2.2.5.3. Connecting approach: Science, technology and design context
Indeed, as suggested by Weibel, mapping the connecting approach or Processpatching method to science studies, shows us interesting parallels with the ‘Against Method’ of Feyerabend. At first glance, this might read as a contradiction, as Feyerabend argues against (scientific) methodology. The link between the processpatching method and Feyerabend’s theory however, can be found elsewhere. Freyerabend’s publication aims to break the paradigm, to leave the general methodology and to open the field for knowledge growth, progress and innovation. In this research on artistic methods, the provocative reference to the artistic research and development process as a ‘method’, underlines my conviction in the positive effect of breaking the paradigm in the arts where the romantic imago of vagueness and mysterious art making processes still prevails (see also 1.1.). The variety or plurality of methods that are remixed in the Processpatching method, although achieved from the opposite direction, come close to Feyerabend’s credo that ‘Anything Goes’. On a conceptual level, Feyerabend’s theory and the suggested theory of this investigation could intersect with each other in a Third Space or in the zone of transvergence between the disciplines, where the obstructing disciplinary paradigms from both sides are evened out. Ridley[171] who states that artists go further in applying ‘anything goes’ approaches than scientists, underlines this. Ridley mentions, in his plea to save the world from scientism (2.1.), the importance of plurality and diversity as one can see in the arts. He makes this clear by comparing what art and science have to say. Science informs us through uniformity, while art deals with unique plurality. This plurality demands a clear analysis as it also relates to the collisions mentioned earlier. The communication difficulties raised by the vagueness of unpredictable aspects of this connecting or plural approach should be looked at in the right perspective, as most artists do not intend to build facts or create ‘black boxes’, as Latour[172] describes scientific work. In a general sense, interactive electronic artists are establishing dynamic, fluid processes in which the aesthetics and ethics of the (social) interaction or experience is of crucial importance. It is hard to communicate these goals or intentions in a clear jargon, as we (Western art and science discourse) lack a vocabulary to describe unpredictability and instability or ‘openness’ as positive, valuable features of the work.
