Poiesis, ecology and embodied cognition

2020 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-29 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Westermann
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Design Theory ◽  
Architectural Design ◽  
Spatial Perception ◽  
Environmental Psychology ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Western Philosophy ◽  
Design Practice ◽  
Embodied Experience ◽  
Cognitive Sciences

Since René Descartes famously separated the concepts of body and mind in the seventeenth century, western philosophy and theory have struggled to conceptualize the interconnectedness of minds, bodies, environments and cultures. While environmental psychology and the cognitive sciences have shown that spatial perception is ‘embodied’ and depends on the aforementioned concepts’ interconnectedness, architectural design practice, for example, has rarely incorporated these insights. The article presents research on the epistemological foundations that frame the communication between design theory and practice and juxtaposes it with scientific research on embodied experience. It further suggests that Asian aesthetics, with its long history in conceiving relations and art as interactive, could create a bridge between recent scientific insights and design practice. The article links Asian aesthetics to a discourse on ecologies in the post-Anthropocene, in dialogue with contemporary conceptions of time. It outlines an approach to the interconnectedness of minds, bodies, environments, the sciences and cultures, in favour of a future that is governed by creative wisdom rather than ‘smart’ efficiency.

From Problem-Solving Paradigm to Co-Ontogenic Drift: How Do Learning Narratives Self-Generate?

Leonardo ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
pp. 133-138
Author(s):  
Johann van der Merwe ◽  
Julia Brewis
Keyword(s):  
Problem Solving ◽  
Real World ◽  
Design Education ◽  
Design Theory ◽  
Social Situation ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Use Of Self ◽  
Real World Problems

It is now an accepted maxim in design theory and practice that real-world problems needing the attention of design practitioners are not neat and well-structured, but ill-structured and “wicked”—part of a larger, complex social situation. For design education, then, to take its lead from contemporary social, political and economic structures, it will have to seriously re-think its problem-solving paradigms. The authors investigate the use of self-generating learning narratives in the classroom and contrast the approach they introduce with the still-too-prevalent notion that knowledge can be transferred from teacher to student. Their methodology draws from ideas formulated by Maturana and Varela on autopoiesis, specifically the notion of co-ontogenic drift.

Milton's Alleged Ramism

PMLA ◽  
1952 ◽  
Vol 67 (7) ◽  
pp. 1035-1053
Author(s):  
P. Albert Duhamel
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Thought Processes ◽  
Practical Deliberation ◽  
Human Thought ◽  
Recent Scholarship

Recent scholarship has tended to overstress Milton's adherence to Ramism and to overlook his significant deviations in both theory and practice. The distrust of the human thought processes in theoretical or practical deliberation and the faith in the immediate intuitive perception of logical relations, which is the ultra-spiritual epistemology implied throughout the Ramistic logics, were much more in keeping with the enthusiasm of the radical sects of the seventeenth century than with the rationalism of Milton. Milton was an independent thinker in logical matters as elsewhere and the balance of scholarly evaluation is in need of some readjustment.

Statistical Design: Theory and Practice.

1988 ◽  
Vol 83 (403) ◽  
pp. 909
Author(s):  
Dallas E. Johnson ◽  
Charles E. McCulloch ◽  
Steven J. Schwager ◽  
George Casella ◽  
Shayle R. Searle
Keyword(s):  
Design Theory ◽  
Statistical Design ◽  
Theory And Practice

scholarly journals Exploring Regenerative Co-benefits of Biophilic Design for People and the Environment

2021 ◽  
pp. 391-412
Author(s):  
Maria Beatrice Andreucci ◽  
Angela Loder ◽  
Beth McGee ◽  
Jelena Brajković ◽  
Martin Brown
Keyword(s):  
Human Health ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Design Theory ◽  
Environmental Psychology ◽  
Biophilic Design ◽  
Health Goals ◽  
Apply Research ◽  
New Directions ◽  
Regenerative Design ◽  
Research And Policy

AbstractThere is an increasing awareness of the role that buildings, districts, and neighborhoods play on health in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic that coincides with pressing climate concerns. This has renewed attention to the benefits of nature for both human and climate health. Buildings, cities, and regions are attempting to align regenerative design principles with human health goals but often lack the tools and knowledge to do so. This is partly rooted in a failure to understand how to apply research and policy for different contexts as well as at different scales. It is also still uncertain exactly what types of nature can lead to which types of benefit, and for whom, despite long-standing research within the environmental psychology, sustainability, and design fields. This chapter outlines key research paradigms that influence the way we understand the benefits of nature, where biophilic design theory sits in this field, and how it can be and has been applied at different scales through two case studies at the building and city scale. This chapter ends with the proposal of new directions for integrating biophilic design into regenerative design and policy.

scholarly journals The Threshold of Abstraction in Beginning Design Pedagogy

2020 ◽  
pp. 101-110
Author(s):  
Stephen Temple
Keyword(s):  
Architectural Design ◽  
Embodied Experience ◽  
Design Pedagogy ◽  
Threshold Concept ◽  
Design Choice ◽  
Self Development ◽  
Gradual Introduction ◽  
Design Students ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Individual Design

By immediately being asked to work abstractly, beginning design students are investigating architecture through a pedagogy taken-for-granted by its instructors. To abstract something is to draw it out of the concrete, and unless a student is looking for this displacement, they will become disconcerted, struggle, and become lost to the design process. Abstract operations of design, when presented out of step with student self-development, can mislead and distort experience. This essay defines a student’s encounter with abstraction as a threshold concept within the transformative journey of design student self-development. Writings about abstraction in artistic production by Sigfried Gidieon and Rudolph Arnheim define abstraction and provide a basis for critique of abstraction as a threshold concept in beginning design pedagogy. Challenges caused by abstraction for both pedagogy and beginning design students are investigated. Arnhem’s definition of abstraction as relations between part and whole implies a pedagogical approach for learning design that positions encounters with abstraction as a transformative threshold, suggesting that a gradual introduction of abstraction can build connections through embodied experience rather than disassociations. A series of architectural design exercises will be demonstrated that are structured, as result of this study, to gradually introduce abstract operations in design through a progressively transforming sequence over the first six weeks of beginning design studio. Delivered as analogous to architecture, each successive exercise initiates an abstract design operation as an individual design choice, enabling students to learn to see part in terms of whole, toward a working, conceptual understanding of abstraction in design.

scholarly journals Theory and practice

2004 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 99-99
Keyword(s):  
Architectural Design ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Research Assessment ◽  
Research Assessment Exercise ◽  
Recent Conference ◽  
Architectural Research

With the UK's 2008 Research Assessment Exercise looming, we make no apologies for publishing a further exploration of the nature of architectural research. In her paper (pp141–147), Jane Rendell makes a lucid and persuasive case that design is a complex interdisciplinary activity that sits uneasily within current definitions of research. For Rendell, architectural design, just as much as writing, can be practised as a form of criticism, a proposition that was explored at ‘Critical Architecture’, the recent conference at the Bartlett School in London (pp105–108).

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