All course materials and assignments including excerpts from readings will be provided through Canvas. There is no standard textbook for this course but there is an extensive readings list (both mandatory and optional).
Recommended Background and Prerequisites
Students across FAS with an interest in any area of design are welcome. There is no formal prerequisite for this course, but if the course is oversubscribed preference will be given to upper-level undergraduate students who have taken an introductory course combining computation, design, or art (e.g., ES50/51, CS73, CS79) as well as students pursuing joint concentrations (e.g., computer science, history of art and architecture, engineering, cognitive science). Graduate students will be required to complete additional coursework.
Reading Material
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Shape: Talking about Seeing and Doing (2006), George Stiny
The Sciences of the Artificial. 3rd Edition (1996), Herbert A. Simon
Computation: finite and infinite machines (1967), Marvin L. Minsky
A History of Modern Computing, 2nd Edition (1998), Paul E. Ceruzzi
Structural information theory: the simplicity of visual form (2012), Emanuel L. J. Leeuwenberg and Peter A. van der Helm
Linear algebra and learning from data (2019), Gilbert Strang
Aesthetic measure (1933), George David Birkhoff
Transformations in Design: A Formal Approach to Stylistic Change and Innovation in the Visual Arts (1994), Terry Knight
Introduction to the theory of computation, 3rd Edition (2012), Michael Sipser
Architectural geometry (2007), Helmut Pottmann, Andreas Asperl, Michael Hofer, and Axel Kilian
Formal engineering design synthesis (2001), Erik K. Antonsson and Jonathan Cagan (Editors)
Logicomix: an epic search for truth (2008), Apostolos Doxiadis
Coleridge on Imagination (1960), I.A. Richards
The four pillars of geometry (2005), John Stillwell
Cognitive Psychology and Its Implications, 6th Edition (2004), John R. Anderson
The Design of Everyday Things (1988), Donald A. Norman
Aesthetics of the Familiar: Everyday Life and World-Making (2017), Yuriko Saito
Beyond price: value in culture, economics, and the arts. (2008), Michael Hutter and David Throsby
What Makes Things (2017), Derek Thompson
On Painting and Sculpture (1972), Leon B. Alberti
Ugliness and Judgment: On Architecture in the Public Eye (2019), Timothy Hyde
A Philosopher Looks at Architecture (2021), Paul Guyer
Algorithmic Aesthetics: Computer Models for Criticism and Design in the Arts (1978), George Stiny and James Gips
Shape of Imagination: Calculating in Coleridge’s Magical Realm (2022), George Stiny
Classical and Non-Classical Computation (1976), Terry Knight and George Stiny
Kindergarten Grammars: Designing with Froebel’s Building Gifts (2017), George Stiny
The Logic of Architecture: Design, Computation, and Cognition (1990), William J. Mitchell
Mathematics and Architecture Since 1960 (2002), Lionel March
Structure in Drawings and the Hidden-Surface Problem. (1973), Ivan Sutherland
Computing Machinery and Intelligence. (1950), Alan M. Turing
Problem-Solving Machines (1950), Allan Newell and Herbert Simon
Computer Science as Empirical Inquiry: Symbols and Search. (1976), Allan Newell and Herbert Simon
Steps Towards Artificial Intelligence (1960), Marvin Minsky
Artificial Intelligence, A Modern Approach, 4th Edition (2020), Stuart Russell and Peter Norvig,
Necessary Conditions of Learning (2014), Ference Marton
The Closed World: Computers and the Politics of Discourse in Cold War America (1996), Paul N. Edwards
The End of Programming (2023), Matt Welsh
Deep Learning (2016), Ian Goodfellow, Yoshua Bengio and Aaron Courville
What is ChatGPT Doing... and Why Does It Work? (2023), Stephen Wolfram
Engineering Knowledge: The Construction of Knowledge in Artificial Intelligence (1993), Diana E. Forsythe
Architectural Intelligence: How Designers and Architects Created the Digital Landscape (2017), Molly Wright Steenson
Machine Learning: Architecture in the Age of Artificial Intelligence (2022), Phil Bernstein
The Age of AI: And Our Human Future (2021), Henry Kissinger, Eric Schmidt and Daniel Huttenlocher
Builders of the vision: software and the imagination of design (2015), Daniel Cardoso Llach
Architectural Morphology: Introduction to the Geometry of Building Plans (1983), Philip Steadman
Building Types and Built Forms (2014), Philip Steadman
The Society of Mind (1986), Marvin Minsky
Theory and Design in the First Machine Age (1960), Reyner Banham
The Alphabet and Algorithm (2011), Mario Carpo
Notes on Synthesis of Form (1964), Christopher Alexander
Design by Optimization in Architecture, Building and Construction (1988), Anthony D. Radford and John S. Gero
The Geometry of Environment: An Introduction to Spatial Organization in Design (1971), Lionel March and Philip Steadman
