Tools for thought are a beautiful idea—inventions which can “change the thought patterns of an entire civilization.” But that’s a 30 year old quote. Why are they so hard to make? and I try to answer that question and suggest paths forward:
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Modern design practice demands deep engagement with users' context: interviewing, embedding, reading, empathizing. Such a powerful discipline… yet it's hard to shake the sense that the people creating profound tools for thought are doing all those things—somehow way more deeply.
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In numinous.productions/ttft, and I argue that the most powerful tools for thought express deep, novel insights into the underlying subject matter. It's not enough to empathize with users—the designer must be able to produce original research in the target domain.
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On a personal level, that idea was the emotional core of the piece for me. I've really struggled with my relationship to design. I've felt enthralled and empowered by its remarkable practices, but also instinctively uneasy that the work I most admire seems subtly "apart" from it.
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Developing this piece with has helped me tentatively resolve that tension: it's a yes-and.
This was a huge relief! I saw that the practices were somehow limited—but they were too predictive to write off, and I couldn't see how to subsume them.
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Thanks! I'm not sure - there's a lot of overlap with "Cognition in the Wild" (which I did read, and Hutchins published in the same year). But it's been a long time ...
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