C.D.C BLOG WEEK 9: The Great PDT Debate 2021

Week 9 brought with it the annual pdt debate usually held on campus in class with our peers. This is something I was looking forward to and was very disappointed it couldn’t of been done in a class setting. While the online version was good fun it pales in comparison to what it could have been. Another token of frustration from a dreadful year in relation to online learning something I think cant be sustained.

I consider myself a very physical learner and having experience with public speaking from my time in transition year. During this time I was captain of one of the two school debating teams also being one of the primary public speakers for several projects one of which being the cycle against suicide campaign a cause which importance I understand personally. known for its slogan “its ok not to be ok” my involvement in such school campaign led me to speak in front of over four thousand people at the rds.

Back to the matter at hand we were set fourth to form 2v2 teams to debate on design topics. I found myself in the company of fellow UL student and friend manus merriman. Our topic “Form should follow Function: Aesthetics are not important in designed objects” our opposition Patrick Molloy and James Holloway also good friends of ours and formidable foes. Yet no match for the combined forces of myself and manus. I can only describe the following debate as a vicious massacre we took no prisoners and to put it frankly the class witnessed a murder that day.

I pride myself in my speaking ability and felt like I thrived during this exercise with our topic well researched and planned out we began the verbal sparring.

On the matter of form over function and weather aesthetics is importance on design I feel like its an often touched on and discussed topic in the design world one of spoken about before. We stripped design to its core . gun to your head finger on the trigger is aesthetics really important? No..

I touched on the situation that in the beginning of designing aesthetics weren’t considered as they weren’t a necessity a caveman wasn’t worried about the aesthetics of a animal skin used as clothing they just needed to stay warm. To compare this to fashion shows in current times with flamboyant clothing being paramount, you’re quick to realise the reality that aesthetics are not vital to the majority of product design . put yourself in the situation that you’re faced with a cold night in the wilderness and you’ve two jacket options a warm ugly insulated puffer jacket that will protect you from elements or a jacket that is more aesthetically pleasing yet not as efficient at protecting you, you’re choosing the warmer jacket every time because when you boil down to it form should always follow function I believe I expand on an aspect of this in our week 6 class in relation to building aesthetics.