Communication and orthopraxy

Communication and othropraxy

I was listening to the audiobook of a good novel from the beginning of this century while doing something on my smartphone, when the realization struck me. One of the characters in the novel had left a message to another character, announcing a visit. The message was left in an unspecified manner that clearly didn't involve the expectation of confirmation or other direct reaction. If the recipient objected to the visit, he should made it known somehow. That was how we used to communicate before mobile phones and the Internet. In shorter than two decades, new technologies have altered our possibilities but more significantly our attitudes. Communication has become more efficient and transparent but also more demanding: we feel obliged to announce many things and respond to probably even more.

One of the striking things is the multimediality of our communication. Some had expected that the Internet would promote literacy and verbal expression. Others have lauded texting language as a renewal. It turns out that text is less important than they thought. Images and pictorial symbols, from memes to emojis are taking over, turning most forms of communication into something akin to a comic book. Given my love for comic books, I should be glad about this development but I'm rather worried.

The likeness of our communications to comic books is not accidental. There's a combination of economy and expressiveness in comic books that makes them so readable but also rather easy to write (not draw). Telling something in a text, either short or long, can be a daunting task for many. Compiling a comic-book-like sequence of ready-made elements removes much of the difficulty of verbal expression, moreover in a way easily adaptable to the latest vogues - something with obvious appeal to avid users of the new digital media. It's also quite democratic: one doesn't need special skills to use emojis.

The problem is exactly that: it's easy to avoid developing any significant skills in expressing oneself and still be quite active in communication. In many cases, it just amounts to effortless and uncritical use of clichés. People don't learn to write, draw or invent; they just learn to follow.

This reveals a dangerous conflict. On one hand, we are challenging many orthodoxies and asking people to open up their minds, remove prejudices and go beyond old beliefs in order to understand and live harmoniously with each other or to advance science and technology. On the other, we are promoting orthopraxy in most of its forms, not only reducing creativity but also tacitly subjugating thinking to old and new conformities. It's not a new conflict but that it persists despite brave claims about the potential of new technologies for human society is telling.

Orthodoxy and orthopraxy

Orthodoxy and orthopraxy

Design methods are split into two categories: proscriptive ones that tell you what is acceptable and prescriptive ones that tell you how to do it. This distinction between orthodoxy and orthopraxy is quite fundamental. One can fine it everywhere, including in religion: the ancient Greeks and Romans were arguably more into orthopraxy (making offers and following rituals) than orthodoxy (developing a dogma).

In archtiecture, proscriptive methods tell you that a classical or modernist building is what you should make. That's what matters and in order to do it, your building should include elements from the corresponding canon. It's not possible to make a classical building without elements from the classical orders.

Prescriptive methods can be seen as a reaction to proscriptive ones: it's not enough to know the final state of a design, we need to know the way to reach it. So, prescriptive methods love algorithms and sequences of well-defined steps. They tell you to do first this, then that and so on. If you're lucky, they also tell you when to stop.

One might be tempted to see proscriptive and prescriptive methods as complementary: by putting the two together, one would have a complete, strong method. However, I fear that any union would bring out the weaknesses of both. Proscriptive methods restrict designing to arbitrary systems and conventions leading to stagnation and frustration. From an intellectual viewpoint, it's interesting how they operate by excluding all other options but adopting them can be quite claustrophobic. Prescriptive methods, on the other hand, tell you too little to feel confident. They often amount to hill climbing: taking small steps towards some local optimum that may not be the best option or even good enough - but then you cannot know that as you move blindly around.