Head Trauma Clinic
(X) to the power of
n is its smallest unit of analysis.
This unit was developed to serve as a key code for an architectural
head trauma clinic.
(X)n:
the unit of analysis of lived architectural
experience with identifiable boundaries in space and time, and with
an internal structure which interrelates elements from Popper’s
worlds 1, 2, and 3. These are:
- physical entities,
- mental states such as emotional and
psychological states,
- the world of the products of the human
mind such as stories, explanatory myths, scientific theories (whether
true or false), technological problems, social institutions and
works of art (Bucsescu 1975).
The elements of this unit of analysis
are markers and
terminals (terms
defined by William Mitchell). The central operational device is contingency.
Theory
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by Wallece Stevens |
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(M-Marker, T-Terminal)
| I am what is around me. |
(M) |
| Women understand this. |
(M) |
| One is not a duchess |
(T) |
| A hundred yards away from
a carriage. |
(T) |
| These, than are portraits: |
(T) |
| A black vestibule; |
(T) |
| A high bed sheltered by
curtains. |
(T) |
| These are merely instances. |
(Xn) |
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Other Related Concepts
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- an act of making
(Pratt Journal 3)
- place (Aristotle,
Heidegger, Norberg-Schulz, Frampton, Muntagnola, Bucsescu
1975)
- poetic logic, rhetoric
(Vico)
- “elan vital”,
intuition (Bergson)
- double arrow/bodily thinking
(Knesel)
- “concrete abstraction”
(Barthes)
- tacit knowledge (Polany)
- world (Nelson Goodman)
- poetic image independent
of causality (Bachelard)
- the thing itself (Husserl,
Merleau-Ponty)
- eroticism (Bataille)
- tropical mode (Hayden
White)
- pictorial form (Wittgenstein)
- nomological knowledge
(Habermas)
- move (S. Friedman)
- Metatron (Sol
Yurick)
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Method-System
Tools
*Autonomous morphocenters*
Markers have interface requirements
and functions, represented diagramatically by boundary conditions
and points. The details of the elements shape and internal
organization are left unspecified. (William J. Mitchell)
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Epistemological Relationships
(How do we know?) and Strategies
- sensate (empiricist,
materialist, phenomenological/ontological)
- idealist (essentialist,
fundamentalist, ontological, theological)
- interactionist (method,
systematic, dialectical, schizophrenic, pragmatic, poetic,
tropical or rational modes - Deconstruction?)
Space/Time Relationships
- Spatial Operations:
- sensory-motor
- concrete operations
- formal abstract operations
- Spatial Syntactical Relationships
(Le Corbusier, Colin Rowe, Norberg-Schulz, Eisenman 72
et al.):
- topological (Piaget)
- projective (Piaget)
- euclidian (Piaget)
- non-euclidian
(Heelan)
- Spatial Reference Systems:(Piaget)
- egocentric action
space
- fixed-external, path-type
- survey multiple coordinated
system of reference
- time relationships:
synchronic, diachronic
- Movement (change
of position) and acts of Measurement
Semantic Relationships
(Nelson Goodman)
- denotation
- exemplification
- expression
- mediated reference
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| Matter-invariants
Terminals have known geometry
and behaviors, in other words, they have identity. That
is they can be drawn in complete details, and do not contain
terms with unknown values. The functional description of
a terminal represents empirical knowledge (including experience
or world 2 and 3) of how this type of element actually behaves.
(William J. Mitchell)
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Form
- Geometry/Morphology
(B. Fuller, Haresh Lalvani)
- architectural syntax
and typology (Vitrivius, Leon Krier, De Stijl,
Eisenman, Puriny, Lynch)
- ontological/phenomenological
and all other perceptual building blocks (Mach,
Husserl)
- technology/structural
systems (B. Fuller, Haresh)
- material (Breuer)
- site: underground,
over, edge, terraced
Behavior
- known human experience/culture
- small economy of meaning
- narrative/precedent/fact/the
made (Vico)
- episodes/places/sample/diagrams
- World 2 (Popper)
- mental states:
emotional/psychological states
- personal memory
(Aldo Rossi)
- World 3 (Popper)
- the world of the
products of human mind such as stories, explanatory
myths, religion, scientific theories (whether
true or false), building technology, recording
devices, computers
- social institutions
- architectural program
- works of art and
architecture
- psycho-analytic
theories
- ideology-political
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