dulake are working on a similar 
problem, of relating an internal technical process to its external 
effects. Their partner is a chemist who has a detailed understanding of 
nano level effects. The chemist can tell you all about these effects and 
their implications for the wider world but only by setting out the 
mathematics. Jeff and Nick (film maker and designer) find the 
mathematics incomprehensible, as would most of us who had not studied 
both chemistry and mathematics sufficiently to become a professor of 
chemistry, but they recognise that the chemist has a deep tacit 
understanding of what the maths create for us, he just lacks the ability 
to tell anybody who is not another chemist.  The chemist can, of course, 
build us a machine (a formulation) that will apply those effects in 
useful ways but we cannot see that machine working so we are none the wiser.

To solve that "problem", Jeff and Nick negotiate (slowly and with 
difficulty) with the chemist to come up with valid metaphors - three 
dimensional models and behaviours that allow us to understand the 
chemistry sufficiently for our needs. It is very important that the 
metaphors are shared ones - the chemist must agree that they represent 
the mathematics with enough precision - the project started because the 
chemist was unhappy with naive metaphors (eg robots riding on sperm) 
that concealed the science. The work they are doing seems to me to be 
essential if the rest of us (policy makers, business people, 
schoolchildren, designers  etc etc) are to make effective use of the new 
knowledge in our complicated lives.

So now Terry has set out his idea (In Michael Polanyi's terms, a glimpse 
of a further shore) we are going to need several things that the 
nano-chemists are developing in their case:

1. An intuitive/learned ability* that allows some people to relate the 
very complex and subtle combinations of effects, that he hints at, to 
their equally complex and subtle external results.
2. A narrative framework that allows us to comprehend the actual 
framework at work
3. Some practical formulations that we can apply to understanding or 
(preferably) facilitating designing.

If I can see all that coming along then I would be prepared to start 
using it in my own thinking. Until then I'll stick with Rittel and 
Polanyi's clumsy attempts. And thanks to Keith Russell for that quote 
which seems to describe my own experience closely enough to convince me 
that at least three people (Polanyi, Russell and me) have the germ of a 
useful framework that suits us three at least. So we are happy, how 
about the rest of you? :o)

*Along with Polanyi, Dewey and others I am happy that people can learn 
these kinds of things and I don't need to understand the biochemical 
underpinning. But to be consistent, Terry's new system would have to 
explain all that stuff as well.

My suspicion is that Terry is attempting to understand the art of 
drilling holes in metal by studying only the electrical fields in the 
motor of the power drill. :o)  :o)

best wishes from Sheffield
Chris Rust