Design

Design is a beautiful thing, it is so simple yet it can change so many things. It can make something feel a certain way, design has the power to make something appear to be very beautiful on the outside but end up being very dark and disturbing on the inside or it can work in the opposite way. The power that design has, lies in appearance and exhibition that can be produced to impact a certain desire or feeling of a consumer, fellow colleague, or any other inhabitant.

The very first thing you might think of when you hear design, might be a magazine, poster, or a rooms decor, but design isn't as simple as that. It could be a way that somebody organizes their actions or even the way that they present themselves. Adam Swaan, a writer for Forbes, suggests that " there’s a new, mass expectation of good design: that products and services will be better thought through, simplified, made more intuitive, elegant and more enjoyable to use." He is suggesting that we are turning to something that is designed in all aspects to provide answers for a question that we have, or to create a place that a consumer can look to that is a trustworthy place.

In order to have a feeling of trust, we look for patterns of organization. Forms of organization are brutally important to design because without organization, there would no longer be any resemblance or anything that unites a reoccurring concept together. Richard Branson, the founder of  the Virgin Group believes that this organization and development in design is key in promoting a business. He claims that "A well-designed space immediately says that you care about the details and that you want to contribute something fun and meaningful to your customers' lives -- it will help them to relax and talk about what they're looking for. " He suggests that something as simple as the way that a room is organized can completely change the overall feeling of a company, and the feelings of consumers.

We find design everywhere that we look, when we pick up our cell phones, log on to the internet, enter a classroom, or even make the decision to obey our justice system. Design isn't always based around a consumer, it is based on importance. If something is necessary, such as the laws that are DESIGNED to enforce respect among other people, it will be created in a fashion that promotes the overall goal. It might cause controversy, but the overall design is created for the benefit of the public. In 2012, the United Nations issued a statement saying that "human rights, the rule of law and democracy are interlinked and mutually reinforcing and that they belong to the universal and indivisible core values and principles of the United Nations". They are establishing a new standard of the promotion of democracy and the core values of government, the United Nations designed a new format to represent the people of the world.

Design can be as simple as a magazine though, over the course of the month, the Journalism 2 class that I am a part of have, has been looking at design throughout journalism and we have created our own designs. As an Editor for the Hoofprint, our school newspaper, I have continually learned ways to improve the designs that I have published.

      

The design above, was created in 50 Minutes in a challenge that we did as a class. I've tried the design previous times, but I think the format works for a story like this. 

The Generating Wins design was the first design that I have made that utilized 3D objects and such. There are a lot of things that I would like to change on the design, such as implementing the blue and green colors, and increasing font size for interesting details.

Everything has design because everything that is created has a purpose. Humans appreciate design and have learned to admire and despise the way that certain things are designed. The design of something has the capability to 'make or break' anything that it is involved in. Portraying the desired outlook of a concept has become so important because of the impact that design has on consumers. 

Choice

People have a desire to be in control of their lives. I think that as a species, we have this desire for control. We may desire to control people, personal actions, or simply a factor in our lives that impacts us. I think that when we cannot control an aspect of our lives, it feels like we have lost control. When we lose control, we look to blame some sort of a control: we look for people or things to blame. By saying that it was the fault of someone else, we can no longer say that it was in the control of ourselves.

 "The choices we think we are making, expressions of our freedom, are being made subconsciously, without our explicit control." 

The quote above was published by Marcelo Gleiser in a blog post published by NPR about the concept of The Fate of Free Will. He made this conclusion after observing the results of many scientific studies done regarding the decision making processes of the brain. The idea that the decisions that I make being out of my control makes me very scared of what could happen to our society if people buy into this scientific concept. If people begin to buy into this concept, they may begin to recognize that declared freedoms are being diminished by their own brain, I believe that people will think that the consequences of their decisions are inadequate. 

Philosophers all over believe that the choices that we make are the things that we latch to and take responsibility for. They also believe that anything that is done to stop us from a goal or from success (no matter how small or large), is generally presumed as something that is out of our control and something that is not our responsibility. Timothy O'Connor describes this in the Encyclopedia of Philosophy, he said that "The presence or absence of these conditions(external factors) and constraints are not (usually) our responsibility, it is plausible that the central loci of our responsibility are our choices."

If we lose the ability to make choices, we also lose the sense of control in our lives. In a study done by the University of Texas, Austin, researchers came to the realization that there is a predictable pattern of brain activity when we are faced with the opportunity to take a risk. Sarah Helfinstein, a postdoctoral researcher on this case sums their research up by suggesting that “We all have these desires [to take risks], but whether we act on them is a function of control.”

Whether the choices that we make are really being overturned by our brain activity or not, we must recognize the desires that we have and the choices that we make because of these desires. With new research being introduced about the brain, it is up to the general public to decide how we will react to this new information.