THE TAX REVOLT

Public Economics,

Design as translation activity: a semiotic overview

The paper moves from the following question: can the design activity, intended as inventive and project-making activity, be viewed also as a form of translation? The answer such question compels us to overcome a paradox, because design does not involve a transfer from a source text from which it translates. Design generally acts like a translator and interpreter of social needs that previously exist as unstructured, non-textual, open-ended entities, thus exposed to uncertainty and incoherence and striving through design to acquire a proper structure, i.e. a textual form. From the extensive literature on the subject in semiotics and linguistics, here we will select and outline only the fundamental semiotic models that could help us overcome the paradox at least from a theoretical viewpoint and provide a plausible answer to our opening question

Qual semiótica para o design? A via pragmatista e a construção de una semiótica do projeto

The project semiotic – the project one, not only the design one – should have as goal being put as a discipline of investigation to better understand the meaning of goods production, of social relations mediated by artifacts and in an ultimate analysis of the ways throughout human communities take form. In the pragmatist vision the future is not an object of forecast, like happens in some sciences – like meteorology – that have the task of informing us what might happen tomorrow. In pragmatism, to say in the pragmatist design, the future is pre-configured: displaying things in such a way that through it future might happen. Pre-configuration is the mental act that prepares the project. The pragmatist design, in resume, should be the way of projecting the world we live in, thinking about the consequences that, in all circumstances we may conceive, can influence our ways of acting and thinking. The pragmatic maxim we put in the center of our discourse tells us, in fact, that every projectual act is necessarily an open process, because it is dominated by the idea of possibility: every object of our conception foresees and prepares others. Signs may transform life, but we have to know how to manage them

Semiotica e territorio: il vedere progettuale

In generale, la semiotica si occupa di cogliere il senso delle cose e di tutto ciò che produce significato: parole, immagini, convenzioni sociali, oggetti d’uso, edifici, e altro ancora. Ma come possiamo identificare o definire il senso di uno spazio, di un paesaggio che visitiamo, specie quando questo si presenta senza una propria ed esplicita struttura significante? Perché ogni spazio e soprattutto luogo – ossia uno spazio che risente delle tracce della nostra presenza – ha, e non può non avere, un senso: qualcosa che ci parla oltre le sue apparenze. Il saggio indaga sullo sguardo semiotico sul territorio. Perché il progetto del territorio e sul territorio richiede un’attitudine interpretativa, una sorta di allenamento al vedere interpretante, al vedere progettuale

Semiotica del progetto: la via pragmatista

The semiotics research in the design field often deals with the problem of meaning. Beyond aesthetic and functional issues, it is a “problem” due to its relation with the fact that the world of the artifacts is not always structured as a system of signification, where the meaning identification of an object is often merely a descriptive exercise. The vision of the artifacts within the social practices still – even if relevant in the socio-semiotics – leads, in my view, to partial results. Thus, from where should one start to identify the sense of things? The answer, that is, the direction of research, theoretical and applied, is then sought within the Peircean pragmatistic view of meaning: the sense and the meaning of objects are in the mental habits and behavior they are able to produce. Then, it is a matter of searching the sense of things in the ways through which the objects are able to influence and guide our will to act and think. This has significance not only in the everyday practice, but also in the mental formation (e.g. preferences, ideological positioning, etc.), starting with the idea that «what a thing means is simply what habits it involves» (CP 5.400)

An aesthetic for sustainable interactions in Product-Service Systems?

Copyright @ 2014 Greenleaf Publishing.Eco-efficient Product-Service Systems (PSS, in which the economic interest of the stakeholders involved in the offer continuously foster the optimisation of environmental resource consumption) represent a promising approach to sustainability. However, despite their potential win–win characteristics, the application of this concept is still limited. One key reason is that eco-efficient PSSs are often radical innovations and their adoption usually challenges existing customers’ habits (cultural barriers), companies’ organisations (corporate barriers), and regulative framework (regulative barriers). Starting from these considerations this chapter first investigates the barriers that affect the attractiveness and acceptance of eco-efficient PSS alternatives. A debate is then opened on the aesthetics of eco-efficient PSSs and the way in which aesthetics could enhance specific inner qualities of eco-efficient PSSs, i.e. facilitating and enhancing their wider diffusion. Through the analysis of several case studies, and integrating insights from semiotics, the chapter then outlines several research hypotheses on how the aesthetic elements of an eco-efficient PSS could facilitate user attraction, acceptance and satisfaction

Low Mach Number Modeling of Type Ia Supernovae. IV. White Dwarf Convection

We present the first three-dimensional, full-star simulations of convection in a white dwarf preceding a Type Ia supernova, specifically the last few hours before ignition. For these long-time calculations we use our low Mach number hydrodynamics code, MAESTRO, which we have further developed to treat spherical stars centered in a three-dimensional Cartesian geometry. The main change required is a procedure to map the one-dimensional radial base state to and from the Cartesian grid. Our models recover the dipole structure of the flow seen in previous calculations, but our long-time integration shows that the orientation of the dipole changes with time. Furthermore, we show the development of gravity waves in the outer, stable portion of the star. Finally, we evolve several calculations to the point of ignition and discuss the range of ignition radii.Comment: 42 pages, some figures degraded to conserve space. Accepted to The Astrophysical Journal (http://journals.iop.org/

Design: dall’oggetto al progetto

La progettualità, e quindi la possibilità di costruire identità culturali, è frutto di una incessante attività di interpretazione orientata verso un fine. La forma che diamo agli artefatti e all’esperienza è essa stessa interpretazione di un desiderio così come di una necessità o di un ideale sociale. È qui che entra in campo la semiotica. In particolare la semiotica che pone la massima attenzione ai processi interpretativi quale strumento di trasformazione e progetto