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Time and Transition : RSD5

Jabe Bloom
Jabe Bloom

This document discusses the role of design in societal transitions to more sustainable futures. It addresses the complex temporal nature of "systems problems" that exist at multiple scales within social and environmental systems. The authors argue that designers need to understand how to work iteratively over long time horizons at multiple scales. They discuss concepts like temporal complexity, transition design, and contingencies to emphasize the radical contingency of our worlds and the need to design within transitions rather than seeking resolution or endpoints. The focus is on evaluating situations and rapidly adapting to changing conditions to profit from what is harmful to opponents or advantageous at a given time.

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Time & Transition Joshua Bloom PhD Candidate Carnegie Mellon University jabe@cmu.edu @cyetain Ahmed Ansari PhD Candidate Carnegie Mellon University aansari@andrew.cmu.edu @aansari86 Systemic Design for Social Complexity
I am privileged with nearly complete freedom of travel. This privilege allows me to be seen, published and be heard in ways not available to many.
Design has a key role to play in societal transitions to more sustainable futures Interconnected and interdependent systems problems, exist at multiple levels of scale within the social and environmental spheres [Designers need to] understand how to work iteratively, at multiple levels of scale, over long horizons of time COMPLEX TEMPORAL DESIGN TEMPORALLY INFORMED TRANSITION DESIGN TEMPORAL COMPLEXITY
Present Condition Preferred Condition Idealized Condition Alternate Futures Alternate Futures Alternate Futures
Branching Futures Game Theoretic the Planning Model
Present Condition Preferred Condition Idealized Condition Alternate Futures Alternate Futures Alternate Futures Present Mileau Present Mileau Imagined Mileau
Changing Milieu Present Condition Present Milieu ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Time and Transition : RSD5
Each of us sits in a long dark hall within a circle of light cast by a small lamp. The lamplight penetrates a few feet up and down the hall, then rapidly attenuates, diluted by the vast darkness of future and past that surrounds it. Simon, Herbert A. (1996-09-26). The Sciences of the Artificial (p. 156).
The light dims even more rapidly in the opposite direction, toward the future. Although we are titillated by Sunday Supplement descriptions of a cooling Sun, it is our own mortality, just a few years away, and not the Earths, with which we are preoccupied. We can empathize with parents and grandparents whom we have known, or of whom we have had first-hand accounts, and in the opposite direction with children and grandchildren. But beyond that circle our concern is more curious and intellectual than emotional. We even find it difficult to define which distant events are the triumphs and which the catastrophes, who the heroes and who the villains. Simon, Herbert A. (1996-09-26). The Sciences of the Artificial (p. 156). Discounting the Future Thus the events and prospective events that enter into our value systems are all dated, and the importance we attach to them generally drops off sharply with their distance in time.
A Digression
Linear Growth Extrapolation / Resource Frame
Exponential Growth Extrapolation / Resource Frame
Sustainment Extrapolation / Resource Frame
Collapse Extrapolation / Resource Frame
Chaotic Extrapolation / Resource Frame
Uncertain Information Frame
Branching Information Frame
Certain Teleology Frame
At an End
Time and Transition : RSD5
A Future we credit men with practical wisdom in some particular respect whenthey have calculated well with a view to some good endit follows that in the generalsense also the man who is capable of deliberating has practical wisdom. Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics Time
Mencius, The Meng Tzu Time A Future "However acute one's intelligence may be, it is better to rely on the potential inherent in the situation"; "even with a mattock and a hoe to hand, it is better to wait for the moment of ripening."
The ancient Chinese tell us that it is enough to know how to make the most of the way a situation develops and to let yourself be "carried" along by it. You do not rack your brains, you do not struggle or strive. But that is not at all because you wish to disengage from the world; rather, it is the better to succeed in it. To describe this kind of intelligence that bypasses the theory- practice relationship and instead depends solely on the way that things evolve, let us use the term strategic. Francois Jullien, The Efficacy of Things
Time and Transition : RSD5
The science of warfare had begun to concentrate on the art of making weapons, constructing fortifications, and organizing armies, and the ways to get the latter to move as was required. It had thus shifted from siege strategy and military tactics toward an increasingly elaborate art of mechanics. Francois Jullien, The Efficacy of Things
27 Chronos
Francois Jullien, The Efficacy of Things For, in order to increase the energy inherent in the situation, the Chinese general does not merely exploit all the aspects of the topography and the state of the troops that may be unfavorable to the enemy. He also manipulates the situation in such a way that his own troops are driven to display the maximum degree of ardor
29 Kairos
PRESENTTO THE COLLAPSE
Time and Transition : RSD5
Seen from the viewpoint of man, who always lives in the interval between past and future, time is not a continuum, a 鍖ow of uninterrupted succession; it is broken in the middle, at the point where he stands; and his standpoint is not the present as we usually understand it but rather a gap in time -Hannah Arendt Arendt, Hannah; Kohn, Jerome (2006-09-26). Between Past and Future (Penguin Classics) (p. 10). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
we seem to be neither equipped nor prepared for this activity of thinking, of settling down in the gap between past and future. -Hannah Arendt Arendt, Hannah; Kohn, Jerome (2006-09-26). Between Past and Future (Penguin Classics) (p. 10). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
PAST FUTUREPRESENT
What is Present is That Which Makes Itself Present
What is Present is That Which is Indeterminate
Evaluation of a situation, rather than planning for one Rapid adaptation to changing situations is key The exploitation of the situation when the time is right What is disadvantageous at one point in time may turn to ones advantage later Determining the circumstances with a view to profiting from them. " - Sun Tzu it is on the basis of what is harmful to my opponent that I perceive what is profitable to myself. - Wang Xi "the potential of the situation is whatever profits from that which is variable. - Du Mu When your partner has doubts, you "modify" your conduct... - Guiguzi
CONTINGENT CONTINGENCIES Our situation become irrevocably complex as we have pursued ever widening futures (futures we tend to imagine without imagining their concomitant defuturing) We must accept that our worlds have become irrevocably radically contingent
The radical deduction therefor is the gap is not there to cross there is no resolution There is no end to the precarious worlds we find ourselves in. we must learn to live in the gap
Designers must learn to stay with (to care for) what is present in the world we must learn to design IN the transition Amor Mundi

