We will publish Nikos Salingaros' book, Unified Theory architectural , in a series of installments, making it digitally, freely available for students and architects around the world. the next chapter discusses the extent to which architecture can be considered successful, namely adaptation to its specific location. While recognizing the merits of "critical regionalism" Salingaros here why this framework is not enough to analyze the architecture in terms of its environmental impact, cultural and emotional. If you missed them, be sure to read the previous installments here.
Suppose that we successfully documented and cataloged all the formal language, including vernacular traditions, times past and contemporary practice. A scientific approach requires the next step, which includes both the analysis and classification. A catalog is a useful information store, but it is only the beginning of a systematic study.
What is certain formal languages have in common and what qualities do some different? A measure is the degree of complexity, as documented by the length of the description of the form of language. Another is the adaptation to the locality. How a form of language be justified as regional? Here, the region is the opposite of universal.
Therefore useful to classify the form of language in how they adapt to a certain locality . If it fits, every language, of course, adapt to its own specific area: what we measure is the quality that the adaptation is. The success of the adaptation is measured if the buildings are effective in low-tech sense of energy, so that the majority population can benefit. In contrast, the high-tech energy efficiency can be very useful, but it is generally based on the technology and imported materials, and therefore global, not regional.
Let's take a theoretical result: " is the complexity of a form of language related to its degree of regionalism ?"
Regionalism measures how using local materials, how local culture is respected in the geometry of the building, how has evolved adaptations to climate become part of the design, etc. Conversely, we measure to what extent these factors are ignored for the purposes of imposing a stylistic design from top to bottom.
In the past, transportation was difficult, people were forced to use locally available materials. There is a philosophy linked regionalism that respects the landscape and nature. Are trees, rivers, hills and lakes complied, or are they just indiscriminately erased to make way for a building? Also, if a building uses good local materials, it is long lived with the repair and maintenance required. There is a feeling that it is the place and culture. But the buildings that do not meet the local environment often disintegrate relatively quickly. If they do not, they can become the hated intruders.
There is another, huge subject of further investigation, and it has to do with how a person responds emotionally to a building. This has more to do with the language of forms, while only a few of the response is specific to a building.
This question makes sense only when we accept the request of Christopher Alexander that 0% of our emotional response to a building is shared between cultures. It is not a matter of opinion, as if we "like" something or not. It depends on the education and conditioning, and is less fundamental.
Something feels connected to our person, in our deepest self, and identify with it. As Alexander said, he became "personal". This connective effect is due to geometric properties, some of which we know (and will study here).
geometric consistency in a structure, when it reaches an optimal value, induces an intensely positive feelings in us. This could paradoxically come a structure that, for other reasons, we do not particularly, or that we believe that it is not of great artistic or architectural importance. The contradiction between what our body knows and what our rational mind tells us, could induce cognitive dissonance.
An intense degree of connectivity with an artifact or structure establishes a personal relationship with the physical object or space. We experience a healing process, a sense of happiness, unless of course we live instead of cognitive dissonance. (This creates a state of stress.)
This discussion has important philosophical implications. It offers post-Cartesian view of the universe. Recall that Descartes saw things natural as individual machines each other. However, we consider a person and the object he / she is interacting with the two components of a larger system. The act of experiencing an artifact or a building connects the observer to the observed.
Modern physics is actually based precisely on this concept of close interaction between the observer and what is observed. The experiments demonstrating this phenomenon work on the quantum level. What we are discussing here occurs at the macroscopic level, however. Thus, we must rely on our perception rather than physical measurements.
