JellevanDijk.org

Weak Week.

As dull as the current winter in the Netherlands: this was the general feeling of the past week, in terms of my thesis progression: there was hardly any. I did have a chat with a statistics professor about what would be the right kind of analysis for my data. I guess I was dissapointing him a bit with my data-set: he said it was “all not very exciting”, and I would do fine with a Chi-square, and that I was worrying for no reason, and that I would find no trouble to sort it out for myself (read: I was telephoning him for no reason … and basically wasting his time :-). But he was really very nice, and he did give me precisely the answers that I needed. He also said: “Good to hear that you have returned to science, after all”. It sounded a bit like: “Good that you have found your way back to the church, my lost lamb”. I also emailed a few times with Hedderick, and old fellow student who made a swift career and is doing great in Groningen. This got me thinking about design-research again: I think I still need to find a good angle on how to convince people like Hedderick that what I am doing is a valuable contribution to standard empirical research (or perhaps I should’nt even try to convince them in the first place). But anyway, as far as my statistics go: I have to wait for my new laptop because I do not want to install stuff on this borrowed thing and the ICT services still haven’t returned my old Macbook. Anyhow, the data don’t look too good: some of the counts are exactly the same for both conditions (and that will never give me a significant result - this I could conclude without the help from my statistics teacher). Meanwhile I have been making a set-up for chapter two: Embodied Cognition Theory. I’ve started to integrate the basic explanation/review of the theory with discussions on design and interaction design. This way it will be more to the point and I think I have a good framing now of the theory that really builds up to the project work. In all, I think I am right in the middle of a faceless, boring and somewhat unsettling period signaling a difficult period where it will really get cold (which I heard will be next sunday…). Hanging in there till spring!!!

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Vandaag opgepikt via Petra, Project Wildeman. Tekst, klank, muziek, theater, vormgeving. Ik zie helaas geen optredens voor 2012 - maar help me herinneren dat ze bestaan als ze weer op tour gaan. De website is al cool: hij begint direct volledig in audio.

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Op de achtergrond luister ik naar een rapportage over hoe slecht de inspectie voor de gezondheidszorg functioneert. De politiek zal niet veel ondernemen, zo lijkt het. Het lijkt me heel simpel: we geven de *zorgverzekeraars* hiervoor fikse boetes. Moet je zien hoe snel de problemen opgelost zullen zijn. Dat is marktwerking in de zorg.

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Today I talked with Remko and Caroline about my chapter one. It was pretty positive in the sense that they weren’t angry or shouting or throwing things at me - in fact, we were having a lively and fun discussion about content. I do need to revise the chapter seriously, and in particular there are some issues I need to think about. Especially the beginning of the beginning: how to start this story? I had some good bits - but they don’t work the way I put them in right now. Maybe there’s even some darlings I should kill altogether. As it is, the beginning of the beginning is not good yet - but what do I want to say in the first paragraphs? Perhaps just leave it open for a bit - I can write that all the way at the end as well. Another issue was the ‘model’ I proposed of how my three stories hang together. I have a story to tell about cognitive theory, and one about design principles and one about creative group meeting practices. The picture I showed in phdlog01 suggests that theory is at the top and practice is at the bottom, as in a hierarchy. But I could also make it the leaves of a flower or circles in a Venn-diagram or visualize them left-to-right, and so on. I do not know. Each picture would implicitly present a different idea about how the three stories relate, and in the text so far I act as if they don’t necessarily relate in one particular way. But Caroline rightly offered that they do: the only question for me is to be clear about the way I think that they relate. Mostly though, in the background two other worries were creeping up in the back of my consciousness, that were not part of the discussion at all but started to dominate my thoughts later that day: 1) do I have enough of solid content to talk about and 2) do I have enough time to do all the things I still need to do? The first issue is worrying me since Caroline of course has not a very in depth insight into what I have been doing, because Kees supervised most of the project so far. Issue 2) is a hard one because at home I have no energy to keep on working at nights, due to the little guy that is asking a lot of attention lately. So for instance I could start to do something now - but I won’t, because I need to wash the dishes and sleep, as well.

O well, the only task for me is to ignore both 1) and 2) and keep on working on that thesis!

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A thought: tools, like hammers and such, used to be the things that a skilled craftsman would have in order to be the autonomous, respected, skilled craftsman he was. And the thing this craftsman could do, he could only do, and so this would put him in power with respect to the boss, or the customer, or the city council, etc.., since they needed the carpenter (and the other crafts). The tool was part of that power structure. But now, many tools (ICT tools, like e.g. Microsoft Outlook, but also an office desk or chair) are tools that are *used* by office workers but they function actually to put *other* people in power over those office workers. So the power relations have changed dramatically. Suddenly the tool you use in your work has become part of the system that puts you down, and makes you less autonomic. Of course this only goes for certain tools. Many very complex tools (programming languages, 3d studio max, and so on) still basically function as craftsman tools like the hammer did. But for the non-technical office worker, there is no tool anymore and basically no craft, and so no power.

