The Cybernetics of Design and the Design of Cybernetics

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to connect two discourses, the discourse of cybernetics and that of design. Design/methodology/approach – The paper takes a comparative analysis of relevant definitions, concepts, and entailments in both discourse, and an integration of these into a cybernetically informed concept of human-centered design, on the one hand, and a design-informed concept of second-order cybernetics, on the other hand. In the course of this conceptual exploration, the distinction between science and design is explored with cybernetics located in the dialectic between the two. Technology-centered design is distinguished from human-centered design, and several axioms of the latter are stated and discussed. Findings – This paper consists of recommendations to think and do things differently. In particular, a generalization of interface is suggested as a replacement for the notion of products; a concept of meaning is developed to substitute for the meaninglessness of physical properties; a theory of stakeholder networks is discussed to replace the deceptive notion of THE user; and, above all, it is suggested that designers, in order to design something that affords use to others, engage in second-order understanding. Originality/value – The paper makes several radical suggestions that face likely rejection by traditionalists but acceptance by cyberneticians and designers attempting to make a contribution to contemporary information society

An Exploration of Artificiality

The following explores the artificiality of human artifacts. To talk of artifacts, we must avoid ontologizing. Ontology ignores human participation in its construction and describing artifacts as if their descriptions had nothing to do with it contradicts the idea of their artificiality. Instead, I will explore the nature of artifacts from the perspective of human-centered design and with culture-sensitive conceptions in mind. Exploring artifacts from this perspective offers scholars and practitioners a fascinating field of inquiry. Following are six closely connected mini essays about artifacts, starting with the use of the word “artifact” and ending with the virtual worlds that artifacts can bring forth

The Changing Landscape of Content Analysis: Reflections on Social Construction of Reality and Beyond

Prof. Klaus Krippendorff is Gregory Bateson Emeritus Professor of Communication at the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania. He received his PhD in communications from the University of Illinois (Urbana) in 1967. He has received numerous awards and honours over the years. To name just a few, he received a Doctor of Philosophy honoris causa from the Linneaus University in Kalmar/Växjö, Sweden in 2012. He is an elected Fellow of the International Communication Association (ICA) and was its president in 1984–85. He is an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in 1982. His book Content Analysis: An Introduction to Its Methodology received the ICA Fellows Book Award in 2004. He has published extensively in many fields including communication, research methodology, semantics, information theory, design, cybernetics, etc. In this academic dialogue, he talks about how he first came to the U. S. from Germany and his early encounter with the method of content analysis. He elaborates on his unique approach to the methodology of content analysis, its changes in practice over the years, as well as his insights on communication scholarship. His organic involvement in and cross-pollination of many related fields listed above is also revealed

Conversation: Possibilities of Its Repair and Descent Into Discourse and Computation

This essay contends that radical constructivism makes a mistake by focusing on cognition at the expense of where cognitive phenomena surface: in the interactive use of language. By contrast, it advocates a radically social constructivism grounded in the conversational nature of being human. It also urges to abandon the celebration of observation, inherited from the enlightenment’s preoccupation with description, in favor of participation, the recognition that speaking and writing are acts of continuously reconstructing reality, only partly conceivable by participants yet interactively realized. It distinguishes between conversation as observed and conversation as articulated by its participants. It postulates accountability as a chief conversational move through which conversations can regain their natural flow when disturbed and construct inherently ethical realities for their participants. Unwillingness to repair problematic conversations amounts to acquiescence to constraints that are typical of discourses and the construction of institutional realities. It suggests that the ultimate institutionalization consists of replacing institutional artifacts by computational ones, which was the aim of early cybernetics. Computational artifacts have no agency and cannot be held accountable for what they do. This essay proposes a continuum of possible discourses between authentic conversation and computation. It concludes by calling for drawing finer distinctions within that continuum and expresses the hope for not closing off the possibility of returning to authentic conversation where humans realize their being human, not institutional actors or machines

Major Metaphors of Communication and Some Constructivist Reflections on Their Use

The following essay is about human communication. Traditionally, one would define the concept, proceed to force a variety of experiences into its terms and declare the exercise a success if it appears to capture a great deal of territory. However, while tempting, such constructions of reality also are rather lonely ones devoid of contributions by Others that populate reality as well. In contrast, this essay seeks first of all to listen to everyday expressions of notions of communication. This intent is grounded in the belief that their ordinary nature does not disqualify them when comparable scientific conceptions are available. Indeed, most social scientific theories can be shown to have grown out of ordinary folk wisdom. Scientific conceptions are just more formalized and subjected to different kinds of tests then the notions practiced in everyday life. To listen also means to have an understanding of the language in which these everyday notions arise and an understanding of the communication practices in which they come to be embedded. This essay therefore also is about understanding Others\u27 understanding of the kind of communication practices in which we ordinarily participate. In pursuit of this second-order understanding, I will start the paper with a brief theory of metaphor, one that goes beyond mere rhetorical formulations and links language with the creation of perceived realities. Following it will be a survey of what I consider to be the six most pervasive metaphors of human communication in everyday life. Each turns out to entail its own logic for human interaction and the use of each creates its own social reality. This descriptive account is intended to provide the \u27data\u27 or the ground from which I shall then develop several radical constructist propositions. These are intended to reflect on how a social reality could be conceived that does afford so many incompatible ways of communicating, on the individual contributions to understanding, understanding of understanding, and viability in practicing such metaphors, on what makes communication a social phenomenon, on three positions knowers can assume in their known and the theories of communication commensurate with these positions. Then I will sketch some aspects of mass communication in these terms and comment on its research. Propositions of this kind should prove useful in efforts to construct scientific communication theories or, to be less ambitious, to understand communication as a social phenomenon that involves each of us with other human beings. For lack of space, the concern for issues of mass communication had to be severely curtailed, leaving the readers to continue on their own

Human-Centeredness: A Paradigm Shift Invoked by the Emerging Cyberspaces

Against the background of growing cyberspaces, I am exploring here some consequences for understanding digital technologies along three paths. The first path begins by noting how the increasing efficiency of computation has given birth to a new kind of artifact, the interface. Its characteristics require us to abandon naturalistic conceptions of technology and call, instead, for an effort to understand their users\u27 diverse understandings, to a second order understanding of technology. My second path starts from the curious fact that 17th Century Enlightenment ideas still permeate our celebrations of what the new technologies do while blinding us to the coordination of human activities they cause on an unprecedented scale. This leads us to a new image of human beings as dialogical constituents of networks. My last path begins with interfaces, with what is left in cyberspaces after data, algorithms, and networks have taken up their places, and leads us to languaging as a window to a second-order understanding of others, as a community’s way of co-ordinating co-ordination (of technology), and as our opportunity to redirect our creative attention towards keeping technology human-centered