NextD Journal I ReReThinking Design Conversation 26
Double Consciousness
The wheels were reduced in diameter so as to give more leg room in all seats. The engine, which was at the rear, could be removed as a unit with the back wheels and raised so that the mechanic could reach all nuts and bolts, etc. very easily in the most comfortable working space (which is directly in front of one’s chest) – instead of having to work lying underneath the car or reaching upward in a maintenance pit. And while the detachable power unit was in repair, a spare one was to be attached to the car to keep it in service. “Reversing the reversal” refers firstly to the subjection of people to fit machines and the industrial system, and secondly to the undoing of the mistaken priority of “putting things before people”. To my mind this “undoing” of what is wrong with technology and industrial living is the essence of good design and the right aim in all things postindustrial. It is not so much an imaginative change as a moral one. But, of course, these are suppositions, not proven facts, but a reversal of values. pause I hope that this small example is enough to show how very different life could be if we re-arranged and transformed our technologies so as not to contradict or distort the animal flexibility, or the spiritual presence, that is in each of us.' The stance or mental attitude that can enable one to design in this way is that of “putting oneself at the receiving end,” observing or experiencing or imagining what it is like to be the user, the operator, the builder, even the designer of the products in question. And then, in an action that is both rational and imaginative, as well as ethical, to attempt to redesign the whole situation in collaboration with everyone concerned. The obvious difficulty of this (and its apparent hubris, or even madness) is what I think has to be overcome if we are to solve the global problems that now beset us and seem so threatening. These problems I think can be overcome if what is good about designing is made available to everyone (with the help of universally available software). But even with the Internet, that is a big “if.” What I am attempting (in works that some may find strange or bewildering) is to explore this idea beyond the range of what is possible within industrial or academic organizations as they exist at present. But I’d rather not continue in this abstract language. I’d prefer to attempt a fictional world in which such things can be imagined more concretely. The latest of these fictions is “the electric book, version 2” which appeared on my website yesterday afternoon! It is a beginning of something envisaged in my reply to question 13: The redesign of our culture. last pause Before sending off this last reply, I’ve re-read the whole correspondence and I am pleased to say that it seems better than I thought at the time of writing! There is a distance between us which I think allows others to see through what we wrote as we brought our differing experiences together.
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