On my way to Vancouver, I read Henry Cloud’s book on character and integrity. The book is written well, simple and flowing language. It inspires me in certain ways, especially how to talk about character in interactive products and services. here is an extract from the book:
“in the same way that we metabolize food, we metabolize experience. Experience becomes our character, as we have seen earlier, just as food becomes the cellular makeup of our bodies. You are your experience, in certain ways. It shapes you and forms you, metabolically. You take food in, then break it down into what is usable, and what is not. Your body takes the good part of the experience and keeps that to make new cells, energy and the like. ..in metabolizing experience, the process can break down in the same way. Taking in the good parts of a losing experience means that we learn what we can from the experience and take that forward as new “cells” of our character, meaning wisdom. Also, through persevering and continuing to go forward and reengaging life, we develop strength, patience, hope, optimism, and a host of other important character traits that we will need to make things succeed.” -integrity: the courage to meet the demands of reality, henry cloud, page 163
This insight is from the second systems thinking class. Once we begin thinking of systems and their relationships, we also begin to realize the boundaries of the human-made deliberations, or judgments. Harold makes a witty word play with the G.O.D in the previous class. Designer faces two challenges in his systemic thinking, first one is the Guarantee Of Design, second Guarantee Of Destiny. Designer can accept the first challenge with his/her judgments and actional deliberation, however, the second one is pretty much beyond his/her competency. Borrowing from Helen myth, that is why Nelson characterizes designer as a lame G.O.D., who needs to keep continue on making in order to survive, in order to serve for the bigger gods.. For my side, it was striking to see the connection between the part and wholes, and how the concept and existence of ‘destiny’ comes into the stage as a boundary to the systems-thinking. At another time, I would like to think of this boundary as a matter of ‘chance’. Goffman has a nice piece on chance and chance taking in his Interaction Rituals..
I attended Harold Nelson’s systems thinking and design action class today. Nelson talked about the basics of systems design and how systemics is all about relationships, interrelationships, and emergence. Emergence can be explained by the wisdom that whole is bigger than its sum. In design, we name emergence and emergent qualities as the composition and compositional qualities. The entire class Nelson tried to explore the topical pairs of part and wholes, descriptions and explanations. Here is an introductory video from Russell Ackoff, one of the pioneers of systems thinking. This one is followed by two consecutive videos.
I came across Reinventing Ritual at the library, and just delighted by the title, borrowed it without hesitation. Reinventing ritual is originated from the exhibitions on contemporary Jewish life, which was held at Jewish museum in New York. I always find the subtle sensitivities of Jewish life sympathetic, mostly because also coming from an Abrahamic tradition. In the preface, Arnold Eisen comments on how ritual brings meaning to our lives:
“Thank goodness. I don’t know what I would do without ritual, whether in my friendships, my community, or my attempts to fill my space and time on earth with sacredness and meaning. The older, I get, the more I appreciate ritual performances and forms. Of course, these run the risk of decline into habit, mere routine. That is the occupational hazard of ritual, so to speak. But without the motion that ritual imposes and prescribes, I would not know moments of fulfillment that I reassure almost as much as love and life itself…. how can we join in community with strangers, or people well known to us, act in concert with them for the good, or go deeper into life together if we do not gather around same table at a specific time move to the same rhythms , respond to the same image and symbols and take for granted-so as to challenge- the same rules and expectations?”
One of the things that puzzles me in ritual products is their symbolic power which is hard to deal with in a design context, and most of the times results in mimicry and facelifting of their normative forms. To overcome shallowness of facelifting, it is critically important to focus on the actions (movements, actions, interactions, and participations) of rituals rather than the physical forms. Here are two examples from the book that achieve that leap from physical to actional. First one is netilat yadayim (Dov Ganchrow), a hand cleansing vessel that provides a self-cleansing ritual; and frontier-vest (Azra Aksamija), a transformable wearable that provides praying ritual for both Muslims and Jewish. Both products are inventive yet carrying their ritualistic values and symbolic meanings..
Tingfang shared the below dance performance video from a dance company called Cloudgate from Taiwan. I fell in love with this 30 seconds trailer. Calligraphy embodied in dance does not sound original, but it really is, we relate Western typography with certain emotions and feelings, but this relating is usually a verbal or visual one, this work even though representing a different origin shows us how to exceed that boundary, revealing emotions in motion…
My framework or/and topic reminds one of my friends an NPR radio show talking about puppies, which are part of a multi-purpose transition program called Puppies Behind Bars. There are two phases of the program. First part is the education of these smart dogs either for service dogs for veterans or as bomb-sniffing dogs. For education, they assign each puppy to an inmate who carries certain qualities and who is close to her/his release . The program can last six to twelve months, but during the process, the dog becomes an intimate and natural way for these inmates to transition to the outside world. They become the compassionate partners that do not judge or stigmatize their teachers. The education of dog at this phase becomes a service itself, helping inmates facilitate their transitions. but wait it is only the first phase.
once they finished their education, they are assigned to veterans who have returned from military service(mostly iraq) with some traumatic-disorders or phobias like claustrophobia. These soldiers probably had terrible experiences in uncanny corners or crowds in the battle field, and lost their trust to their environment. Puppies intervene into this type of loss and become friends or care-givers, checking corners or closed spaces and let their partner know it is ok to move on.
