Analogous and Digital

"An integral component of Aicher's work is that it is anchored in a 'philosophy of making' inspired by such thinkers as Ockham, Kant or Wittgenstein, a philosophy concerned with the prerequisites and aims, the objects and claims, of design. Aicher's complete theoretical and practical writings on design (which include all other aspects of visual creativity, such as architecture) are available with this new edition of the classic work. If Aicher prefers the analogous and concrete to the digital and abstract he does it with a philosophical intention. He relativizes the role of pure reason. He criticizes the rationality of Modernism as a result of the dominance of purely abstract thinking. Anyone who prefers the abstract to the concrete does not only misunderstand the mutual dependence of concept and view. In Aicher's judgement he is also creating a false hierarchy, a rank order that is culturally fatal. Things that are digital and abstract are not greater, higher and more important than things that are analogous and concrete." —Wilhelm Vossenkuhl

9 preface by sir norman foster 10 introduction 22 grasping with the hand and mind 28 extensions of the ego 36 the eye, visual thinking 47 analogous and digital 55 universals and capitals 60 buridan and peirce 63 reading scores 65 honourable burial for descartes 75 design and philosophy 93 architecture and epistemology 109 use as philosophy 133 planning and control 146 development, a concept 150 an apple 154 something quite ordinary 170 life form and ideology 178 cultures of thinking 188 afterword 190 sources