TUFF Climate Workshop Planning Meeting 2
20th July 2018 in Hexagon Room
N.B. the following lecture slide notes may not make complete sense by themselves
please write down your questions/ideas and bring them to next Friday's meeting
please carry out the assignment instructions that you will find in red text
You know that...
unfortunately it's business as usual..._
this is how Wikipedia sees climate change:
why does everyone think technology will save us?
politicians use the least effective tools for change...
design is more direct...but the profession is fragmented
it can be useful to merge and re-imagine conventional disciplines
1. have a go at re-thinking the essential specialisms for human survival (in 4 parts)
loosely speaking, traditional design uses a top-down approach
how might politicians expect designers to ease climate change?
is this what politicians mean by climate change 'technology'?
2. please do some research on the word 'technocentricity'
loss of biodiversity is a factor in the climate change scenarios....
journalists have given us a dumbed-down version of what's happening
e.g. methane and other gases may be more important than CO2
See McDonough's 'new language of carbon'
what did Albert Einstein really mean?
3. please write down some examples of this phenomenon (below)
the word 'paradigm' is important for designers
it comes from an Ancient Greek word used in marketing
Plato's generation believed that the 'real' was (today's term) the 'virtual'
since then we adapted and expanded its meaning
is it useful to think of the design industry / norms / habits as a whole?
what stops us from changing the whole system?
4. think of useful design skills that could be harnessed for addressing climate change
humans like to follow the pathways they already know
why did the word 'cynic' have an opposite meaning 2k years ago?
we behave like sheep and we don't question our assumptions
(the reference to 'sheep' is a joke, by the way....I used it as an example of unintentional damage)
5. write notes on what might persuade people that they can inspire change?
by 'thinking outside the box' we can create more synergies
Bill Dunster created building standards (including car hire / local money system)
vested interests often support one another (directly, or indirectly)
should we blame the education system for a collective failure to see what is going on?
realistically, designers cannot expect to moralise, or to criticise people
6. please bring in some examples of 'designed affordances' that interest you
WHAT IS A LAWN? language (metaphors & grammar) shapes our thinking)
how might we regain some of the lost meaning of a LAWN?
7. write down some (non-English) words that might help design thinking
some believe that our thinking patterns were shaped by conditions that no longer exist
Governments use the least effective ways to change systems
8. please make notes on Donella Meadows' levers for change approach
do we need to re-think/challenge/revise the way that designers work?
9. ask yourself what new skills and capabilities you need
how might we summarise 'design' and how it works?
Aristotle's concept of design lasted into the 20th century...
if possible, we should design teams that are small and self-managing
this would probably mean that each player would need to have complementary skills?
10. Please identify yourself with one, or more, of these types (1-8)
our Metadesigners approach informed our practical work
OPTIONAL EXTRA: please suggest technologies that make data capture easy and effective
just a thought...could our teams function like living systems?
OPTIONAL EXTRA: make some notes on Maturana and Varela's term 'autopoiesis'