P. 561, "THE ARCHITECT'S DREAM"

. . . work at a suitable scale large enough to make the world beautiful in its entirety, small enough to allow love of craft, and making, and detail, to find expression in every project.

P. 557, "HOW TO ENLARGE THE ARCHITECT'S RESPONSIBILITY // BROADER SCOPE WITH LARGER IMPACT"

. . . the methods an architect must use in the 21st century, to have the right kind of relationship to the environment --- can only be indirect methods. We can only accomplish our aim, by finding some way of creating living structure, without personally having to design every bit of it . . . This must --- can only --- lead to an indirect, generative method.

P. 555
     I imagine a new role for the architect, in which we take more seriously our responsibility for all form and space in the world . . . Just as doctors, as members of their profession, take the responsibility for the care of illness and disease --- and take this responsibility , in principle, for all the people on the Earth . . .

P. 560

     Helping hundreds of people to design and layout and build their own structures, adding a touch here and and touch there to make the largest processes go well. . . . Once again, the emphasis . . . must be on the beauty and coherence and positive space within the large, as it results from the cooperative work of hundreds.

(Notes taken in transit on phone)

Page 547-548, "The network evolves"
. . . imagine such a passionate new process in which all we members of society together generate a vessel for our lives. . . . What might this new world be like? . . . I believe four general features of the overall system of society will turn out to be fundamental:
1- every process in common use has, among its tasks, the major act of consciously creating coherent form.
2- a fluid over-arching process, created piecemeal by the actions of thousands and millions of people, slowly begins taking care of the whole, and we understand how it does so. Within that whole, smaller processes will take care of some of the smaller centres, and we understand how they do so. And then, once again, still smaller processes will take care of the still smaller centres. . .
3- it becomes natural for people to consider making or modifying their own sequences, sharing and exchanging ideas, trying consciously to improve the sequences they know . . . it is part of their obligation to share the material they have, to deposit improved sequences in the gene pool, so that others may gain the benefit, also. . . .
3.5?- sequences all have the important character that deeper aspects of structure are laid down first, and that subsequent steps always follow smoothly
4- ". . . we shall all gradually come to feel a concrete and realistic obligation to make sure that every action taken, by anyone, in any place, always, heals the land. A widespread ethical change begins to appear. Healing the land is understood by more people: Throughout society, slowly each person comes to recognize his or her fundamental obligation to make sure that in every act of every kind, each person does what he or she can do to heal the land and to regenerate, shape, form, decorate, and improve the living Earth of which we are a part."


P. 559, LARGER AND DEEPER
. . . a new and different kind of professional [than the 20th-century architect], undertaking different tasks, playing a larger role, increasing the scope of what is covered — yet at the same time also playing, at least half the time, a smaller and more modest role, a more engaged role, more embracing in his/her artistic responsibility as a maker.

P. 556
. . . imagine a small architectural firm of four architects . . . working together for a year [and together designing and completing] all the buildings, roads, gardens, on about 300 acres, and they must achieve this one a year, every single year of their working lives. This is a huge number . . .

P. 560
    In this vision, the craft of the architect — the forming of the environment in its beauty, in its majesty, in its humanity — is to be assisted by semiautonomous generative sequences that help millions of people to become creative.
. . . What is an architect to do? . . . Four words encompass an answer . . .

P. 546

. . . the MEADOW-MAKING PROCESS must call on the PARKING-LOT-MAKING PROCESS . . . because the creation of meadows in the areas of the urban fringe requires that the meadows be useful, hence that people drive to them sometimes, hence that a few cars can be placed modestly and quietly, without huge parking lots. . . . This is neither voluntary nor compulsory. It is simply a part of what it means to understand the MEADOW-MAKING PROCESS

. . . the unfolding creation of a human being in the embryo state must call on the LEG-MAKING SEQUENCE

. . . in arithmetic, the LONG DIVISION PROCESS must call on the MULTIPLICATION PROCESS or on the SUBTRACTION PROCESS

P. 545-546, "INTERDEPENDENCE OF SEQUENCES"
In order to make the system of living processes work best, what is necessary, above all, is that the linked processes actually are initiated when needed. How, then, can linkages be activated? . . . (Example given regarding arithmetic: certain mathematical processes call on others. Division sometimes calls upon multiplication) . . . in the act of making meadows, we must call on a sequence which teaches us how to make modest, hidden, cheap, yet workable parking lots.

// the "meadow-making process" does not define the "parking-lot making process", it merely calls upon it. each one is a gene. in order to be snippable, i.e. capable of being used by itself, it must define the positioning of its boundaries, it must have 'snip lines', it must be aware - and make its students aware - of where this gene relates to another gene. it must stop there, but with an open hand, not a dead end.

I worry myself about whether I would just be injecting my own bias into situations when I ask someone to see for themselves the deep feeling, but I also think a designer is nothing special; I have no exclusive claim to the ability to see past a bad reactive proposed (or demanded) solution to the deeper feeling. If I look at something like this as a designer (is that even the right word? I need a better word), do I involve the person making the complaint or do I carry on without them?

It is a more living world in which I can speak frankly to the person about what I think they really feel. Then that is what I must do.

However: it also depends on the context. If it is someone who doesn't really care, who has no reason to care, no investment in the process, then I do not need to involve them in the process. I just need to discuss with them their own feeling, not . . . the whole entire thing.

According to people's experience of what makes the world around them living. I think about this. Complaints about the world and how it works and people's place in the world . . . I look at these like a designer looking at playtesters' comments. It's not the specific complaints and certainly not the specific solutions that a person says they wish were applied . . . But what is the deep feeling of such complaints?

P. 545
. . . a system of processes . . . evolving gradually according to people's experience of what makes the world around them living . . . the environment can gradually be healed.

This next bit is about processes 'triggering' each other. A living house layout process may evoke a living street repair process, or describe its layout to a living neighbourhood.

I think of this as part of the process gene piecemeal strategy; the gene might be usable in the context of usual 'modern' processes but explicitly calls out better 'living' processes in order to hopefully have a cascading effect . . . It should, i think, do so in a way that is inviting rather than prescriptive. E.g. 'while building a house you may need a process for designing and making windows, one that does x and y and z, and would you look at that,  here's a good one that does all of those things. . .'

P. 542
. . . If my predictions are fulfilled, the PATTERNLANGUAGE.COM site will in the end be only one of many similar sites: all carrying evolving sequences. And we must hope that the movement and evolution of the sequences goes, by common public agreement, towards those which do sustain life.

How do people learn game design? What is game design?

"Where is the gene pool located? . . . The natural answer to this question for the 21st century is, of course, the Internet." (P. 541-542)

This website is very cute: www.patternlanguage.com

Process gene.

Alexander gives an example of a process gene. I'll summarize rather than quoting.

He ran an architecture + construction firm for a long time, the two parts together, but this is rather overwhelming for an architect to handle. It is a lot of responsibility.

However the snippable "process gene" which bridges the gap between isolated-architect and architect-and-construction unity is the idea of the architect taking responsibility over one small aspect of construction, say, window-making or tile-setting.

This brings more income to the architect themselves (or through them, this part is not clear to me - is the architect doing the window-making, the tile-laying, or are they simply working directly with the subcontractor responsible?), and the architect gets to be involved with the actual construction of the building rather than only sitting at a drafting table drawing which is "not so much fun."

Actually, I will quote his concluding statements.

P. 538
     As a result of injecting it into the normal process, daily life for architects, clients, and tile-setters, becomes more meaningful. And the buildings get better.
     The chance that this process gene will spread is quite considerable.