My thoughts in the intersection of design, cognitive science, social psychology, philosophy, and ethics.
Straightforward musings as well as some short fiction / thought experiments, when they serve best.
Two weeks ago, I introduced this series on anthropomorphism. In this post, I aim to describe more about what anthropomorphism is and about our understanding so far of how it works — ft. someone crying in a coffee shop, an old car, and some triangles & a circle.
Read MoreIn 2017 alone, Amazon’s Alexa received over one million marriage proposals. You might imagine that most of these were jokes, you know—Alexa, will you marry me? Ha ha—but you might also agree it’s interesting that we seem far less likely to ask this—even as a joke—of the average dishwasher or calculator. The public lamented for NASA’s Curiosity Rover…
Read MoreI spent the past month living and working on a farm. I learned so much of what it is to live intentionally, with gratitude, and with a sense of inner calm and contentment: I am so far convinced that it begins with a deeper awareness of all the living things around us and with a realization that life is now.
Read MoreDetractors might attempt to deflate the significance of the design of film, or other “invented” media, insisting that because it is not real in some important sense—not even framed as real—it is not a significantly impactful feature of the environment. But my claim is that all designed features of the environment—manufactured, non-fictional or entirely fictional—impact those who interact with them in an important way.
Read MoreWhy does design matter? The work of designers is even more far-reaching than we might suppose: we design our environments and thereby design ourselves.
Read MoreThe woman with the beautiful hair trailed a finger over the cool and unyielding edge of the dark alloy that cased the most advanced memory system in the world. She did this with a slowness of speed and warmth of gaze that could only be called reverence.
Read MoreMy approach to design is rooted in the process of design thinking.
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