Quotes About Function

A chair is the first thing you need when you don't really need anything, and is therefore a peculiarly compelling symbol of civilization. For it is civilization, not survival, that requires design.

Design always has a purpose, art has no purpose. That's really the difference between them. Do I think one is better than the other? Absolutely not. I think they both fulfill functions.

Design acknowledges change. Its meaning encompasses change in our times. To design is to 'create order and to function according to a plan.' The notion of change and design move along the same path.

Design is... above all an effort to improve reality... I always try to begin with considerations of its function... I ask myself, who needs it, which materials best suit its functions and so on.

Design always has a purpose.

Everything that I do has a certain mechanical logic to it, and follows my definition of design--which is function with cultural content.

Once we have a nice, conceptual sketch and rendering and design approved, then it's really about pinpointing what's functional and what's not, because functional equals expensive.

It's one of the curses of designing that when you look at anything, you're constantly thinking, Why? Why - why was it designed like that, and not like this?

The beauty of design ought to be totally incidental to the enterprise itself.

No matter how much talent you have in your mind and spirit, if your body is not able to function, you are not able to fulfill your destiny.

A building is a human being's space and the background for his dignity and its exterior should reflect its contents and function

There has been a strong tradition in this country that it is not the function of the military to educate the public on political issues.

People commonly educate their children as they build their houses, according to some plan they think beautiful, without considering whether it is suited to the purposes for which they are designed.

The economy is like a machine.

Almost everything is like a machine.

After a great many questions I eventually ascertained that he is suffering from some kind of disorder of the mind. Is there anything more sorrowful than a brain whose proper function has been disrupted?

La société démocratique, où toutes les fonctions sont formellement ouvertes à tous, suscite les espoirs et les ambitions. Elle multiplie en conséquence, à tous les niveaux le nombre des déçus et des humiliés.

Skeuomorphic is the technical term for incorporating old, familiar ideas into new technologies, even though they no longer play a functional role. Skeuomorphic designs are often comfortable for traditionalists, and indeed the history of technology shows that new technologies and materials often slavishly imitate the old for no apparent reason except that is what people know how to do. Early

We only need to remember sufficient knowledge to let us get our tasks done. Because so much knowledge is available in the environment, it is surprising how little we need to learn. This is one reason people can function well in their environment and still be unable to describe what they do.

Herbert Read thought we would need a mystical theory to connect beauty and function. Well, it took one hundred years, but today we have that theory, one based in biology, neuroscience, and psychology, not mysticism.

In the 1980s, in writing The Design of Everyday Things, I didn't take emotions into account. I addressed utility and usability, function and form, all in a logical, dispassionate way—even though I am infuriated by poorly designed objects. But now I've changed. Why? In part because of new scientific advances in our understanding of the brain and of how emotion and cognition are thoroughly intertwined.

Effective memory uses all the clues available: knowledge in the world and in the head, combining world and mind. We have already seen how the combination allows us to function quite well in the world even though either source of knowledge, by itself, is insufficient.

Perceived affordances help people figure out what actions are possible without the need for labels or instructions.

Forcing functions are a form of physical constraint: situations in which the actions are constrained so that failure at one stage prevents the next step from happening. Starting a car has a forcing function associated with it—the driver must have some physical object that signifies permission to use the car. In