Metadesign
Encyclopedia
Metadesign is an emerging conceptual framework aimed at defining and creating social, economic and technical infrastructures in which new forms of collaborative design
can take place. It consists of a series of practical design-related tools for achieving this.
As a methodology, its aim is to nurture emergence of the previously unthinkable as possibilities or prospects through the collaboration
of designers within interdisciplinarity
'metadesign' teams. Inspired by the way living systems work, this new field aims to help improve the way we feed, clothe, shelter, assemble, communicate and live together.
into governance, because design intervention works more directly (i.e. at the level of lifestyle). However, whereas many designers may be personally conscious of the ecological context, the divisive pressures of the prevailing economic system
have proved almost insuperable. Also, most designers are trained - and then paid - to work as specialists with a specific focus. The current professions of design are unable to re-design (consciously) their working practices. This is because, at the professional level, they are currently unable to attain a high level of strategic power. Their specialism may also make it more difficult for them to think 'outside the box', i.e. the familiar mindset of their specific practice. Nor are designers trained to cope, in a competent and responsible way, with the highly complex situations in society as a whole. 'Metadesign' is therefore akin to what Buckminster Fuller
proposed as Prime Design. At the practical level metadesign is a way for society to reform itself within its environment by modulating the way it feeds, clothes, shelters, assembles and communicates.
Motivated by the environmentalist and ethical concerns described above, some researchers are working towards the establishment of a metadesign profession. This would comprise a new field of ethical design that works in conditions of great complexity. This may mean that 'metadesign' becomes a superset of co-design
, and other methods of design
that have emerged over the last fifty or so years. It would operate within entrepreneurial teams that synergise many different disciplines and approaches. It would adapt to its predicament by finding opportunities, and by re-designing itself accordingly. Metadesign aims to create a synergy
of benign synergies. By making these synergies practically useful, and by sharing them within communities, humanity would be able to 'do more with less'. However, synergy is elusive because it does not respect the boundaries of language that underpin our conventional paradigms and sense of reality
. Metadesign acknowledges this problem by incorporating an active and creative language-based element within the whole metadesign task (e.g. it may add, or modify key paradigm
s, metaphor
s and neologisms). At the strategic level, metadesign acknowledges the principle that synergy
requires difference. At the conceptual level this is similar to the possibility-finding technique that Koestler called bisociation. At the ecological level it is similar to symbiosis
, or the systemic stability that derives from bio-diversity. Metadesigners may therefore need to seek, and/or co-create a ‘diversity-of-diversities’. This is a difficult prospect that will require collective innovation, development, field-testing, evaluation and refinement.
approach to Complexity Theory
and Information Systems
by Dutch designer Andries Van Onck in 1963, while at Ulm School of Design
(later at Politecnico di Milano). Since then, several different design, creative and research approaches have used the name "Metadesign", ranging from Maturana
and Varella's biological approach, to Giaccardi's techno-social approach, and Virilio's
techno-policital approach.
Later on, a very active group was present at Politecnico di Milano, and several different universities and graduate programs began applying Metadesign in design teaching around the world generally based at Van Onck's approach, further developed at Polictecnico di Milano. Nevertheless, there's a very active, but widely dispersed, group that base their activities at Maturana and Varella's approach.
More recently, some efforts have been made to systematize Metadesign as a structured creative process, such as Giaccardi's and Vassão's academic works , among several others, based on a much wider reference frame, ranging from Post-structuralist philosophy
, Postman's
Media Ecology, Alexander's
Pattern Languages and Deep Ecology
.
This variety of approaches is justified by the myriad interpretations that can be derived from the etymological
structure of the term.
’ originally meant ‘beside’ or ‘after’ but is now also used to imply the possibility of change or transformation, including self-transformation. Metadesign can therefore allude to a possible design practice that (re)designs itself (see Maturana and Varela's term autopoiesis). The idea of Metadesign acknowledges that future uses and problems cannot be completely anticipated at design time. Aristotle
's influential theory of design
defined it by saying that the 'cause' of design was its final state. This teleological
perspective is similar to the orthodox idea of an economic payback at the point of sale, rather than successive stages when the product could be seen to achieve high levels of perceived value, throughout the whole design cycle. Some supporters of metadesign hope that it will extend the traditional notion of system design beyond the original development of a system by allowing users to become co-designers.
practice that is entrepreneurial and entredonneurial on many levels. If it is conceived within an eco-mimetic design framework it can be used to reinvent the language that co-sustains existing habits. Our 'metadesign’ methodology seeks to combine existing resources ‘bisociatively’ in order to create an auspicious synergy of benign synergies. In aspiring to this outcome, metadesign teams will cultivate auspicious ‘diversities-of-diversities’. It suggests that metadesign would offer a manifold ethical space. In this respect, related approaches include what Koestler (1967) called holarchy
, or what John Chris Jones
called 'creative democracy'.
understanding of the term "tool":
1 - Levels of Abstraction (the ability to understand the structure and limits of abstractions, language and instrumental thinking);
2 - Diagrams and Topology (the use of diagrammatic thinking and design, sustained by topological understanding);
3 - Procedural Design (the creation of realities through the use of procedures, such as in game and role playing, as well as in procedural design, art and architecture);
4 - Emergence (the absence of absolute control, and the ability to take advantage of unintended and unforeseen results).
