This morning I got an interesting email:
I came across your sites by accident. My reaction: What gives you the right to call what you do “computational design”? The concept was developed by Prof. Dr. Dr. Mihai Nadin around 1994. THAT is computational design. I urge you to take a look at www.code.uni-wuppertal.de. You can only learn. And please at least give credit to the man who actually developed the concept… before you ruin it further.
(name removed for privacy)
Research Associate
antÉ – Institute for Research in Anticipatory Systems
University of Texas at Dallas
Not wanting to ruin the work of a man I have never met, I did a little googling. As the email says: “You can only learn.”
Professor Dr. Mihai Nadin (see also Wikipedia) is a computer graphics pioneer of Romanian origin who has worked with computer applications in art and design since 1960. Currently a professor at the University of Texas at Dallas, Dr. Nadin has an impressive academic CV dealing with human-computer interaction. He started Computational Design as a field of study at the University of Wuppertal in 1994, defining it as follows:
2. the design of products and processes through the use of digital means.
These products and processes themselves integrate digital technology (they are embedded systems). Thus, the program’s long-term goal is the constitution of the world of ubiquitous computing.
This definition does not seem to conflict with the use of the term on this blog or in the community in general. I therefore assume that the writer’s indignation is due to the lack of proper acknowledgement of Nadin’s contribution to the field. In my defense, I can only say that until today I was unaware of Dr. Nadin and have not read any of his research.
My use of the term stems from the work of John Maeda and students from the ACG group, which was the first group I became aware to use the term to describe the application of computational solutions to design problems. To put a date to it, I read about ACG first in 1995, but I can’t remember using the term computational design until later, possibly around 2001. I welcome any historical data on the use of the term.
To rectify my own ignorance (and possibly that of others) of Professor Dr. Mihai Nadin and his work, I duly provide the following links:
- Mihai Nadin homepage
- Wikipedia: Mihai Nadin
- ANTÉ: Institute for Research in Anticipatory Systems
- Book by Mihai Nadin: Civilization of Illiteracy
It should be mentioned that googling computational design gives plenty of results not relating to the work of Dr. Nadin, including an architecture course at CMU, applications in biology etc. I can only apologize for the fact that the top link on Google as of this moment will lead you to pages documenting workshops I have given.
Wow. Another “researcher-engineer” with no knowledge of Art History or Contemporary Critical Culture. For a research associate in an academic institution, that email was rather unbecoming. Kudos Watz for maintaing your level of professionalism. It’s people like you who will truly advance science or whatever “Anticipatory” hokus pokus they are fooling around with these days!
I don’t know about advancing science, but credit will be given where credit is due. Dr. Nadin’s work has now been acknowledged on this blog, and I leave it to the readers to make up their own minds.
It is not unknown for visionaries and pioneers to be forgotten when the ideas they championed later gain popularity. Myron Krueger is one example.
I am genuinely interested in viewpoints on the background of the term Computational Design. Any of the ACG crew reading this who could give a background of how the phrase was used at MIT?
reading the excerpt of this email makes me kind of angry. so this goes out to the research associate in texas.
first of all i consider myself a computational designer. i am not a computational designer because its hip or trendy, but because this is what i do everyday. for work and in my sparetime. designing with code, designing computational processes, instructing a machine to compute and process an output of the code i have written, for the sake of having something that looks good, pretty, beautiful … poetic, analytic, informative, revealing. basically computer graphics, animations, visualizations, so to say in mr. nadin’s words, “digital means”.i even write code for “means for analysis & planning” like database management, data-mining, simulation. for example in research (and at the same time artistic) projects i participated in “making visible the invisible”, or Pockets Full of Memories II. these projects use computers to find out, store, analyze, and visualize aspects of social and cultural snapshots – made visible through design, computational design.
not being too self confident i think i fit well into the practical part of mr. nadin’s computational design definition and so do many others reading/writing this blog or considering their discipline they work in as computational design. but i still prefer the approach of theaesthetics and computational group at mit.
