Alexander was a Janus: a mathematician at his father's insistence
when he wanted to be an artist. An architect by compromise. Face
two was a Taoist mystic infused with hard core Catholic fundamentalism.
His Ph.D. thesis—which became his first book, /Notes on the
Synthesis of Form/—was an attempt to define a mathematical science
of [architectural/industrial] design. But in the same book, he
stated that optimal design arose from a "non-selfconscious" process,
embedded in myth and ritual and culture.
/A Pattern Language/, was part of a trilogy that included /The
Timeless Way of Building/ and the /Oregon Experiment/. /APL/ was
written by committee and edited by Alexander (although he took all
the credit) to fulfill a government grant. His mystical side was
front and center in /TTW/; and the Oregon Experiment was a case study.
Alexander transcended Patterns and his last major work—/The Nature
of Order, vol 1-4/—centered 15 generative properties that have
little to nothing to do with patterns and is far more mystical and
Catholic-God focused than his earlier work.
Ward Cunningham and Kent Beck brought /APL/ to the attention of the
software community as a workshop at OOPSLA (ACM conference on Object
Oriented Programming Systems and Applications). The 'Gang of Four'
authors of /Pattern Languages of Programming/ participated in that
workshop. A year after their book was published a mock trial of the
GoF for "heresy" was staged and they were found guilty.
Perhaps the most significant error made by the software community
was seeking patterns in "solution space" rather than "problem
space;" the latter being where most of Alexander's work was focused.
The software patterns community looked at written programs to find
multiple instances of similar bodies of code and attempt to discern
a generalized problem that they solved (albeit with contextual
idiosyncrasies).
There are hundreds of thousands of software patterns published, but
maybe three or four that actually capable of being applied in
multiple contexts—of actually being considered "true" patterns.
The connection to geometry, both in Alexander and in software
patterns, was never more than tenuous. A majority of the patterns in
APL (e.g., "Dancing in the Streets," "Sleeping in Public") had
nothing to do with geometry or any other mathematical formalism.
Even patterns like "Light from Two Sides" are geometric in the only
the simplest sense.
The math in /Notes/ was algebra, not geometry. Only in his last
major work NO, can you find properties that are overtly geometric,
e.g., "centers" and "alternating repetition."
more upon request
davew
On Mon, Sep 26, 2022, at 5:13 PM, glen wrote:
> I'd appreciate you (and SteveS) throwing some words at it. In
> particular, since software patterns are *supposed* to be linked
to the
> geometric patterns of architecture, *where* or *how* has it gone
wrong
> in extrapolation? Did Alexander go wrong in his extrapolation? Or
did
> others [mis]interpret?
>
> (I've purposefully left the Subject the same because it definitely
> relates to Chan's morphology based taxonomy and my argument with my
> meso-biologist friend about "species diversity" versus "phylogenetic
> diversity".)
>
> On 9/26/22 15:35, Prof David West wrote:
>> I am a patterns and Alexander expert. glen's uncertainty / mild
antipathy is spot on. Software patterns are an oxymoron.
>>
>> Strong words, but happy to back them up with dozens of papers
written/presented and hours of discussion.
>>
>> davew
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Sep 26, 2022, at 6:29 AM, glen wrote:
>>> Very cool! Thanks.
>>>
>>> In particular, our property abuts "the ravine", which is a
semi-wild
>>> place. The permaculture categories might help me orient my own
>>> intuition (that everything in the ravine should be left alone)
with my
>>> neighbor's (clearing the whole area and reintroducing natives).
He owns
>>> the majority of it. So, c'est la vie ... or perhaps "telle est la
>>> mort". (Don't blame me. I don't know French.) One thing this
zone 0-5
>>> model might permit is modularity. That blog post implies such
with the
>>> inverted garden interface. But it seems like there could be
pockets of
>>> zone0es in wild areas and pockets of zone5s in urban areas,
>>> particularly in sprawling cities like LA or Houston. Growing up in
>>> Houston, where every square inch of semi-abandoned land seemed
rapidly
>>> reclaimed by the swamp, is probably the source of my skepticism
with my
>>> friends' diversity doctrine.
>>>
>>> There's a lot to digest in the biophilia links. I have to
confess, I
>>> haven't given pattern languages much attention. It always seems
>>> motivated by geometry, which fails for me. Of course, I'm familiar
>>> enough with software patterns. But that's always failed for me
as well.
>>> They seem too ephemeral, unstable ... i.e. not real, convenient
>>> fiction, and *perfect* opportunity for gurus to blind others
with their
>>> gobbledygook mouth sounds. I guess it reminds me of category
theory,
>>> too abstract for my ape brain. But maybe some of his earlier
work on
>>> Clifford algebras might motivate me? I could start here, I guess:
>>> https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4757-1472-2_41
<https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4757-1472-2_41>
>>>
>>> Thanks again.
