Attacking authority

The quality of our public discourse – think of the climate change debate for instance – is never very high. A day spent observing it reveals a litany of misrepresentation and error, argumentative fallacy, and a general lack of good will. In this paper I focus on a microcosmic aspect of these practices: the use of two types of argument – the argumentum ad hominem and appeal to authority – and a way in which they are related. Public debate is so contaminated by the misuse of the ad hominem tactic that it is important to have an understanding of one of the ways in which its use may be legitimate. So readers who might have expected an analysis of the ad hominem fallacy will, on the contrary, be presented with an account of one of the places for its potential success. In ad hominem, arguers are viewed as legitimate constitutive targets for their own argument; in authority arguments, arguers provide a legitimate constitutive warrant for an argument they deploy. These types of argument are connected in so far as the identities of persons deploying them carry the cognitive weight of the argument. If authority arguments sometimes deserve to succeed, ad hominem attacks on them are potentially legitimate. An important motivation for this analysis is that in identifying the success conditions for one of the ad hominem types we attain some clarity in the evaluation of their use

Requirements for model server enabled collaborating on building information models

The application of Building Information Modelling (BIM) has demonstrated enormous potential to deliver consistency in the construction collaboration process. BIM can define an explicit configuration for digitized information exchange, however the technology to collaborate on models has not yet delivered the industry requirements for BIM collaboration. This research project is intended to provide a fresh review of industry requirements for BIM collaboration and will analyse how these requirements can be supported using a model server as a collaboration platform. This paper presents a review of existing collaboration platforms, with a particular focus to evaluate the research and development efforts on model servers as a collaboration platform. This paper also reports on the findings of three focus group sessions with industry practitioners to identify any problems in the available collaboration systems. The focus group findings identify a number of issues in current collaboration environments which help to understand the main domains of user requirements for BIM collaboration. These requirement domains will be further analysed to identify functional and technical specifications for a model server enabled collaboration platform

A study of BIM collaboration requirements and available features in existing model collaboration systems

Established collaboration practices in the construction industry are document centric and are challenged by the introduction of Building Information Modelling (BIM). Document management collaboration systems (e.g. Extranets) have significantly improved the document collaboration in recent years; however their capabilities for model collaboration are limited and do not support the complex requirements of BIM collaboration. The construction industry is responding to this situation by adopting emerging model collaboration systems (MCS), such as model servers, with the ability to exploit and reuse information directly from the models to extend the current intra-disciplinary collaboration towards integrated multi-disciplinary collaboration on models. The functions of existing MCSs have evolved from the manufacturing industry and there is no concrete study on how these functions correspond to the requirements of the construction industry, especially with BIM requirements. This research has conducted focus group sessions with major industry disciplines to explore the user requirements for BIM collaboration. The research results have been used to categorise and express the features of existing MCS which are then analysed in selected MCS from a user’s perspective. The potential of MCS and the match or gap in user requirements and available model collaboration features is discussed. This study concludes that model collaborative solutions for construction industry users are available in different capacities; however a comprehensive custom built solution is yet to be realized. The research results are useful for construction industry professionals, software developers and researchers involved in exploring collaborative solutions for the construction industry

Performing Our Lives: An investigation of Solo Autobiographical Performance from the Performer’s Perspective

This practice-led research project investigates the genre of solo autobiographical performance by documenting and analysing my own practice and that of nine other Australian solo autobiographical performers. It seeks to understand the questions and challenges unique to creating and performing solo autobiographical performance, and to locate the genre within current theoretical discourse in the interconnected fields of performance studies, practice-led research/practice-as-research, autoethnography, autobiography and psychology. As the autobiographical component of the research drew heavily on my own lived experience and involved a high degree of self-search, I drew on elements of Clark Moustakas’s (1990) methodology of ‘heuristic inquiry’, where ‘the focus in a heuristic quest is on recreation of lived experience; full and complete depictions of the experience from the frame of reference of the experiencing person’ (p. 38). Here I was guided by two principal research questions: How do I, as a performer, investigate my life by performing it? and What motivates or inspires me, as a performer, to investigate my life by performing it? The heuristic approach led me to immerse myself in my inquiry—a process that consisted of periods of intense life-writing and broad, relevant reading. The next stage, acquisition, involved me viewing a number of solo autobiographical performances and interviewing nine Australian performers who have worked in the genre; these processes provided me with valuable insights and knowledge about the performers’ creative methods and motivations, which, for all performers, drew strongly on their relationships with their families. The creative methods informed my own practice-led enquiry central to this study. To arrive at a deeper understanding of the challenges and opportunities of solo autobiographical performance as a genre and to test these creative methods, I wrote and presented a work-in-progress performance of an original script, Can I Come Home Now? This second immersive period led to the realisation stage: a ‘creative synthesis’ expressed in the form of the performance script. As a practitioner seeking to research and gain first-hand knowledge of this particular genre of performance, it was essential that I engage in the actual practice and performance. Through this experiential process, I developed an in-depth embodied knowledge of the application of the creative methods, dramaturgical process, performance style and the distinctive performer–audience relationship of this genre. Like the other performers—who acknowledged the vulnerability inherent in the process of writing, workshopping and performing stories drawn from their own life—I recognised the importance of working with a dramaturg and director whom I could trust and who created a safe environment for the work. Although the practice-led research component is fundamental to this research, it remains one of three interlocking circles; the other two of which are the theoretical considerations and the interviews with performers working in the genre. Through its combination of creative practice, theory and performer interviews, this research provides new knowledge and insights into the motivations, creative methods and experiences of solo autobiographical performers in Australia. It also provides new knowledge about the emergence of the genre in Australia and how it offers Australian solo performers a vehicle to explore questions about identity, family, culture and agency; and to share these insights with an audience