It does sound a little bit teddy bear – the utmost cliche transition object- when you first heard, however, it is much more elaborate, elegant, and experiential; it also hints at the education topic as a strong companion and variation for transition topic…
Stress eraser as its name suggests aims to decrease stress, facilitating people’s (growing a) meditation habit. It uses a simple biofeedback therapy method by leveraging haptic input and providing visual feedback. here is a definition of biofeedback from their booklet:
Biofeedback is any technology that non-invasively monitors your body’s functions – such asblood pressure, heart rate, skin temperature, or muscle tension – and conveys that information to you in real-time. Biofeedback has been clinically proven over 30 years of research to help people learn to use their body’s voluntary functions – such as breathing, focusing, or contracting muscles – to have an immediate and positive impact on their well being. By communicating your body function in real-time, a biofeedback machine increases your awareness of a particular bodily function and allows you to exert greater control over these functions.
what makes this product tempting for me is its transitional strength. it may be one of primitive yet efficient transitional products, which aims to increase quality-of-life by its simplest means, intervening in people’s breathing rhythm. It is perceptive rather than socially interactive, trying to reach at habitual through behavioral means. Company suggests using the product before going to bed, trying to intervene into bedtime rituals-if people have any. I would cast this product as a perfect ritual product, emulating eastern traditions of meditation and awareness…I’ve discovered a similar product called emwave, i will think a loud more may be next time with emwave…
while tackling with principles, and trying to nail down abstract conception of principle into more concrete and actionable terms, I have found a useful book from walter watson (thanks to dick), and here is a nice quote describing the “functioning” principle of principles.
every text is not only an argument by an author about a subject matter, it is also for the sake of some end or purpose or function…An end or purpose or function is present in the text so far as the text has within it something that causes it to function, a principle of its functioning. such internal principles functioning can be called principles in a distinctive sense…a principle can be either relatively or absolutely first; that is, it can cause functioning, and itself be caused, or it can be an uncaused cause of a functioning, a first principle. God, if He is a principle at all, is ordinarily first principle…there may be an ordered set of actions, but unless, there is some reason for action the text cannot function as an ethics. or imagine a tragedy that lacks any engagement of feeling. there may be an ordered sequence of actions and events, but without feeling the text cannot function as a tragedy…(architectonics of meaning, p.101, walter watson,)
these are experts who envision and investigate new product meanings through a broader, in-depth exploration of the evolution of society, culture, and technology. these experts who pursue R&D on meanings, may be managers of other companies, scholars, technology suppliers, scientists, artists, and of course, designers.
- design driven innovation, roberto verganti.
I attended an event the other night, featuring current projects going on in Pittsburgh, or concepts aiming for better Pittsburgh futures. The projects are diverse, from arts to education, health to infrastructure. Presenters include Susan Everingham, director of the RAND office in Pittsburgh; Scott Faber, a developmental pediatrician at the Children’s Institute; Raymar Hampshire of sponsorchange (.org); Sean Jones of the Pittsburgh Jazz Orchestra; Alexi Morrissey, a poet; Priya Narasimhan from Carnegie Mellon’s Mobility Center; LaVerne Baker Hotep from the Center for Victims of Violence and Crime; Hilary Robinson, dean at the College of Fine Arts at Carnegie Mellon; Jon Rubin, artist, and the man behind The Waffle Shop; and Janera Solomon, executive director of the Kelly Strayhorn Theater. Each of the presenters took 3 minutes to present their concepts/projects. Concepts have different approaches how to facilitate social change, from the arts to the education. People from arts express strange ideas, like constructing huge fans in downtown Pittsburgh to create a climate change or creating a local Maoist revolution sending academia to the city-field. I found these defamiliarizations quite witty to open up a discussion space or re-framing of possible visions. Among these concepts, I like the LaVerne Baker’s holistic approach best. She is trying to create a five year community program, aiming at changing diet (food habits) of a community gradually, to decrease the (tendency of) violence. It sounds bizarre when you first heard it, but she has conducted some research showing that people consuming healthy and less meat-type products have more calmness than the ones who consume meat. This reminds me Eastern religions diet/fasting practices, especially Buddhists and Sufis a lot. I am looking forward to see more programs from City-Live initiative in the new year..
