Committee on the Environment

ORGANIC LOGIC

Organic reaction correlates external influences with internal response. This is adaptation in the Natural Domain and must become design in the Built Domain. The first is a gift; the second a responsibility, and essential to the balance required for survival on a planet that does not compromise with ignorance. Appearance is not necessarily an indication of success in the Natural Domain, but a desirable symbol of increasing awareness in the Built Domain.

                Our survival has always depended on the way we think and has always involved the linear concept of cause and effect. Science simply organized a confused search that was full of emotion, distraction, assumption and superstition. At one time we danced for rain and believed it would happen, but random success destroyed the credibility of an idea. Science introduced the concept that achievement is not success until it can be duplicated. This makes talent an achievement but not a success.

Science requires measurement systems and research with vocabularies and specialized languages; but each dispassionate experiment remains a linear thought process that isolates cause and studies effect with the tools created and the knowledge accumulated.

                Linear thinking has gotten us here, but organic thinking must adapt to its success. Organic thinking involves linear strands of knowledge that combine to form a web of response. Architects are used to thinking in these terms without recognizing the attribute, because they have focused on a tactical level of achievement. By this I mean that architectural tactics have an objective that involves a strategic concept and a web of specialized knowledge, but the effort wins a battle that adds to sprawl. I should add that this organic logic may be overlooked because the thought process and decision-making is primarily learned, but not taught, which makes talent a substitute for knowledge. This leaves a vocabulary, pattern language, measurement system and method of evaluation that is not equal to the symbiotic challenge.

                Organic logic is a leadership trait at the tactical, strategic and policy levels of human decision because many variables must be reconciled within a maze of options. Advancing from the instinct, intuition and tactics of linear thought to the more abstract reconciliation of competing options with organic logic has never been easy throughout the course of human history, but it is the challenge that faces the Built Domain in the 21^st century. Architects can participate or they can lead, but leadership means that tactical objectives must be woven into a strategic plan focused on a common goal. The result will be public benefit, but the effort will require determination and help from all in the web required for organic logic and adaptation.

Architecture is one of many professions that can rise to the challenge. It is certainly capable of translating talent into knowledge. This must be one objective in a strategy to achieve symbiotic harmony with the Natural Domain. Its business plan, however, may prevent a leadership effort in the public interest. This is not a criticism. It is an attempt to face reality. Major organizational adjustment would be required for architecture to participate in policy and strategic design decisions at the highest levels of human deliberation, but this is where you go when land is not taken for granted.

                Shelter is a fundamental element of survival and the only one I'm remotely qualified to address. It can also be a threat to survival. Those who have read my earlier essays know that I believe it must exist within a Built Domain that does not expand to threaten its source of survival - the Natural Domain. If you agree with this, then you may also agree that the development capacity of this Built Domain will be a function of the shelter intensity options chosen. I've mentioned in previous essays that intensity can be measured, classified, evaluated and forecast; but its implications require a coordinated web of research from many tactical professions and sciences. If undertaken, the reward will be knowledge that has leadership potential based on a common measurement system. At this point, tactical architecture will be led by a strategic language on the road to symbiotic victory.

We all know that the decisions of many contribute to victory and few receive award. The objective is to improve these decisions to repeat success. To make a difference, therefore, the emphasis in architecture must adjust from design award to design decision before we will be able to shelter growing populations within sustainable limits. An emphasis on defining decision builds knowledge. When decisions contribute to a goal and strategy, public benefit can be obvious. Opinion will be supported by research and award will recognize achievement that contributes to knowledge capable of repeating success.

An emphasis on award makes it the goal. This results in fame for a few but does not produce a pubic perception of value for the entire profession. Design can produce a symbiotic future for the family of man when the emphasis is on organic logic and decision. These decisions are not limited to architecture, but architecture will be part of any solution. It can be a tactical achievement in a web of organic thinking or move to the center of an organic movement that measures excellence in relation to its symbiotic goal.

             In either scenario, architectural design is a thought process based on organic logic. It conducts business at the tactical level of achievement, but can translate talent to strategic knowledge and policy debate when it improves its vocabulary, language and methods of evaluation. A professional goal is to repeat success in the public interest. The challenge is to elevate architectural goals from tactical achievement to symbiotic strategies that contribute to a sustainable future. When this goal is achieved, architectural value will be priceless and award will be public recognition. Fine art will symbolize the contributions of an entire culture and the Symbiotic Period will begin.

Walter,

In principle I couldn't agree with you more, but to escape long standing habits of linear thinking in our culture we would need lots of true examples of organic thinking, and develop an awareness, motivation and technique.   The surprise answer I come to is that architects are already quite good at it, but have not quite understood how their approach to design could be widely apply. 

When we find out just how numerous and varied the true working examples of organic design in action are, that our culture has remains quite unaware of, it's almost so embarrassing as to be humorous.   It's in virtually every action in nature.   Every breath we take, every project on the boards, every smile, begins just like pregnancy does, with a explosion of things fitting together that would become unmanageable if it didn't change.  So, the rule architects know about needing to move to design development and not spend the whole fee on conceptual and schematic design, is what's missing from our world's plan for economic growth.    

You see it in the plan for our rather advanced design for our uses of the earth to get bigger to just get bigger, like the start-up explosion of anything just get's abandoned.   The question for organic design is then what can you do with what's left.  So we might give special study to the great efforts to give birth to new things that leave something of value despite largely failing to achieve their initial apparent goal.   Dinosaurs gave us birds, for example.   Some design projects proliferate so many visionary options that at the end of conceptual design there's only one small scrap of paper left after discarding an enormous pile.

