The fiscal impact of population change: discussion

Ronald Lee and Ryan Edwards have provided a comprehensive analysis of the prospective budgetary implications of the aging of the U. S. population over the period to 2100. They cover a lot of ground but two major points stand out: Their analysis suggests that the budget pressures that aging will imply will be intense and very possibly greater than many other analyses would suggest; and the most important pressure is less likely to come from Social Security payments of old-age pensions than from demand for medical care. Their most important policy message relates to the need for policymakers and the wider public to be educated to the realities aging will imply, in order to facilitate the difficult decisions that will be needed. I can only endorse this message and note that the necessary decisions become more difficult as they are delayed.Demography ; Economic conditions

Making opera work: bricolage and the management of dramaturgy

Based on an ethnographic study of an international opera company, the paper reports a number of aspects of preparation, rehearsal and performance. It documents the creation of operatic productions as everyday, mundane work. Two themes are presented. First is the theme of bricolage. Starting from the concrete bricolage of creating artefacts in the ‘props’ department, the paper extends the metaphor to capture the dramaturgical work whereby cultural bric-à-brac is assembled in the process of creating an opera production through the rehearsal period. Second, this leads to a specific consideration of how vocabularies of motive are invoked by directors and performers in order to make sense of the narratives and characters of the opera. Motivational interpretation is shown to be a form of cultural bricolage itself

Back to basics: Questioning the process of design

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‘The Robots are Coming!’: Perennial problems with technological progress

A proliferation of recent media coverage has addressed the latest advances in artificial intelligence. While expressing admiration for its potential, these publications have worried about the negative impact AI could have on the social order. These sentiments are not new. Similar headlines have accompanied articles about computers ever since the first ‘Mechanical Brains’ appeared. However, archives reveal that experiments in AI have been undertaken for many years, and yet progress has been fairly limited. Yet, no matter how far away true AI might be, concerns about the consequences of technology remain valid. What is it about our relationship with technology that scares us? We appear to be convinced that the technologies we develop will turn out to destroy us. The paper proposes that fundamental changes need to be made in the discourse of technological progress in order for it to be accepted as more of an opportunity than a threat

All about that place

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All together now?

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A clean, white world

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Design for non-designers

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The Design Journal and the meaning of design

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