Vassão argues that, in all different approaches to Metadesign, the presence of these conceptual tools can be verified.
Design
Design as a noun informally refers to a plan or convention for the construction of an object or a system while “to design” refers to making this plan...
can take place. It consists of a series of practical design-related tools for achieving this.
As a methodology, its aim is to nurture emergence of the previously unthinkable as possibilities or prospects through the collaboration
Collaboration
Collaboration is working together to achieve a goal. It is a recursive process where two or more people or organizations work together to realize shared goals, — for example, an intriguing endeavor that is creative in nature—by sharing...
of designers within interdisciplinarity
Interdisciplinarity
Interdisciplinarity involves the combining of two or more academic fields into one single discipline. An interdisciplinary field crosses traditional boundaries between academic disciplines or schools of thought, as new needs and professions have emerged....
'metadesign' teams. Inspired by the way living systems work, this new field aims to help improve the way we feed, clothe, shelter, assemble, communicate and live together.
The Need for Metadesign
In order to address the impending ecological catastrophe it will be vital to change the average person’s mindset and behaviour. However, governments are unlikely to achieve this, especially with a ‘targets and penalties’ approach because the global economy is driven by acts of consumption. A more creative approach is needed. One solution is to introduce more design thinkingDesign thinking
Design Thinking refers to the methods and processes for investigating ill-defined problems, acquiring information, analyzing knowledge, and positing solutions in the design and planning fields...
into governance, because design intervention works more directly (i.e. at the level of lifestyle). However, whereas many designers may be personally conscious of the ecological context, the divisive pressures of the prevailing economic system
Economic system
An economic system is the combination of the various agencies, entities that provide the economic structure that defines the social community. These agencies are joined by lines of trade and exchange along which goods, money etc. are continuously flowing. An example of such a system for a closed...
have proved almost insuperable. Also, most designers are trained - and then paid - to work as specialists with a specific focus. The current professions of design are unable to re-design (consciously) their working practices. This is because, at the professional level, they are currently unable to attain a high level of strategic power. Their specialism may also make it more difficult for them to think 'outside the box', i.e. the familiar mindset of their specific practice. Nor are designers trained to cope, in a competent and responsible way, with the highly complex situations in society as a whole. 'Metadesign' is therefore akin to what Buckminster Fuller
Buckminster Fuller
Richard Buckminster “Bucky” Fuller was an American systems theorist, author, designer, inventor, futurist and second president of Mensa International, the high IQ society....
proposed as Prime Design. At the practical level metadesign is a way for society to reform itself within its environment by modulating the way it feeds, clothes, shelters, assembles and communicates.
Motivated by the environmentalist and ethical concerns described above, some researchers are working towards the establishment of a metadesign profession. This would comprise a new field of ethical design that works in conditions of great complexity. This may mean that 'metadesign' becomes a superset of co-design
Co-Design
Co-design is a philosophy in the American pragmatist tradition, which argues that all people have different ideals and perspectives and that any design process needs to deal with this. Co-Design traces its roots to Immanuel Kant, who in the Critique of the Pure Reason observed that to put a...
, and other methods of design
Design
Design as a noun informally refers to a plan or convention for the construction of an object or a system while “to design” refers to making this plan...
that have emerged over the last fifty or so years. It would operate within entrepreneurial teams that synergise many different disciplines and approaches. It would adapt to its predicament by finding opportunities, and by re-designing itself accordingly. Metadesign aims to create a synergy
Synergy
Synergy may be defined as two or more things functioning together to produce a result not independently obtainable.The term synergy comes from the Greek word from , , meaning "working together".-Definitions and usages:...
of benign synergies. By making these synergies practically useful, and by sharing them within communities, humanity would be able to 'do more with less'. However, synergy is elusive because it does not respect the boundaries of language that underpin our conventional paradigms and sense of reality
Reality
In philosophy, reality is the state of things as they actually exist, rather than as they may appear or might be imagined. In a wider definition, reality includes everything that is and has been, whether or not it is observable or comprehensible...
