Last night I started reading Julian Bleecker's "Design Fiction" essay in which he explores the relationship between design and science fiction. The essay draws upon Dourish and Bell's previous discussions in Resistance is Futile’: Reading Science Fiction Alongside Ubiquitous Computing. So being both involved in interaction design, and an avid science fiction reader/viewer these essays have prompted many thoughts. And more specifically because Bleecker's essay touches on some of Phillip K Dick's work - and it is PKDs novels that have been one of the main distractions through out my PhD.
Anyway, after reading both Bleecker's essay and Dourish and Bell's, I have had a vague feeling that something is missing - now maybe this something is to do with the fact that both works focused more on science fiction as represents in Film and TV, as opposed to literature. It is science fiction literature which I "consume" far more of - probably due to the dearth of good sci-fi on the screen and the wealth of great sci-fi literature.
It is interesting to consider the way Bleecker has discussed the relationship between science fiction and design in his essay, and specifically his ideas about the ways fact and fiction become tangled, "swap properties". This he discusses using Minority Report (the film) and specifically the gestural interface, as an example.
Some background, Minority Report the film was directed by Stephen Spielberg - which is an adaption of a Phillip K Dick short story called The Minority Report, which I believe was first published in 1956. Sadly PKD passed away before the screen adaption. Obviously the screen play involves a number of changes made to the original story, notably the protagonist is transformed from a middle aged balding man to a younger fitter character more suitable for drawing audiences, and sustaining a suspension of disbelief during action scenes. Despite this the central theme of the film remains relatively similar to that of the original, and the noir(ish) styling of the film is a cue to the vintage of the original story.
Anyway, Bleecker separates out the gestural interface used by the protagonist (Anderton) for discussion in the context of the relationship between fact and fiction. His discussion is informing, and clearly shows how fact and fiction become entangled, yet I am left feeling that there is something more to it then consideration of what amounts to an interaction style.
Despite his interest in the broader social context and not fetishizing the gadgets as things-in-themselves - Bleecker does not really spend much time talking about the system to which the technology in question is an interface to...
The gestural interface depicted in the film is part of a much larger system at the center of which are three humans with precognitive abilities i.e. they can apparent predict the future. It is the gestural interface that allows the protagonist to explore the recorded visions of the precogs.
Now the gestural interface - and the larger system to which it provides access to - actually plays an interesting role in the plot. In short, the system and hence interface are not neutral, the interface does not necessarily provide Anderton with a value neutral, 'truthful', representation of the visions of the precogs at the center of the system. In fact it is the design of the system that is integral to setting to plot in motion.
To understand this we need to go back to the story for a moment. Anderton works as a detective who fights crimes committed in the future, and which are foreseen by three people with precognitive abilities. The plot is set in motion when the system predicts Anderton will commit murder...
Now the plot spoiler is that the system has been designed such that the visions of only 2 of the 3 precogs need to agree for the visions to be named an accurate prediction of the future. The vision that does not agree is discarded, and not made available to the person using the gestural interface, this discarded vision is named a minority report. In Anderton's case this is what he suspects has occured - the data presented to him via the gestural interface is not the full story, so he has to kidnap a precog to gain access to the so called minority report.
In the original version of the story this is a little different - each precog sees a different future for Anderton, there is no agreement.. We will get back to the implications of this for design fiction in a moment.
In minority report we have the benefit of having two renderings of the story - one in text form by Dick, and a second in Film as discussed. In Dicks text version there are many difference, but the one I find interesting in this context is the way PKD described the interface. In the film we have a gestural interface that is very much represents contemporary interface design directions, and in the original text the interface is described as punch cards. (I have always wondered why in the film there was the need to pass media around on clear plastic cards?)
A historical note - PKD version of The Minority Report was published in 56, and punch cards, which had been used for data processing since the late 1800s, were till in use. However magnetic tape systems, and newer interfaces were being design and developed through the 50s. The major HCI landmark however is Ivan Sutherland's SketchPad in 63.
An interesting coincidence, is the story of the UNIVAC election prediction in 1952 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNIVAC
It is our ability to predict the future that is a central theme of both the original story and film remain the same. What is interesting is that the themes explored through both film and text remain the same, yet the technological backdrop and props used in the telling of the story are clearly entangled with technologies of the day, the mid 50s and early 2000s respectively..
On the surface the stories explore the question of determinism vs free-will. However, upon a closer reading we see that there is the presence of a paradox. That being, does the use of a system for predicting the future set that future in motion - one of the other PDK adaptions, Paycheck, explores this central paradox more overtly.
In Minority Report we can ask does the fact that the system presents a vision of Anderton murdering an unknown man actually bring about this event by setting in place the sequence of events that lead to death of this unknown man?
Now when we consider that the system for predicting the future contains a logic - which says that there only needs to be 2 of 3 visions agree for it to be a prediction of the future, we see that the system is designed to select (automatically presumably) between possible futures...
What is also of interest here is that while there is the assumption that the foreseen murder is determined, the purpose of prediction is to stop the foreseen murder - which suggests a (technologically) determined future for one of the actors yet a world of changeable futures of other actors.
In both the story and film there is actually multiple futures, and that fore knowledge of one future effects the unfolding of events, hence through design one future is secured / predetermined as 'true' and hence determines action in the present.
What Minority Report tells us is that foreknowledge of different futures can be used to manipulate present events, in Minority Report this is to the point where Anderton is almost enticed to murder. i.e. Anderton's path towards murder is set in train by the knowledge that he is going to commit a murder - which is not the only future.
The overlaying of a deterministic view of the future on top of system whose ability to change the future (i.e. stop a predicted murder from happening) is based in a multiplicity of possible futures, and raises questions for design fiction.
The power of design fictions (drawn from the discussion re science fiction) comes from the presence of a multiplicity of futures, but once we begin to crystallize our fictions - or mistake fictional futures for 'precognitive visions' - we find ourselves in the same position as Anderton, or worse Lamar Burgess.
Blade Runner - Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep provides another film adaption and PKD text to consider in relationship to (interaction / ubicomp) design...