Resilient Cities in a Changing World AMPS | City, University of London Page 29 based only on opinion or prejudice. Nevertheless, sensory appeals contribute to the reception of designed projects. Architect Lance Hosey has emphasized that appearance contributes to success and survival in both natural and in cultural setting.11 Landscape architect Elizabeth K. Myer has commented the lack of discussions about aesthetics within larger discussions of environmental design can undermine sustainability goals.12 Or, as art historian George Kluber has written the, 'merely useful things disappear more completely than meaningful and pleasurable things.'13 One author that provides a basis for thinking about aesthetics in this framework is Russel Ackoff, who was a scholar of business management. Writing on general problem solving, he identified four areas of knowledge and endeavor that provide a basis for human agency (and at an extreme, the pursuit of omnipotence to improve one's world).14 The first requisite concerns understandings of science to improve capabilities and capacities to act with efficiency. The requisite concerns political economy and an ability to access the resources needed to make change. The third requisite is ethical and moral to reduce conflict among competing factions. The fourth requisite is aesthetic and concerns the ability to imagine ever new possibilities for improvement. Ackoff's description of the last requisite is built on the role of the arts to inspire and on the shared use of the phrase, 'it's beautiful' to describe both great works and innovative solutions to problems.15 With regard to the topic of the present paper, the lesson from Ackoff is that considerations of aesthetics can be outwardly and collectively purposeful ideations for the future and not (only) inwardly and personally reflective examinations of the present or past. A second author that provides a basis for thinking about aesthetics in this framework is the philosopher Jacques Rancière. While he begins with the recognition that aesthetics concerns outward appearances, he continues his exploration in terms of politics.16 Central to both art and politics are logics and questions about how things in the world are shared and divided, distributed and re-distributed. That is, in this approach, art includes conventional works of art, but also extends to expressions of governance and the ways problems are assessed and addressed over time and space. For Rancière, a general regime of art combines 'modes of production of objects or the interrelation of actions; forms of visibility of these manners of making or doing; and the manners of conceptualizing or problematizing these manners of making or doing and these forms of visibility.'17 The interplay of the three factors creates a basis for what is conceivably possible to create and what is recognizable when presented. Kluber employs a relatable but different logic to understand evolution of artifacts, but both he and Rancière seem to recognize that a given present moment will have its own aesthetic potentials and limits. These guides are in effect until larger factor changes. Like Ackoff, Rancière positions aesthetics in relation to other activities. His emphasis on the political, though, foregrounds considerations on the various rights and responsibilities of different members or kinds of members in a polity to participate. In this light, aesthetic propositions or postures contribute to the ways, means, and ends envisioned to change existing conditions into preferred ones with respect to differences of groups within a society. Using the ides of Ackoff and Rancière to establish a provisional basis to consider aesthetics as contributing substantively (as opposed to only decoratively) to design (as opposed to art) compositions, the next part of this paper antifragility as a normative objective and the kinds of knowledge and interrelation of actions that might be taken to achieve it. ANTIFRAGILITY The term 'antifragility' was coined by Nicolas Nassim Taleb to describe systems that improve when exposed to volatility.18 As introductory examples, he distinguishes antifragile from fragile and robust systems based on the potential effects of uncertainty using characters from Greek mythology. Fragile systems, like Damocles under the sword, have great exposure to loss due to uncertainty and do not benefit from exposure to it. Robust systems, like the Phoenix that rises after death, resist harm from uncertainty, but have limited gains from it. Antifragile systems, like the Hydra, are systems that grow
