Industrial inheritance

the search for industrial inheritance nick foster

long and fruitful history decorative (William Morris - Evenlode pattern 1883)

Structural Joseph Paxton 1851 structure for the Great Exhibition Made of cast iron framing inspiration from the latticed veins of the Giant Victoria Waterlily Crystal Palace earning Paxton a knighthood.

systematic and mollecular level inspiration Janine Benyus and the Biomimicry approach Ross Lovegrove ‘Captain Organic’ Organic Essentialism, Go chair made from Magnesium The David Brent of the design world.

They all use natural inspiration for a the creation of a single object Can natural models help us understand the transitions between designed objects?

Design DNA. BMW 1500 debuted at the 1961 Frankfurt Motor Show. C pillar feature (after BMW design director Wilhelm Hofmeister) To give the vehicle more dynamism.

become a core part of what makes a BMW a BMW.

These optimised bands use standard Standard Squircle (X = Y) Outer Offset o sets for the side radius R2, while the X corner radii are halfway between the o set and scaled versions. X R1 = Y/4 Band R2 = 3X X /3.5 3X Rectangular Squircle Inner Offset X Band X/10 X/6 3X 1. Split Squircle at center points; 2. Join Squircle halves with move halves outward straight lines Correct Band thinner than X/10 Too round Square edges Nokia have their own DNA elements The Squircle More focussed on brandable stylistic elements. make a product recognisable Typically these teams are moving into brand departments Is there something more fundamental about the success and failure of products? what do they pass onto their successive generations?

The case for Darwin: (as the established evolutionary model) Evolution by natural selection. Paraphrased as ʻsurvival of the ﬁttestʼ (Herbert Spencer)

Many phenotyptic variations occur via genetic mutations during gestation The phenotype which is best suited survives to adulthood and reproduces. Others are less fortunate and are weeded out. Darwinism has been used in abstraction to justify the ruthless practices of capitalist monopolists such as Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller. There is a clear parallel

This cycle is repeated with the ﬁttest genetic packets being passed on genetic makeup of a population drifts towards an optimum solution.

genetic drift can be seen in the evolution of the digital camera First protoype built in 1975 by Steve Sasson of the Kodak Labs created a new string of DNA, a moment of instantaneous speciation.

hopeful monsters Each had a different cluster of mutations exhibited different phenotypic traits. Over time these ʻless ﬁtʼ mutants were weeded out.

todayʼs consumer digital camera portfolio. genetic drift becomes visible, resulting in a common ﬁttest phenotype.

So far, so Darwin. the parallel begins to dissolve. Design is a conscious pursuit with a creator. In this tableau, designers are gods, and we are in the realm of ʻintelligent designʼ

1. The design process is an evolutionary accellerator user research, focus groups, market research, ethnography. The ʻRʼ before the ʻDʼ. Pre-gestationary cycles of study make the Darwinian model a ʻrigged lotteryʼ.

2. greenhouses can modify the environment allowing oganisms to ﬂourish leading to unnatural selection

Through careful use of branding, marketing, advertising and a whole host of nefarious tricks to control and modify an environment prior to launch latent demand

3. the environment exerts changes on an object through itʼs life which can be passed onto the next generation. inheritance of changes during life is distinctly non-Darwinian

Jean-Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet Chevalier de la Marck Aged 16, he bought a horse and rode across France to join the army Took command of his company after it was reduced to 14 men He was promoted to Lieutenant on the spot. A friend playfully lifted him up by the head to celebrate, rupturing the lymphatic glands in his neck, putting him in hospital for a year. Decided to pursue a career in Botany Huge achievements: Defined the term ʻinvertebrateʼ, ʻarachnidʼ and ʻcrustaceanʼ. He was the first to use the term ʻbiologyʼ in itʼs modern sense. The first man to propose a coherant theory of evolution, which we now know it to be untrue, but how does it play out in the industrial world?

Lamarck deﬁned two forces: the complexifying force - organisms tend towards the more complex

the adaptive force - the environment forces change upon the organism Organisms develop through their lives. These developments are passed to the next generation

in a similar way once a product is released into the environment, it can be observed and critiqued. Habits, modiﬁcations, preferences can be fed back into the next generation

Bending Lamarckism Increasingly we donʼt have to wait for a generational cycle

devices are born unﬁnished or empty as software becomes an integral part of many products they follow the ʻbetaʼ approach allowing upgrades, updates and modiﬁcations during life

The genetic equivalent of growing a pair of wings upon reaching a cliff face. Instant Lamarckism This is all very well for software elements, but what about industrial design?

we could provide chunks of genetic code To allow this environmental agility Red camera Jim Jannard (ex Oakley) The ultimate modular approach to industrial design

The customer can then conﬁgure the parts into a huge variety of combinations, TV camera SLR Full hollywood rig

Oh, and two units can be bolted together to shoot in 3D! Make your own mutants.

Lamarckʼs three wives died he went blind before dying in 1829. His family couldnʼt afford to bury him. His home and books were sold at auction and his body was buried in a temporary lime pit. a rightly deserved renaissance in the ﬁelds of soft evolution and memetics

1 Be willing to launch a risky mutant, it may just succeed 2 Make sure you make it genetically agile 3 Have a think what its kids might be like So, three simple rules: 1. Be willing to launch a risky mutant, it may just succeed 2. Make sure you make it genetically agile 3. Have a think what itʼs kids might be like

thanks www.fosta.typepad.com hellofosta@gmail.com @fosta

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Industrial inheritance

by hellofosta on Nov 15, 2010

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