jose luis casamayor wrote:
> - How would you define a new physical artefact that perform a new function that can solve a current crucial problem, and that has for that purpose had to develop new knowledge? It would be good practice, research, etc.?

Thanks Jose, this gets to the point that I wanted to make in response to 
Don.

I feel there are (at least) three possible kinds of research that we 
might consider here.

Research that advances our understanding of designing, as Don indicates. 
My only problem about that is that it is rather introspective. As I've 
said before, if chemists only investigated how chemists study chemistry 
the rest of us would have a right to question whether they deserved our 
support and attention.

Research that advances the state of our art more directly. I can think 
of two well-established examples, both the subject of PhD projects. 
Owain Pedgeley's work on the construction of guitars, that provided us 
with a better understanding of how plastic materials and construction 
might be used to create acoustically better instruments, and Graham 
Whiteley's project that created a set of mechanical principles for the 
joints of an analogous skeletal arm, allowing the construction of 
artificial arms that are capable of replicating natural human movement. 
Graham's thesis is available here 
http://chrisrust.wordpress.com/2009/02/20/whiteleythesis/

Research in which designers collaborate with others and use their 
ability to create concepts and prototypes as a provocation within the 
interdisciplinary setting. As well as participating more generally in 
the shared research which may lead to advances in the state of various 
arts, designers and their products can have an important and intentional 
role as provocateurs in the research that I have described here: 
http://chrisrust.wordpress.com/2009/02/22/unstated-contributions/

In both of the latter cases artefacts play an important role in the 
research and if we don't allow them to form part of the narrative we are 
not doing a full job, although as I've said a researcher has to "own" 
their research and that usually requires some kind of narrative account 
that will involve written descriptions and arguments. However it is 
worth noting that before Graham Whiteley produced his prototype arm 
nobody could make such a thing, afterwards any competent mechanical 
engineer could look at the prototype or drawings and understand fairly 
easily how to make it and what it did. It also did not require a great 
deal of forensic skill to see the intentions behind the prototype. What 
you could not see without the thesis, including the intermediate 
drawings and models, was to see the process of inquiry that led to and 
validated the prototype

So I share Don's worries about the use of the "r" word, although we have 
to accept that the terms "research" and "researching" are widely used by 
very large numbers of people who are quite comfortable with their 
various usages so maybe we need a qualifying term as in "scholarly 
research" to be clear with ourselves and others. But I am confident that 
designing can be a valid instrument of inquiry with designed artefacts 
providing important evidence of the research and its contribution to 
knowledge.

best wishes from Sheffield
Chris

...............................................................o^o
Professor Chris Rust FDRS
Head of Art and Design
Sheffield Hallam University, S1 2NU, UK
+44 114 225 6772
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http://chrisrust.wordpress.com/

Every time I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the 
future of the human race. - H. G. Wells