. Metadesign acknowledges this problem by incorporating an active and creative language-based element within the whole metadesign task (e.g. it may add, or modify key paradigm
Paradigm
The word paradigm has been used in science to describe distinct concepts. It comes from Greek "παράδειγμα" , "pattern, example, sample" from the verb "παραδείκνυμι" , "exhibit, represent, expose" and that from "παρά" , "beside, beyond" + "δείκνυμι" , "to show, to point out".The original Greek...
s, metaphor
Metaphor
A metaphor is a literary figure of speech that uses an image, story or tangible thing to represent a less tangible thing or some intangible quality or idea; e.g., "Her eyes were glistening jewels." Metaphor may also be used for any rhetorical figures of speech that achieve their effects via...
s and neologisms). At the strategic level, metadesign acknowledges the principle that synergy
Synergy
Synergy may be defined as two or more things functioning together to produce a result not independently obtainable.The term synergy comes from the Greek word from , , meaning "working together".-Definitions and usages:...
requires difference. At the conceptual level this is similar to the possibility-finding technique that Koestler called bisociation. At the ecological level it is similar to symbiosis
Symbiosis
Symbiosis is close and often long-term interaction between different biological species. In 1877 Bennett used the word symbiosis to describe the mutualistic relationship in lichens...
, or the systemic stability that derives from bio-diversity. Metadesigners may therefore need to seek, and/or co-create a ‘diversity-of-diversities’. This is a difficult prospect that will require collective innovation, development, field-testing, evaluation and refinement.
History
Metadesign has been initially put forward as an Industrial DesignIndustrial design
Industrial design is the use of a combination of applied art and applied science to improve the aesthetics, ergonomics, and usability of a product, but it may also be used to improve the product's marketability and production...
approach to Complexity Theory
Complexity
In general usage, complexity tends to be used to characterize something with many parts in intricate arrangement. The study of these complex linkages is the main goal of complex systems theory. In science there are at this time a number of approaches to characterizing complexity, many of which are...
and Information Systems
Information systems
Information Systems is an academic/professional discipline bridging the business field and the well-defined computer science field that is evolving toward a new scientific area of study...
by Dutch designer Andries Van Onck in 1963, while at Ulm School of Design
Ulm School of Design
The Ulm School of Design was a college of design based in Ulm, Germany.Founded in 1953 by Inge Aicher-Scholl, Otl Aicher and Max Bill, the latter being first Rector of the school and a former student at the Bauhaus. The HfG quickly gained international recognition and is now viewed as being second...
(later at Politecnico di Milano). Since then, several different design, creative and research approaches have used the name "Metadesign", ranging from Maturana
Humberto Maturana
Humberto Maturana is a Chilean biologist and philosopher. He is considered a member of the second wave of cybernetics, known for developing a theory of autopoiesis about the nature of reflexive feedback control in living systems.- Biography :After completing secondary school at the Liceo Manuel de...
and Varella's biological approach, to Giaccardi's techno-social approach, and Virilio's
Paul Virilio
Paul Virilio is a cultural theorist and urbanist. He is best known for his writings about technology as it has developed in relation to speed and power, with diverse references to architecture, the arts, the city and the military....
techno-policital approach.
Later on, a very active group was present at Politecnico di Milano, and several different universities and graduate programs began applying Metadesign in design teaching around the world generally based at Van Onck's approach, further developed at Polictecnico di Milano. Nevertheless, there's a very active, but widely dispersed, group that base their activities at Maturana and Varella's approach.
More recently, some efforts have been made to systematize Metadesign as a structured creative process, such as Giaccardi's and Vassão's academic works , among several others, based on a much wider reference frame, ranging from Post-structuralist philosophy
Post-structuralism
Post-structuralism is a label formulated by American academics to denote the heterogeneous works of a series of French intellectuals who came to international prominence in the 1960s and '70s...
, Postman's
Neil Postman
Neil Postman was an American author, media theorist and cultural critic, who is best known by the general public for his 1985 book about television, Amusing Ourselves to Death. For more than forty years, he was associated with New York University...
Media Ecology, Alexander's
Christopher Alexander
Christopher Wolfgang Alexander is a registered architect noted for his theories about design, and for more than 200 building projects in California, Japan, Mexico and around the world...
Pattern Languages and Deep Ecology
Deep ecology
Deep ecology is a contemporary ecological philosophy that recognizes an inherent worth of all living beings, regardless of their instrumental utility to human needs. The philosophy emphasizes the interdependence of organisms within ecosystems and that of ecosystems with each other within the...
.
This variety of approaches is justified by the myriad interpretations that can be derived from the etymological
Etymology
Etymology is the study of the history of words, their origins, and how their form and meaning have changed over time.For languages with a long written history, etymologists make use of texts in these languages and texts about the languages to gather knowledge about how words were used during...
structure of the term.
Re-designing Design
The Greek word ‘metaMeta
Meta- , is a prefix used in English to indicate a concept which is an abstraction from another concept, used to complete or add to the latter....
