Programming for Design EDITH CHERRY - Chapter 2

Programming for Design: From
Theory to Practice
EDITH CHERRY

Chapter 2
Thinking About Thinking

Part I: PREPARING FOR PROGRAMMING
Ch. 2: Thinking About Thinking
• Kinds of thinking – Self awareness
• Understand clients and their thought process
• Architectural programmers must communicate well; listen
and understand well.
• Philosophers – How and Why we think?
• Cultures think in different ways and different processes.
• Words are limited means of communication.
• Kinds of thinking: Analysis, Synthesis, induction, Deduction,
Linear, Holistic, lateral, Vertical …
• Abstract vs. Concrete.
• Learning to think abstractly and clearly.

• Analyze and Synthesize
– To Analyze means to take something apart
mentally and examine its parts.
• Social situation: who, what, …
• Building: site, dimensions, interior layout, structural
system, mechanical systems, initial and operating cost,
architectural style, the precedents of its style.

– To Synthesize means to put parts together and
understand the whole.
• Social situation: Statement that sum it up.
• Building: Neo-classical, neo-colonial

– Analysis and Synthesis are opposites.
Analysis Synthesis

– Pena:
• Programming is analysis and design is synthesis.
• Programming takes apart the project context and
examines all of the parts.
• Design must take all the different attitudes,
information, ideas, budgets and so on and put them
together in a new whole that is more than the sum of
the parts – a gestalt.

– Scales of Design
• Site analysis: topography, vegetation, wind direction,
sun angles, parking

• Inductive and Deductive Reasoning
– Inductive: from the parts to the whole, from
particulars to generalities.
– Deductive: starts with the whole – a theory or
hypothesis - and moves towards the parts.
– Both types can lead to faulty conclusions!

• Inductive and Deductive Reasoning
Inductive Deductive

• Philosophers Think About
Thinking
– Plato: There is a form of
beauty that one becomes
familiar with at some point.
– Aristotle: One starts with all
the parts and develops the
big ideas by grouping the
parts.

• Philosophers Think About Thinking
– Architectural programmers find these different
approaches in clients.
– Some clients concentrate on the big ideas first
and leave the details until later.
– Other clients want to be sure all the details are
covered before getting to the big ideas.

• Linear and Holistic Thinking
– Linear (vertical): Step by step in a consistent
direction.
• Westerners tend to describe the world linearly.

– Holistic (lateral): larger context, see acceptable
detours.

– Edward de Bono (New thinking):
Think laterally in situations where
progress seems to be blocked.

– Vertical versus Lateral Thinking

• The Way of Eastern Philosophy
– The TRUTH, or the understanding of problems,
cannot be gained with any step-by-step process.
– Understanding comes only when one has emptied
one’s mind and made room there for insight, sight
from within. (free writing exercise)
– That which is not spoken, not seen, generally not
obvious, is considered the most valuable, the
most real.

– Riddle – Paradox – Contradictions – Multiple
viewpoints
– What is not there is potentially as important as
what is there.
– Western: Binary Logic – Things are 0 or 1
– Eastern: things can be 0 and 1 and the same time
or neither 0 nor 1

– The awareness of what is missing as opposed to
what is present.
– Define the undefined
– Ideas in various stages of development
– Cope with ill-defined notions
– The unknown or chaotic

• Fuzzy Logic
– Straight Logic uses just Zeros and Ones to define a
state of a particular piece of information. Many
pieces of data are more subjective than this and
grey areas are needed to define them
– AI (Artificial Intelligent)
– We operate somewhere between Art and
Technology.
ArtTechnology

• Fuzzy Logic
– Can a computer understand this?

• The Versatile Thinker
– All types of thinking are valuable at times.
– Shift from analysis to synthesis at many levels.
– Inductive and Deductive at appropriate times.
– Linear thinking and Holistic thinking
– Cleanse what is there from our minds and concentrate on
what is not there.
– We need to determine what type of thinking is
appropriate in a particular situation.
– Suspect our own judgment and at the same time trust it.
– Don’t take things for granted!

– Thinking in the manner most appropriate to the
problem at hand.
– Experience and Awareness of one’s own thought
processes.
– Epistemology: Knowledge.
– Ontology: Being.

• The Nature of Problems
– Context.
– The symptom of a problem vs. the problem itself.
– The sources.
– What causes the problem?
– Pena: “You cannot solve a social problem with an
architectural solution.”
– We can aggravate them!
– Rittle:
• Tame problems - True or false solution – Quantifiable – Correct.
• Wicked problems – Don’t have clear-cut solution – No good or bad
approaches.

• The Role of Value Systems
– Wicked problems have a “right” solution only
from one point of view.
– The individual’s value system.
– Values affect decisions we make and information
we gather.
– Our values color the way we think and the way we
seek information.
– The way we ask questions.

• Methods of Organizing Data
– Ordering the Order
• How we form categories.
• How we organize information.
• Cognitive categories: The act of organizing perceptions.

• Methods of Organizing Data
– The ordering of information into categories and
the ordering of those categories into a hierarchy
implies a process.

