Abstract
Drawing on methods and literature from the field of philosophy, an
account is given of the general nature of the artefact production
process in order to provide a conceptual platform for design
research. Designing itself is defined as the production of design
representations; and the latter notion is analysed in the context
of the artefact production process. The analysis is conducted in
such a way as to keep the assumptions on which it is based
explicit, plausible, and acceptable to common sense. The ‘obvious’
view of design representations as descriptions of possible or
future things is rejected, and so the major philosophical
difficulty is to propose a reasonably precise definition of
‘design representation’ without implying the existence of such
non-existent things. To overcome that difficulty, a definition is
developed in terms of human agents, their actions and ideas
(including intentions). The paper closes with a summary of the
assumptions made.
Original language | English |
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Journal | Design Studies |
Volume | 20 |
Issue number | 1 |
Pages (from-to) | 57-81 |
ISSN | 0142-694X |
Publication status | Published - 1999 |