Proceedings of the ECCS 2005 satellite workshop: embracing complexity in design - Paris 17 November 2005

Embracing complexity in design is one of the critical issues and challenges of the 21st century. As the realization grows that design activities and artefacts display properties associated with complex adaptive systems, so grows the need to use complexity concepts and methods to understand these properties and inform the design of better artifacts. It is a great challenge because complexity science represents an epistemological and methodological swift that promises a holistic approach in the understanding and operational support of design. But design is also a major contributor in complexity research. Design science is concerned with problems that are fundamental in the sciences in general and complexity sciences in particular. For instance, design has been perceived and studied as a ubiquitous activity inherent in every human activity, as the art of generating hypotheses, as a type of experiment, or as a creative co-evolutionary process. Design science and its established approaches and practices can be a great source for advancement and innovation in complexity science. These proceedings are the result of a workshop organized as part of the activities of a UK government AHRB/EPSRC funded research cluster called Embracing Complexity in Design (www.complexityanddesign.net) and the European Conference in Complex Systems (complexsystems.lri.fr). Embracing complexity in design is one of the critical issues and challenges of the 21st century. As the realization grows that design activities and artefacts display properties associated with complex adaptive systems, so grows the need to use complexity concepts and methods to understand these properties and inform the design of better artifacts. It is a great challenge because complexity science represents an epistemological and methodological swift that promises a holistic approach in the understanding and operational support of design. But design is also a major contributor in complexity research. Design science is concerned with problems that are fundamental in the sciences in general and complexity sciences in particular. For instance, design has been perceived and studied as a ubiquitous activity inherent in every human activity, as the art of generating hypotheses, as a type of experiment, or as a creative co-evolutionary process. Design science and its established approaches and practices can be a great source for advancement and innovation in complexity science. These proceedings are the result of a workshop organized as part of the activities of a UK government AHRB/EPSRC funded research cluster called Embracing Complexity in Design (www.complexityanddesign.net) and the European Conference in Complex Systems (complexsystems.lri.fr)

Design out of complexity: A mathematical theory of design as an universal property of organization

Objective: One of the most challenging problems in science is to identify whether there are certain common principles that characterize how organization at a microscopic level leads to the formation of complex structures, behaviours or functions at a macroscopic level. This is the very quest of complexity science. Within this quest, there remains one special issue that has received little attention: the 'problem' or 'phenomenon' of design. In this thesis, design is perceived as a capacity that arises because of certain characteristic organizational conditions. In line with complexity research, design is studied as a 'universal' property of organization without making assumptions as to whether this is a biological, cognitive or social organization. The thesis can be summarised as follows: Research problem: What entails the capacity to recognize and carry out design tasks Hypothesis: Design is a function of the complexity of organization. Objective: A mathematical theory of the organizational properties which are responsible for the capacity to recognize and carry out design tasks. Methodology: The above hypothesis is an epistemological statement about the nature of design, but it also has a methodological dimension. Methodologically it gives emphasis to the production of knowledge 'by construction'. The study approaches this objective mathematically, using category theoretic constructions. Results: The main results of the study are: It explicates the notions of organization and complexity and ascertains the basic dimensions of organizational level descriptions. It characterises design as a universal property of complexity and identifies the organizational conditions and principles that are responsible for the capacity to recognise and carry out design tasks. It develops a mathematical structure (a theory) that defines the universe within which design tasks and activities are realized. Overall, the thesis offers a mathematical theory of design as a universal phenomenon of complexity

Unearth Hidden Assets through Community Co-design and Co-production

This paper discusses main findings of a pilot study, which explored how co-design and co-production could support asset-based community development. Increasingly, community developments have shifted toward an ‘asset-based’ approach, which concentrates on uncovering and mobilising existing assets in a community to create new opportunities. The study experimented with different co-design techniques to investigate how they could help identify unrecognised assets. Four pilot studies were conducted with key stakeholders in four communities. The study brought together researchers and local communities with the objective to co-design, co-develop and co-analyse the pilots. The results suggested that co-design was perceived as empowering. In most cases, it was ‘people’ that were regarded the most important assets in a community. Engaging people in a creative process could help them appreciate their skills, knowledge and creativity, and recognise themselves as assets. This research advanced the knowledge in Social Design by demonstrating how co-design could support community developments

Types, obstacles and sources of empowerment in co-design: the role of shared material objects and processes