’ originally meant ‘beside’ or ‘after’ but is now also used to imply the possibility of change or transformation, including self-transformation. Metadesign can therefore allude to a possible design practice that (re)designs itself (see Maturana and Varela's term autopoiesis). The idea of Metadesign acknowledges that future uses and problems cannot be completely anticipated at design time. Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
's influential theory of design
Design
Design as a noun informally refers to a plan or convention for the construction of an object or a system while “to design” refers to making this plan...
defined it by saying that the 'cause' of design was its final state. This teleological
Teleology
A teleology is any philosophical account which holds that final causes exist in nature, meaning that design and purpose analogous to that found in human actions are inherent also in the rest of nature. The word comes from the Greek τέλος, telos; root: τελε-, "end, purpose...
perspective is similar to the orthodox idea of an economic payback at the point of sale, rather than successive stages when the product could be seen to achieve high levels of perceived value, throughout the whole design cycle. Some supporters of metadesign hope that it will extend the traditional notion of system design beyond the original development of a system by allowing users to become co-designers.
The Importance of Languaging
Metadesign emphasizes certain explicit relations that are designed to operate at the level of living-style. This is why an effective metadesign profession, or practice needs to be a consensual co-designCo-Design
Co-design is a philosophy in the American pragmatist tradition, which argues that all people have different ideals and perspectives and that any design process needs to deal with this. Co-Design traces its roots to Immanuel Kant, who in the Critique of the Pure Reason observed that to put a...
practice that is entrepreneurial and entredonneurial on many levels. If it is conceived within an eco-mimetic design framework it can be used to reinvent the language that co-sustains existing habits. Our 'metadesign’ methodology seeks to combine existing resources ‘bisociatively’ in order to create an auspicious synergy of benign synergies. In aspiring to this outcome, metadesign teams will cultivate auspicious ‘diversities-of-diversities’. It suggests that metadesign would offer a manifold ethical space. In this respect, related approaches include what Koestler (1967) called holarchy
Holarchy
A holarchy, in the terminology of Arthur Koestler, is a connection between holons – where a holon is both a part and a whole. The term was coined in Koestler's 1967 book The Ghost in the Machine...
, or what John Chris Jones
John Chris Jones
John Christopher Jones is a Welsh designer. He was born in 1927, in Aberystwyth, Wales. He studied engineering at the University of Cambridge, and went on to work for AEI in Manchester, England...
called 'creative democracy'.
Metadesign Conceptual Tools
Regarding a wide range of applications and contexts, Vassão has argued that Metadesign can be understood as a set of four "conceptual tools", utilizing Deleuze'sGilles Deleuze
Gilles Deleuze , was a French philosopher who, from the early 1960s until his death, wrote influentially on philosophy, literature, film, and fine art. His most popular works were the two volumes of Capitalism and Schizophrenia: Anti-Oedipus and A Thousand Plateaus , both co-written with Félix...
understanding of the term "tool":
1 - Levels of Abstraction (the ability to understand the structure and limits of abstractions, language and instrumental thinking);
2 - Diagrams and Topology (the use of diagrammatic thinking and design, sustained by topological understanding);
3 - Procedural Design (the creation of realities through the use of procedures, such as in game and role playing, as well as in procedural design, art and architecture);
4 - Emergence (the absence of absolute control, and the ability to take advantage of unintended and unforeseen results).
Vassão argues that, in all different approaches to Metadesign, the presence of these conceptual tools can be verified.
See also
|
Design Design as a noun informally refers to a plan or convention for the construction of an object or a system while “to design” refers to making this plan... Design methods Design Methods is a broad area that focuses on:* Divergence – Exploring possibilities and constraints of inherited situations by applying critical thinking through qualitative and quantitative research methods to create new understanding toward better design solutions* Transformation – Redefining... Ecology Ecology is the scientific study of the relations that living organisms have with respect to each other and their natural environment. Variables of interest to ecologists include the composition, distribution, amount , number, and changing states of organisms within and among ecosystems... Holarchy A holarchy, in the terminology of Arthur Koestler, is a connection between holons – where a holon is both a part and a whole. The term was coined in Koestler's 1967 book The Ghost in the Machine... Lateral thinking Lateral thinking is solving problems through an indirect and creative approach, using reasoning that is not immediately obvious and involving ideas that may not be obtainable by using only traditional step-by-step logic... |
Sustainable design Sustainable design is the philosophy of designing physical objects, the built environment, and services to comply with the principles of economic, social, and ecological sustainability.-Intentions:The intention of sustainable design is to "eliminate negative environmental... Systems design Systems design is the process of defining the architecture, components, modules, interfaces, and data for a system to satisfy specified requirements. One could see it as the application of systems theory to product development... Systems thinking Systems thinking is the process of understanding how things influence one another within a whole. In nature, systems thinking examples include ecosystems in which various elements such as air, water, movement, plants, and animals work together to survive or perish... |