Idea mapping

In the context of design, 'idea' is understood as a basic element of thought that can be either visual, concrete or abstract. Although it may seem, at times difficult to characterise concreteness and abstractness in ideation, the abstract idea may roughly overlap with the concept of a mental or cognitive map, or just about any mental representation or model, while the visual idea may take on the sign of a visual map, and the concrete idea represented in material form (physical object or artefact). But whatever shape, form or matter the idea takes, ideation is a kind of purposeful wayfinding where the ideators orient themselves in space and time with the help of ideation tools, viz, words, drawings, modelling and computing to cover both physical and cognitive creative activities. Now, wayfinding, in physical space is increasingly facilitated by technology, for example, GPS, or satellite-based radio navigation. In a similar way, ideators can navigate creative space using transformative technologies, such as artificial intelligence for data mapping while maintaining direction and control. Such use of AI-powered data mapping tools may help idea generation and facilitate innovation. That is, idea mapping to enhance ideation and break new creative ground.

It's all in the mind?

Ever since Plato started telling stories about people trapped in caves, as a means of illustrating how reality is created by the mind, philosophers have pondered the relationship between the mind (consciousness) and reality (the world as we experience it). This is generally known as the mind-body problem. Designers may not be overly excited by the mind-body problem but it touches on ideation, as part of design thinking, in that it highlights the relation, or interaction between the idea (subjectivity and intentionality) and outcome in terms of physical properties (spatio-temporal objects). Moreover, design ideas seem to have causal powers, but they also possess the mysterious property of intentionality, that is, being about other thing. Or, as the dualist might see it, the idea is in the matter, or the material world (concrete or visual ideas) but also in the computational world (abstract ideas). Intriguingly, though, simple mathematical relationships may not just tell us something about the way designers think but also something about the world. The body-mind problem, then, from a designer perspective could be conceived as fitting ideas to reality while recognising that nature is independent of ideas.