design doesnt have to look and mean scientific to be computational design. i as a computational designer work with code, algorithms, mathematics, physics, generativity, systems. mostly not on a scientific level but on a creative level forced by enthusiasm, interest, passion, and aesthetics. this also implies being aware of the world that surrounds me, things i observe, and things that feed me with ideas from which i learn. i find computers in many different forms. they are definitely ubiquitous. and (computatinal) designers are aware of this. various posts here at generatorx have shown projects that address new ways of computation which dont have at all a cosmetic origin. the definition of computational design defined here is questionalbe in my opinion and tries to dictate the development of computational design into a direction defined by a small group – although i somehow agree with the direction of ubiquitous computing. but please dont make a religion out of it and try to tell people what they should do or dont. things will evolve by making and not by theorizing.
Just to clarify here, are we talking about ‘computational design’ with a capital C or a lowercase one?
I guess it’s capital C, otherwise it wouldn’t be worth claiming ownership of. Personally I don’t think there’s much of a case here – “Computational Design” is just a juxtaposition of two common words that could mean a number of things in different contexts. Feedback from ACG alumni says that John Maeda certainly never claimed to have coined the term, but no clear history has emerged.
Someone made me aware of this discussion. Computational Design is NOT “just a juxtaposition of two common words.” There is a definition that expresses the goals of such a discipline:
1. development of a computational theory of design;
2. the design of products and processes through the use of digital means.
These products and processes themselves integrate digital technology (they are embedded systems). I do not care about credit. Keep it if it makes you happy. But “hokus pokus” qualifiers, from ignorants too busy to read but not busy enough to actually perform, undermine the intellectual quality of the dialog. If anyone contributes to Computational Design the cause is served. But to believe that someone working in chemistry and using a laptop is a Computational Chemist means to miss the point. Knowledge acquired and expressed in computational form is different from knowledge acquired and expressed in other forms. I respect John Maeda (and his enthusiastic followers), but I do not want to become subject to a discussion on how to please my ego (or that of others). If my work is unknown, so be it. If it makes a difference I will be happy (whether I AM GIVEN CREDIT OR NOT).
Wish you all well.And if you READ some of my work and would like to argue with me, be my guests. i will treat you with respect.
I know of two texts about computational design predating the use of the term by Mihai Nadin. In both of these texts, the term “computational design” is not used, but the idea is prevalent throughout. I’m sure there are more.
1. Alexander, Christopher. Notes on the Synthesis of Form. Harvard University Press. 1964
2. Coyne, R.D. et al. Knowledge-Based Design Systems. Addison-Wesley. 1990
I am checking back on this post after reading it when it first appeared on generator.x a week ago.l I suspected that there might be a dialogue in the comments, and it seems that there is.
Regardless of the intended or non-intended tone of the original message from the research associate, I’d like to thank him for pointing us towards Dr. Nadin’s work. I will certainly follow up on the links.
I think Dr. Nadin himself put it pretty well just up the page when he said “If anyone contributes to Computational Design the cause is served”. Any kind of infighting and/or acedemic sword-measuring seems to be futile at best.
Thanks also to Mr. Reas for the pointers to the texts… I could build a sizeable library over the books recommended by Casey alone!
computational design?
What gives you the right to call what you do computational design?…
To me it seems that the polarisation of opinions on this discussion seem to derive from somewhat differing definitions of the word “design”. In the domain of evolutionary computation, for example, design is most commonly used in the context of engineering design of various kinds and the aim or the target is often in optimisation through computation. Art&design type of design has very different starting point and objectives, though often enough computation does end up playing role similar to the engineering design targets.
Very interesting dicussion. I myself was never really sure on how to use the term properly, though i started calling myself one of that kind, too. ^^
I think fighting is pointless; i don’t mind the term being used in a tolerant way. at the same time we can try to take it to the point. hence i created a wikipedia article on Computational design. You’re all welcome to enhance it, i’m going to try the same.
Computational Design
Thinking about the topic of my diploma next year and what i’m doing or try to, i read a discussion about computational design at http://www.generatorx.no. As more and more of us begin to call themselves Computational Designers, i think i…
[...] Thinking about the topic of my diploma next year and what I’m doing or trying to, I read a discussion about Computational Design at http://www.generatorx.no. [...]