It's really our linear thinking that keeps us from seeing all the building processes of life as locally creative organic designs, so we generally just don't notice that growth of every kind is a quite challenging experience for the thing that is growing.    Every growth process has its quite necessary milestones along the way, deadlines, graduation dates, needs to get a roof on before winter.   If you don't make the turns, and move from one stage to the next, the process fails and stops.   

I had a failed design project that I think prepared my mind to begin noticing the stages of of creating new form in nature's way doing design.   The start-up period of runaway physical expansion really must change to a calming process of integration for both the growing thing, within itself, and for its environment.   It's exemplified by how a building project starts up boldly, without quite knowing what to become, and eventually finds how to become the heart of enduring new relationships for a community.  It may be a struggle along the way, with making it whole the one thing truly essential.  

My design that rather failed the test at conceptual design, never getting to schematic, was the last studio project in first year architecture school.   I had decided to try to design the space of the building without the form...!  Well, it didn't work and it was rather painful, and I was politely invited to do a summer studio, and to please complete something to continue next semester.   I ended up salvaging something from that, surprising myself and everyone else.

Mankind has designed things for growth without end so very frequently, and watched as they failed disastrously without learning from it, over and over.   So our linear thinking is clearly a problem for us, and we are in desperate need of a shock of some kind to get us out of it.  It's the story of all "bubbles" and megalomanias, and we've had plenty.

The problem with linear thinking is having purposes that don't respond to the world they're to become part of.   In the extreme, it leads people to not even recognize that they live in a world, but just come to trust in their own world mental fixations, finding belief to be culturally affirming and observation to not.   We lose track of the need for every beginning to find its own completion.  

So, in our work, architects are already quite accomplished at that and enjoy learning new ways to bring projects into harmony with the environments they're part of.  The one place we may fall down is in playing along with the linear thinking of others, who do not think of that at all, and use us to help them multiply unfinished business.   So I think what we need to do is find how package our awareness of the whole design cycle, our ability to change gears in midstream, and sense of process, and somehow convey it to others.   The world really desperately does need both the idea and techniques for asking "what in the world are we building here"?    

The questions underlined in the italicized paragraph have helped me expand on my original essay. I hope you find the expansion useful.

In principle I couldn't agree with you more, but to escape long standing habits of linear thinking in our culture we would need lots of true examples of organic thinking, and develop an awareness, motivation and technique. The surprise answer I come to is that architects are already quite good at it, but have not quite understood how their approach to design could be widely apply. (emphasis added)

1) Where are lots of true examples of organic thinking?

True examples of organic thinking abound. They attempt to lead the knowledge of many technical specialties toward a shared goal. Organic thinking includes architecture, but architectural decisions are applied at the tactical level of development to achieve a special interest objective. Tactics win battles, not wars. Architectural tactics are not part of a strategic plan to reach an acknowledged public goal. They produce shelter, however, which is an essential component of any solution that attempts to establish a sustainable relationship between the Built and Natural Domains. The goal is a symbiotic future. Architecture can make a significant contribution when it decides to focus on the organic thinking required to contribute. Talent won't get us there until it becomes the knowledge required to repeat success.

I've just mentioned that architectural design is an essential element of any strategic plan for symbiotic survival, but it needs a benchmark language equal to the measurement, evaluation, debate, decision and direction required. This is why I've written Land Development Calculations, and attached forecasting software entitled, "Development Capacity Evaluation". They do not replace architectural creativity. They give it a foundation for debate, accumulation of knowledge, strategic planning, goal definition and repetition of success that does not compromise our quality of life on the road to a symbiotic future. This language of Intensity can contribute to a sustainable future when it's measurements are evaluated in the same way that blood pressure was converted from an idea to knowledge with research. The concept of blood pressure, however, did not compromise the creativity of Jonas Salk et al. It was simply part of the foundation that improved the profession's credibility.

2) How can awareness, motivation and technique be developed?

This is a task for a group with a common goal. Motivation is stimulated by commitment and the group expands with opportunity. Technique develops around the language and strategic tools created to achieve a goal. This sounds ambiguous, so let me try to be more specific.

a) Awareness

Symbiotic awareness has already entered our subconscious through instinct and intuition. I've already mentioned that architects think in organic terms, but they have been primarily occupied with tactical achievement. Strategic success will begin with a language that is equal to the goal. The goal is strategic decisions that shelter the activities of growing populations within a symbiotic Built Domain. This is an expansion of tactical architecture and a step toward its strategic potential. My objective is to make you aware of the language and tools available. The public will only become aware of benefit if the profession decides to use them in pursuit of an expanded goal. 

b) Motivation

Motivation will remain in the hearts of idealists until language enables them to convince others of the message and effort required. This will require individual and organizational adaptation, but architects have the talent to translate organic thinking into symbiotic knowledge with the right language. There are no examples of symbiotic success, which is why adaptation, commitment and determination are required.

c) Technique

Technique evolves with language, tools, knowledge and research focused on a goal. Architects are conversant, but not fluent, in many technical languages; but deadlines often serve as a common benchmark vocabulary. Symbiotic policies will require strategic plans expressed in an advanced language. This is why I have suggested the language of Intensity and the tools of "Development Capacity Evaluation".

3) How can the architectural approach to design be widely applied?

I just mentioned that I created the language of Intensity with this in mind, since it is the same question that started me on this journey. It will be up to you to decide if the language is an adequate addition to a design approach that must be widely applied before it can produce solutions to the problem of shelter for growing population activities within symbiotic limits that protect our quality of life. Study will require the determination to explore a new idea beyond the comfort zone of current commitment, and all designers in any endeavor know how difficult it is to expand from the refinement of an old idea with limited potential.