>>>
>>> On 9/24/22 10:29, Steve Smith wrote:
>>>>
>>>> On 9/24/22 9:49 AM, glen wrote:
>>>>> Such efforts seem so inherently metaphorical it's difficult
for me to approach a concrete conversation. For example, I have a
couple of biologist friends, one meso (bugs) and one macro
(ungulates), who thought I was being contrarian when I challenged
their assertion that biodiversity in urban areas was *obviously*
lower than that of natural areas like forests. Of course, I admit my
ignorance up front. Maybe they are. But it's just not obvious to me.
>>>>
>>>> This may seem a little tangential but the realm of
Permaculture Design has a suite of truisms on these topics, though
they are articulated in their unique language which can be a little
hard to translate sometimes. I think the permaculture community
represent a fertile laboratory for doing *some* experiments as
implied by Glen's questions.
>>>>
>>>> A good example which gestures toward the Chan work at least
morphologically is maybe worth a scan if not a full read here:
>>>>
>>>>
https://aflorestanova.wordpress.com/2016/04/08/zones-in-permaculture-design/
<https://aflorestanova.wordpress.com/2016/04/08/zones-in-permaculture-design/>
>>>>
>>>> Permaculture's 5 zone quantization doesn't preclude a
recognition of there being continuous gradients in many dimensions
from a locus of "technological closed-loop" (zone 0) and "biological
closed loop" (zone 5).
>>>>
>>>> There is a *lot* of talk in the literature about the
interfaces around zone 0, 1, 2 techno-structures creating localized
ecozones that harbor diversity (desired and undesired == vermin)
which I think provide some good anecdotal evidence about
biodiversity in transition zones and acute technological interfaces
(e.g. roofs, walls, corners, posts, fences, etc). Permaculture is a
domain of recognizing and exploiting "happy accidents".
>>>>
>>>> It is also worth noting the diversity spike that happens in
estuarial contexts...
>>>>
>>>> A more formal study of Urban/Architectural design with an eye
to *health* (human-centric view) is the domain of Biophilic Design
<https://www.terrapinbrightgreen.com/report/biophilia-healing-environments/
<https://www.terrapinbrightgreen.com/report/biophilia-healing-environments/>>.
Nikos Salingaros is a hard-core Mathematician at UT-San Antonio who
addresses abstractions of Complexity
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikos_Salingaros#Complexity
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikos_Salingaros#Complexity>> and
Pattern Languages <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattern_language
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattern_language>> as well as
Architecture and Urbanism. He also has some interesting opinions
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikos_Salingaros#Philosophy
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikos_Salingaros#Philosophy>> about
post modernism as well as Dawkins Atheism.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Since then, they've presented (meso and macro) arguments that
justify their position. It does seem obvious that urban areas trend
to more adaptable animals like coyotes and raccoons and less so to,
say, deer. The bugs are more interesting. Meso guy found some
articles that show "species" diversity in urban areas is roughly the
same as natural areas. But phylogenetic diversity is clearly lower
in urban areas. That seems counter intuitive to me. It's a cool result.
>>>>>
>>>>> My main point when I originally expressed skepticism, though,
was about microbial diversity. Is it possible that bug-layer and
microbe-layer (including what lives in/on large animals like rats
and humans) diversity makes up for lower diversity in large-layers?
>>>>>
>>>>> I *feel* that projects like Chan's could help with this
question since it seems prohibitively expensive to sample and test
enough microbial populations of urban and wild areas, especially if
we include intra-animal populations. I'm just not sure *how* they
could help.
>>>>>
>>>>> On 9/24/22 03:38, David Eric Smith wrote:
>>>>>> It’s funny; I know Bert.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> One of our colleagues played a role in bringing him out to
work at Google in Tokyo.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> A mathematician (Will Cavendish) who has part-time support
at IAS
>>>>>> https://www.ias.edu/scholars/will-cavendish
<https://www.ias.edu/scholars/will-cavendish>
<https://www.ias.edu/scholars/will-cavendish
<https://www.ias.edu/scholars/will-cavendish>>
>>>>>> is also interested in the mathematical dimensions of this,
though I have only a glancing exposure to how those two together are
trying to frame the problems. Because Bert has come at it more from
the ALife/engineering approach, and Will’s interests run more in the
direction of proving capabilities of broad classes of systems, often
interested in their aggregation as categories (and also about the
role of simulation as a replacement for proof in systems that
produce complicated enough state spaces), it should be a productive
and interesting collaboration. I don’t know how engaged others are
in the Google group on this specific project, because I am too far
outside that loop.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Eric