• Problem-Solving Processes
– Problem Recognition  Problem Solution
– Gathering information and organizing it.
– Scientific Methods:
• Bacon 17th century:
– Observe – Measure – Explain – Verify
• 19th century:
– Pose question – Collect evidence – From hypothesis – Deduct
implications – Test implications – Accept, Reject, Modify hypothesis
• 20th century:
– Verification – repeatability
– Architectural solutions are not appropriately repeated!

• Problem-Solving Formats from other Disciplines
– Systems Analysis:
• Goals – Objectives – Strategies – Alternatives – Evaluate and
select.
– Historical US Military Analysis:
• Problem – Facts and Assumptions – Criteria – Solutions –
Evaluate – Recommendations
– Federal agency:
• Problem in measurable terms – Measurable objectives –
Strategies – Evaluation plans and dates.

• Problem-Solving Formats from other Disciplines
– Common characteristics:
• Goals and objectives
– Goals: Broad aim
– Objectives: Quantified
• Facts and assumptions – Strategies
• Create ideas
• Evaluation – in a quantitative way

• Architectural Programming Format
– Scientists deal with things that are inherently
measurable.
– Architectural decisions are value judgments.

1- Frabstein (Programming the Built Environment):
• Behavioral science concerns and methods
• Participatory involvement of users
• High quality professional architectural and environmental
programming services.
1- Survey Literature relevant to the facility
2- Describe Users and their expected behavior
3- Develop performance criteria
4- Consider options
5- Prepare space specification
• Continuous evaluation process

2- Kumlin (Architectural Programming, Creative Techniques for Design
Professionals: Checklist of Program Elements (not organized)):
• Priority statement
• Issues, objectives and concepts
• Affinities and grouping
• Organization diagrams
• Existing facility
• Site evaluation
• Site selection criteria
• Space lists
• Flow diagrams
• General standards
• Space standards
• Room data sheets
• Arch/Eng criteria
• Codes, ordinances and regulations
• Equipment data sheets
• Cost evaluation and budget
• Schedule
• Unresolved issues
• Other information

3- Duerk (Architectural Programming):
• Defining the issues: Issues – Facts – Solutions
• Values: Goals – Qualities – Conflicts – Checklists
• Critical decisions: Focusing the design
• Information search strategy
• Keep the issues separate

4- Pena/CRS (Problem Seeking):
• The process of seeking the definition of the problem to
be solved by design.
– Establish Goals
– Collect, organize and analyze facts
– Uncover and test concepts
– Determine needs
– State the problem
– Form – Function – Economy – Time

• Common Characteristics of Architectural
Programming Formats
1. Literature search on building typology
2. Definition of goals, criteria, objectives and issues:
Performance criteria, Priority statements, Goals for
priority issues, Establish goals, …
3. Gather data, analyze information and Synthesize:
Literature survey, User descriptions, …
4. Develop alternatives, strategies and approaches
5. Evaluation
6. Separate programming from design
7. Costs implications

• Common Characteristics of Architectural
Programming Formats
– Information Arrival and Flow
– Ease of access to the designer
– User involvement – democratic idea!

• Phasing Architectural Programming
– How much information to include in each
category?
– The scale of the situation:
• huge master plan – small remodeling project
– Consider the audience:
• Clients, general public, fund-raisers, funding agencies,
legislators, architects, landscape architects, planners, …
• Deliver information at a scale appropriate to the
reader’s task.

InformationScale
Master Plan
Small Remodeling Project
Schematic Design
Design Development

– Designers: Deal with the largest-scale issues first.
– Small scale information can be accommodated
after the more demanding requirements of the
overall schematic design are met.
– In other situations, activities in individual spaces
can have effect on the overall building design.
• Natural lighting.
• Repetition of activity.

– What details are important is made on the basis
of experience.
– What impact will a piece of information have on
the overall design of the building?

– Information does not arrive in order!
– Receive information
– Sort into useful categories
– Verify with the client
– Provide users with the scale of information that
suits their needs.

• Information:
– Information analysis
– Information ordering
Information
Master Plan
Schematic Design
Design Development

– Pena: Two-Phase process of architectural
programming:
• Programming information relevant to the efforts of
schematic architectural design
• Programming information relevant to the design
development stage
– Should be documented separately.

– Scale of information
– Master Plan Program
• Phasing,
– Schematic Design program
• Relationship of more than one space to another, the general
form of the building, the site, the overall budget, the
activities of the building occupants relating to more than
one space, ..
– Design Development Program
• Internal working of individual space, …

• Summary
– Types of thinking processes
• Analysis
• Synthesis
• Inductive and Deductive reasoning
• Linear and Holistic thinking
• Eastern philosophy
• Fuzzy logic
– No one type of thinking is always best.
– Versatile thinkers: Tailor their thought process to the
occasion.

• Summary
– Nature of problem.
– Not al problems have solutions that can be
mutually agreed to by all affected parties.
– Different value systems.
– Ordering of information.

Programming for Design EDITH CHERRY - Chapter 2

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