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Time and Transition : RSD5

  • 1. Time & Transition Joshua Bloom PhD Candidate Carnegie Mellon University jabe@cmu.edu @cyetain Ahmed Ansari PhD Candidate Carnegie Mellon University aansari@andrew.cmu.edu @aansari86 Systemic Design for Social Complexity
  • 2. I am privileged with nearly complete freedom of travel. This privilege allows me to be seen, published and be heard in ways not available to many.
  • 3. Design has a key role to play in societal transitions to more sustainable futures Interconnected and interdependent systems problems, exist at multiple levels of scale within the social and environmental spheres [Designers need to] understand how to work iteratively, at multiple levels of scale, over long horizons of time COMPLEX TEMPORAL DESIGN TEMPORALLY INFORMED TRANSITION DESIGN TEMPORAL COMPLEXITY
  • 9. Each of us sits in a long dark hall within a circle of light cast by a small lamp. The lamplight penetrates a few feet up and down the hall, then rapidly attenuates, diluted by the vast darkness of future and past that surrounds it. Simon, Herbert A. (1996-09-26). The Sciences of the Artificial (p. 156).
  • 10. The light dims even more rapidly in the opposite direction, toward the future. Although we are titillated by Sunday Supplement descriptions of a cooling Sun, it is our own mortality, just a few years away, and not the Earths, with which we are preoccupied. We can empathize with parents and grandparents whom we have known, or of whom we have had first-hand accounts, and in the opposite direction with children and grandchildren. But beyond that circle our concern is more curious and intellectual than emotional. We even find it difficult to define which distant events are the triumphs and which the catastrophes, who the heroes and who the villains. Simon, Herbert A. (1996-09-26). The Sciences of the Artificial (p. 156). Discounting the Future Thus the events and prospective events that enter into our value systems are all dated, and the importance we attach to them generally drops off sharply with their distance in time.
  • 22. A Future we credit men with practical wisdom in some particular respect whenthey have calculated well with a view to some good endit follows that in the generalsense also the man who is capable of deliberating has practical wisdom. Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics Time
  • 23. Mencius, The Meng Tzu Time A Future "However acute one's intelligence may be, it is better to rely on the potential inherent in the situation"; "even with a mattock and a hoe to hand, it is better to wait for the moment of ripening."
  • 24. The ancient Chinese tell us that it is enough to know how to make the most of the way a situation develops and to let yourself be "carried" along by it. You do not rack your brains, you do not struggle or strive. But that is not at all because you wish to disengage from the world; rather, it is the better to succeed in it. To describe this kind of intelligence that bypasses the theory- practice relationship and instead depends solely on the way that things evolve, let us use the term strategic. Francois Jullien, The Efficacy of Things
  • 26. The science of warfare had begun to concentrate on the art of making weapons, constructing fortifications, and organizing armies, and the ways to get the latter to move as was required. It had thus shifted from siege strategy and military tactics toward an increasingly elaborate art of mechanics. Francois Jullien, The Efficacy of Things
  • 28. Francois Jullien, The Efficacy of Things For, in order to increase the energy inherent in the situation, the Chinese general does not merely exploit all the aspects of the topography and the state of the troops that may be unfavorable to the enemy. He also manipulates the situation in such a way that his own troops are driven to display the maximum degree of ardor
  • 32. Seen from the viewpoint of man, who always lives in the interval between past and future, time is not a continuum, a 鍖ow of uninterrupted succession; it is broken in the middle, at the point where he stands; and his standpoint is not the present as we usually understand it but rather a gap in time -Hannah Arendt Arendt, Hannah; Kohn, Jerome (2006-09-26). Between Past and Future (Penguin Classics) (p. 10). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
  • 33. we seem to be neither equipped nor prepared for this activity of thinking, of settling down in the gap between past and future. -Hannah Arendt Arendt, Hannah; Kohn, Jerome (2006-09-26). Between Past and Future (Penguin Classics) (p. 10). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
  • 35. What is Present is That Which Makes Itself Present
  • 36. What is Present is That Which is Indeterminate
  • 37. Evaluation of a situation, rather than planning for one Rapid adaptation to changing situations is key The exploitation of the situation when the time is right What is disadvantageous at one point in time may turn to ones advantage later Determining the circumstances with a view to profiting from them. " - Sun Tzu it is on the basis of what is harmful to my opponent that I perceive what is profitable to myself. - Wang Xi "the potential of the situation is whatever profits from that which is variable. - Du Mu When your partner has doubts, you "modify" your conduct... - Guiguzi
  • 38. CONTINGENT CONTINGENCIES Our situation become irrevocably complex as we have pursued ever widening futures (futures we tend to imagine without imagining their concomitant defuturing) We must accept that our worlds have become irrevocably radically contingent
  • 39. The radical deduction therefor is the gap is not there to cross there is no resolution There is no end to the precarious worlds we find ourselves in. we must learn to live in the gap
  • 40. Designers must learn to stay with (to care for) what is present in the world we must learn to design IN the transition Amor Mundi