Dear Terry,
You wrote, “… Ken seemed to be assuming that any and all publications in an area were of relevance.
This seems to be at the heart of the situation. An awareness of the problems of using atheoretical publications as the basis for scientific theory means there is little or no need to prove each atheoretical publication irrelevant. Instead, the requirement is only to point to the issue, which Chuck has done. Ken, whose research and writing is typically in disciplines in which atheoretical discourse is dominant, has responded to Chuck apparently assuming Chuck’s intentions were also atheoretical.”
This is not an accurate description of my post.
The post had several elements.
The first element was a statement that there is indeed, a literature on these processes. I used the number of hits on Google Scholar to show the size of the literature.
I stated explicitly that much of the literature is irrelevant – and being atheoretical, for Chuck’s purposes, is a kind of irrelevance. I did not assume that all were relevant. I stated quite the opposite.
Nevertheless, a literature search within this body of literature will locate the material that is theoretically relevant. Within a literature this size, there is a great deal of theoretically relevant material.
The specific examples I gave are examples of theoretically relevant material:
Harry Collins (2012); Harry Collins and Robert Evans (2009); T. J. Howard, S.J. Culley, and E. Dekoninck (2008); Harold Nelson and Erik Stolterman (2003 [2012]); Ikujiro Nonaka and Hirotaka Takeuchi (1995); Ikujiro Nonaka and Toshihiro Nichiguchi (2001); Michael Polanyi (1974); Michael Polanyi and Harry Prosch (1977); Michael Polanyi (2009 [1966]); Herbert A Simon (1964); Herbert A Simon (1977); Herbert A. Simon (1987); George Von Krogh, Kazuo Ichijo, and Ikujiro Nonaka (2000); and Andy Warr and Eamonn O’Neill (2005).
These selections were examples of theoretically relevant material by respected and distinguished theorists. For one specific example, the 2009 edition of Polanyi's Tacit Dimension contains an introduction by Amartya Sen for anyone who has not yet understood the theoretical significance of the book.
I selected the specific examples because the publications, concepts, analyses, and discourses made a relevant theoretical contribution to the topic of Chuck’s paper.
You might not like the kinds of theory that all these authors represent, but they are all theorists of distinction. The list includes two of the most highly cited design theory books of our time, and the authors include two Nobel laureates in economics. It also include a physical chemist whose work some believe should have won the Nobel Prize – and two of his students did go on to win the prize. I feel comfortable in arguing that the list of books and papers given as examples are theoretically sound.
I'd suggest that I can judge a relevant theoretical contribution. My criteria are visible in an article on this issue: “Theory Construction in Design Research, Criteria, Approaches, and Methods” (Friedman 2003). Since it is published, anyone is free to decide for himself or herself whether I am as ignorant of theory as you suggest.
Those who wish to read the paper will find both published versions on my Academia.edu page:
http://swinburne.academia.edu/KenFriedman
The journal version is at the top of the stack, the conference version just beneath.
My critique focused on what I see as a problematic gap in a single paper. I did not criticize Chuck Burnette or Chuck’s broad range of skills and ideas as a designer, architect, educator, and thinker. As Ranjan does, I have used and suggested Chuck’s (Burnette 2005) IDESIGN framework to my students – I gave the link to IDESIGN in a post yesterday and I'm happy to give it again:
http://www.idesignthinking.com/main.html
The point of my original post was simply that there is a solid theoretical, conceptual, and empirical literature on this topic. I gave sets of figures to show the size of the entire potential literature. I offered a small selection of specific, theoretically relevant examples to demonstrate the quality of the relevant literature. It is possible to provide more examples – that requires a careful literature search.
In my view, it is a mistake to describe these examples as "theoretical" or "irrelevant." I'd suggest a bit of reading — or at least browsing -- before dismissing them in this way.
But I leave it to the readers of the PhD-Design list to decide whether I am as ignorant of theory as your post suggests.
Yours,
Ken
Ken Friedman, PhD, DSc (hc), FDRS | University Distinguished Professor | Swinburne University of Technology | Melbourne, Australia | [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> | Mobile +61 404 830 462 | Home Page http://www.swinburne.edu.au/design/people/Professor-Ken-Friedman-ID22.html<http://www.swinburne.edu.au/design> Academia Page http://swinburne.academia.edu/KenFriedman About Me Page http://about.me/ken_friedman
Guest Professor | College of Design and Innovation | Tongji University | Shanghai, China
--
References
Burnette, Charles. 2005. IDESIGN. Seven Ways of Design Thinking. A Teaching Resource. Yi Ji Hyun, ed. URL: http://www.idesignthinking.com/main.html
Burnette, Charles. 2013. “Intuition, Imagination and Insight in Design Thinking.” Unpublished draft manuscript posted to URL: http://independent.academia.edu/CharlesBurnette
Collins, Harry. 2012. Tacit and Explicit Knowledge. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Collins, Harry and Robert Evans. 2009. Rethinking Expertise. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Friedman, Ken. 2003. “Theory construction in design research: criteria: approaches, and methods.” Design Studies, 24 (2003), 507–522. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0142-694X(03)00039-5
Friedman, Ken. 2002. “Theory Construction in Design Research. Criteria, Approaches, and Methods.” In Common Ground. Proceedings of the Design Research Society International Conference at Brunel University, September 5-7, 2002. David Durling and John Shackleton, Editors. Stoke on Trent, UK: Staffordshire University Press, 388-414. Available at URL: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.3/41967
Howard, T. J., S.J. Culley, E. Dekoninck. 2008. “Describing the creative design process by the integration of engineering design and cognitive psychology literature.” Design Studies, Vol. 29, Issue 2, pp. 160-180.
Nelson, Harold, and Erik Stolterman. 2003 [2012]. The Design Way: Intentional Change In An Unpredictable World: Foundations And Fundamentals Of Design Competence. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press.
Nonaka, Ikujiro, and Hirotaka Takeuchi. 1995. The Knowledge-Creating Company: How Japanese Companies Create the Dynamics of Innovation. New York: Oxford University Press.
Nonaka, Ikujiro, and Toshihiro Nichiguchi. 2001. Knowledge Emergence: Social, Technical, and Evolutionary Dimensions of Knowledge Creation. New York: Oxford University Press.
Polanyi, Michael. 1974. Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Polanyi, Michael, and Harry Prosch. 1977. Meaning. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Polanyi, Michael. 2009 [1966]. The Tacit Dimension. With a new foreword by Amartya Sen. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Simon, Herbert A. 1964. "Understanding Creativity" Carnegie Review 2 (Reprint #252) np. URL:
http://ptfs.library.cmu.edu/awweb/main.jsp?flag=browse&smd=1&awdid=1
Simon, Herbert A. 1977. “Scientific Discovery and the Psychology of Problem Solving.” Models of Discovery<http://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-94-010-9521-1>. Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science<http://link.springer.com/bookseries/5710>. Volume 54, 1977, pp. 286-303.
Simon, Herbert A. 1987. Making Management Decisions: The Role of Intuition and Emotion.” The Academy of Management Executive. Vol. 1, No. 1 (Feb., 1987), pp. 57-64.
Von Krogh, George, Kazuo Ichijo, and Ikujiro Nonaka. 2000. Enabling Knowledge Creation: How to Unlock the Mystery of Tacit Knowledge and Release the Power of Innovation. New York: Oxford University Press.
Warr, Andy, and Eamonn O’Neill. 2005. “Understanding design as a social creative process.” Proceedings of the 5th Conference on Creativity & Cognition, pp. 118-127. New York: ACM.
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