Yet in recent decades, philosophical Cartesianism triumphed, becoming increasingly extreme. The universe and its very complex mechanisms were all supposed to be as simplistic machines, which is false. Our perception of the world has become reductionist in many areas, including design, ignoring science as he did. Today, the architectural discourse never considers the binding of the observer to the observed.
complex
Tracing the origins of this development leads us to an old political philosophy. A group of philosophers known as the "Frankfurt School" proposed a set of radically new rules for society to follow. This took place in the 1930s as part of a Marxist training for a new society. Their writings , labeled as "critical theory" ignore human nature, and hope rather naively shape a new human being to live a utopia proposed. But all philosophy that is detached from science is bound to be misleading and even dangerous, and this is certainly true of the "Frankfurt School".
A central tenet of Marxist ideology is that the past and all the traditions stand in the way of human progress. The only way forward, she says, is to first reject the past, and destroy it where it contaminates our newly constructed utopia. This thought has profound implications for the design of the environment. Traditional notions of connection to architecture are considered politically incorrect and are strongly condemned.
The problem for architects is that a body of writings marked "critical theory" is confused with architectural theory. They are nothing of the sort; in fact, they are not a theory of anything. "Critical Theory" is just a roadmap for a revolution founded on Marxist principles and technocratic. Traditional societies must be dismantled, and people treated like cogs in a vast industrial machine.
A core resentment arises here against traditional notions of beauty, and that also applies to architecture. Traditional languages are declared undesirable form, fit only for extinction. They must be replaced by a universal language that expresses technology, industrialization and collectivization.
"Critical Regionalism" is a movement to adapt the design climatic conditions and local sites, and to some degree, locally available materials. It represents a healthy reaction to the non-adaptability of the International Style modernism. Unfortunately, the inclusion of the word "critical" creates a contradiction, because it is linked to a philosophical and anti-regional policy and anti-traditional movement. In practice, critical regionalism deliberately perpetuates the form language of modernism. Our understanding, however, is that regionalism must protect and reuse the traditional language of the form. True regionalism must be free of any comprehensive form of language imposed from above, and all the forces of uniformity and conformity.
This raises the question of the form of tongues being tied to particular philosophies. This may very well be true. But I disagree with almost all other authors, and I like that philosophy can not be considered a substitute for architectural theory. Regardless of how one form of language arises, the theoretical tools of architecture and of human biology can be used to explain how effective it is in providing useful buildings. This is the real purpose of architectural theory.
Putting the cart before the horse, namely labeling philosophical discourse or policy attached to a form of language that the "theory" totally confused what the theory is really. Unfortunately, most books on "architectural theory" are simply historical accounts of thought that is used to justify a particular form of language using criteria other than human consumption.
Similar form languages have evolved in different cultures, however, share local materials, climate and topography. This is an example of convergent evolution parallel, much like the dorsal fins of sharks and dolphins in biology. by leveling the cultural and geographical differences, however, it eventually destroys the sustainability and energy efficiency evolved encoded in the traditional form of language.
for about a century, we have theory, which, again, are not at all experienced project theory leads. an architect designs a building intuitively, usually using a form of language inarticulate and creates an explanation after the fact. This is pure marketing. Architectural critics play the game and prepare this ad hoc explanation, talking as if it was the theory, but that makes it neither scientist nor an honest description of the actual design process.
Very often the architect invents a "look" that has no rational basis, only as a source of visceral inspiration of how to express certain favored images. Other times, the architect can be driven by the conscious or destruction of unconscious forces, and this motivation is reflected in the construction project to have a look "transgressive". The explanation offered "theoretical" of such a form is never honest about his inspiration.
I think after the fact justifications of contemporary buildings can be useful tools for architecture students. They confuse the fundamental issue: the distinction between theory and authentic marketing.
Further Reading:
Christopher Alexander The phenomenon of life , Chapter 7 "the personal nature of the order" (Center for environmental Structure, Berkeley, 01).
Léon Krier, "Building civil cities," Traditional Building , 05; is available from
Nikos A. Salingaros & Kenneth G. Masden, "Politics, Philosophy, Critical Theory," Philadelphia Society , 2011. Since this is a chapter of this book, we will post online.
Order the international edition of theory of the unified architecture here and US edition here .
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