We should not expect more precision than a topic naturally affords.
Mr. Wolff, a favorite high school teacher of mine, used the quote to talk about how art is created and enjoyed. It is usually ascribed to Aristotle and I'll admit it flew over my head at the time. Now, walking with a friend in Manhattan, it came back as we talked about design.
He's an engineer - quite a wonderful one as it happens. His contribution to the world has been one of the more important computer languages. He has to work within certain constraints and make something that gives programmers something to create bits and pieces of the digital world with. As with all engineering it's an exercise in compromise and optimization. As a creator he has to constantly deal with the politics of the user communities and help evolve the language to keep it useful.
Both of us are reasonably adroit talking about technology, but as we walked we started talking about things that shouldn't be automated. Games for example. While a computer can be central to many aspects of a game and can play some of them, the point of a game is not how well it can be played by something, but rather is much more human - perhaps it shouldn't be called a goal. Walking or cycling through a city designed for interaction is much more fun for some of us than being moved from place to place by something that isolates us. There's the discovery road trips produce. The list goes on and on.. We need to make decisions about what and how we automate.
My friend is an engineer, but he loves history and art. I'm not an engineer - my background is a liberal arts education (some are surprised, but physics and math are both liberal arts). I've done design without thinking about it - some of it very bad and some of it almost useable. At times I'm involved in systems design. This can be simple engineering at times, but is usually much richer and more interesting when those difficult to quantify human desires and needs enter. I tend to think visually and like to sketch to clear my mind. In a way it's a form of design. There isn't a clear target or rightness or wrongness to it. It can't be measured directly. We don't expect precision from it just as we don't expect precision from a city that is wonderfully architected for the flâneur.
Design can be a bridge between something we create and our humanity. I'm certainly not an expert on the subject, but it seems to exists at many levels each with their own precision requirement. So much of the delight of being a person comes from the non-precise delights - things like play and discovery. These are thing things that are the focus of many of the liberal arts. You don't do physics or math to improve technology or the world. You may get paid for it, but if it's a passion that's not why you do it.
Years ago I was talking with a cellist about the Bach D Major Cello Suite. When preformed well it is considered one of Bach's masterpieces as well as of the musician. He stressed how difficult it is to make it accessible and beautiful and you don't hear masterful performances by young prodigies. Just the physical playing could be considered mechanical. But the mental process, the emotional process, the psychic investment the musician brings to make it seem easy — that part is enormously deep and difficult and the musician is sharing something very personal. The non-precise serendipity of a lifetime.
Most of us aren't very good at a sport, but just playing around is - well - play. As a species it's remarkable what people have done just moving balls around with a bit of design going into the rules. Pointless at some level, but for many it is the stuff of passion. Every now and again you see something so far out of the ordinary that for a second or two it borders on magic. I've seen it at the net from one of the readers. People just can't do that.
Designing for serendipity is certainly possible. At a personal level it isn't terribly efficient, but there's a richness to the path and anyone can do it. I few companies do it by making good use of an intellectually diverse workforce and sometimes talking with people outside their wheelhouse. An animation company tells me they enjoy my visits as it helps them think a bit differently. Sometimes I wonder if my presence was useful as I feel like I'm the one who has learned. Of course learning isn't a zero sum game.
Currently I'm trying to establish a relationship between two schools - one is known for art and the other for science. So far there's a pilot program for the science students teaching them basic sketching skills. The other direction has been a more difficult, but shouldn't be. What Feynman said about appreciating the Natural world when you understand a few of the nuts and bolts and have more questions rings true to me. So far the natural language between the two appears to be play, which tells me something is working as play is a natural language for thinking.
Out of time, but this is an area that fascinates me. I worry that much of the corporate world is going in a different direction.
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