Co-design is intrinsically linked to the notion of empowerment, however little research has focussed specifically on understanding the types, obstacles and sources of empowerment in co-design. This paper combines theoretical investigations with observations derived from co-designed research by academic and non-academic partners to explore these issues, in particular, the role of shared material objects and processes in supporting empowerment during co-design. The paper uses the notions of ‘power over,’ ‘power to’, ‘power with’ and ‘power within’ to tease out different aspects of empowerment, and draws on empirical observations to determine different obstacles and sources associated with each. The study therefore makes a theoretical contribution to the understanding of co-design as an empowerment process and should be useful for design researchers undertaking co-design projects with non-experts

The FuturICT education accelerator

Education is a major force for economic and social wellbeing. Despite high aspirations, education at all levels can be expensive and ineffective. Three Grand Challenges are identified: (1) enable people to learn orders of magnitude more effectively, (2) enable people to learn at orders of magnitude less cost, and (3) demonstrate success by exemplary interdisciplinary education in complex systems science. A ten year ‘man-on-the-moon’ project is proposed in which FuturICT’s unique combination of Complexity, Social and Computing Sciences could provide an urgently needed transdisciplinary language for making sense of educational systems. In close dialogue with educational theory and practice, and grounded in the emerging data science and learning analytics paradigms, this will translate into practical tools (both analytical and computational) for researchers, practitioners and leaders; generative principles for resilient educational ecosystems; and innovation for radically scalable, yet personalised, learner engagement and assessment. The proposed Education Accelerator will serve as a ‘wind tunnel’ for testing these ideas in the context of real educational programmes, with an international virtual campus delivering complex systems education exploiting the new understanding of complex, social, computationally enhanced organisational structure developed within FuturICT

The FuturICT education accelerator

Education is a major force for economic and social wellbeing. Despite high aspirations, education at all levels can be expensive and ineffective. Three Grand Challenges are identified: (1) enable people to learn orders of magnitude more effectively, (2) enable people to learn at orders of magnitude less cost, and (3) demonstrate success by exemplary interdisciplinary education in complex systems science. A ten year ‘man-on-the-moon’ project is proposed in which FuturICT’s unique combination of Complexity, Social and Computing Sciences could provide an urgently needed transdisciplinary language for making sense of educational systems. In close dialogue with educational theory and practice, and grounded in the emerging data science and learning analytics paradigms, this will translate into practical tools (both analytical and computational) for researchers, practitioners and leaders; generative principles for resilient educational ecosystems; and innovation for radically scalable, yet personalised, learner engagement and assessment. The proposed Education Accelerator will serve as a ‘wind tunnel’ for testing these ideas in the context of real educational programmes, with an international virtual campus delivering complex systems education exploiting the new understanding of complex, social, computationally enhanced organisational structure developed within FuturICT

What Design Research Does ... : 62 Cards Highlighting the Power and Impact of UK-based Design Research in Addressing a Range of Complex Social, Economic, Cultural and Environmental Issues

Design research makes a significant contribution to the UK economy and society as a whole. Ever since the establishment of the Government Schools of Design in the nineteenth century, the UK has been widely acknowledged as an international leader in design research. Following this lead, the What Design Research Does… cards highlight the wide range of social, economic, cultural and environmental impacts that design research, funded and based in the UK, makes all over the world. The 62 cards illustrate unambiguously the positive changes that contemporary UK-based design researchers are making in many complex issues. Each What Design Research Does… card lists the challenges and issues faced by the design researchers, who they collaborated with, the research methods and approaches taken, the outcomes of the design research, what the main results and findings have been, and what impact the design research has had. In short, the What Design Research Does… cards clearly articulate the breadth of social, economic, cultural and environmental impacts that UK-based design researchers are achieving today

Computer-Aided Creativity and Learning in Distributed Cooperative Human-Machine Networks

In this paper we discuss designing abilities, such as creativity and learning, as abilities that emerge though interaction in cooperative human-machine networks. We concentrate in a design system that can exhibit and support creative behaviour using knowledge learnt through distributed human-machine interaction. In this context, conflict resolution and coordination is a main issue, as well as a main indicator for the creative and adaptive ability of the design system. More specifically, we are going to present a model of coordination developed using learning control and multi-agent systems methodologies and techniques. A prototype system is tested in a virtual collaborative design assignment for simple location and three-dimensional configuration problems