Poor office worker. I think I am going to learn 3d studio max next.

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Yesterday I sent a draft of the first chapter to Caroline and Remko. I am actually very nervous about what they will say. Of course the whole text is terribly pretentious and over the top: like as if I’m pretending to be the new Lucy Suchman or something. On the other hand, there were some good bits in it that read well. The other problem is that it is not finished at all: some of the hard work (getting in the literature more robustly and completely, and with a good list of references that is APA) I need to do still. And the third problem is that I do not know whether I am taking the right approach at all. The beginning is very important, it sets the scene. But when you get sort of lost in trying to put all little bits of text together, sometimes a little bit of text that is particularly drawing attention and acting as if its very important starts to dominate the whole storyline. If you kick that one little obnoxious bit out - suddenly the text will have a whole now perspective to it, and that clears up the story tremendously. I have the feeling I still have to detect that one bit and kick it out, that it is still influencing the direction where it shouldn’t. We’ll see - at least I guess I have enough of structure to be able to discuss on monday.

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Some people you meet and they act immediately as if they are going to make a fast career. And Fabian is doing just that (making the career, not just acting like it, that is):

http://interaction12.ixda.org/speakers/fabian-hemmert/

http://www.ted.com/talks/fabian_hemmert_the_shape_shifting_future_of_the_mobile_phone.html?awesm=on.ted.com_9Czr&utm_campaign=fabian_hemmert_the_shape_shifting_future_of_the_mobile_phone&utm_content=ted.com-talkpage&utm_medium=on.ted.com-twitter&utm_source=interaction12.ixda.org

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Been typing in words on the keyboard whole day. My neck’s got the cramps. I am supposed to be writing a first chapter that is sort of complete and readable and finalized. Instead I’ve been writing the whole book - but in a vague and sketchy form that I do not want to send to anybody. What am I doing wrong? Thing is: I need to focus. And I am not focusing. Not focusing at all. The text itself grabs me and pulls me in 20 different directions at the same time. It makes me say things I cannot say since this is supposed to be science, not fiction! And I need to write up what I have done, not start all over again. Stop thinking, and start *reporting*. Stop thinking? I don’t want to stop thinking. My head keeps going. And the text as well. My head and the text, they are having so much fun! But together, they are not producing, they’re not delivering. Closing. Focus. Close the deal. If you don’t close - you’re not a good salesman. What movie was that? After this thing is finished, I will be a fiction writer. The freedom I will have, to be able to write just anything that comes to mind! I want to break free! I need to vacuum clean, by the way. The house is a mess. Hell, I do not want to write what I have proved, or what I have done - technically speaking I think I have proved absolutely nothing at all. And I can’t remember all those things that I did. I’m a man of the future, not the past! So what to write? What not to write?

Ok, enough of this drama and self-pity mister. Focus! - first chapter. Introduction. Introducing the important concepts. Background context. Problem statement. Research question. Outline for the thesis. How hard can it be? Deadline tomorrow.

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The year of the truth - as they say in the Netherlands, has started. From today until end of August, I will have to write a thesis. I have decided to keep a (b)log on my progress, in order to keep myself sharp and poised. At least one post a week, and if possible more: ideally a post after each day in the week that I really am writing. This is the first post, so I have to define a sort of zero-baseline here that describes the situation I’m in: It is the last day of the christmas holidays. I have been celebrating them for two whole weeks: put my hart and soul into it.

The old ghost of Peter Hagoort wispers in my ear: “two Whole Weeks of vacation?… And you think you can do a Phd with that many days off? You’re just not cut out to be a scientist, boy!” Ha! I’ll show him! (And then: O bother, isn’t it just stupid how those old wounds never really go away, and keep influencing your thoughts and feelings, even after all those years: let it go man, let it go!…)

Did some good writing yesterday evening by the way, so officially I’ve already been working. I’ve got 30-something pages already for the first chapter - but Caroline asked me to target on 40 pages - for the whole thesis! LOL. Anyway, I got the msg: weeding is what needs to be done, weed until the core and nothing but the core is what’s left of it. That being said, other than yesterday evening, most of the holiday time got spend on family, kids, and painting the hall and staircase. Joep told me, just before holidays, that I was looking tired, and that I should rest. So I did.Somewhere in the next few days I have to deliver the first chapter of the thesis. I see this chapter as a broad overview of the whole thesis, and also not as the final thing, the real ‘first chapter’, that is. I think the piece I am writing now is going to expand, finally, to become the whole thesis itself. This is a danger, of course, because I have to deliver soon - there was no set date, but the monday after next we’re discussing it, so I need to give Remko and Caroline some time to read. I hope they will be ok with me sending them something next tuesday evening, which will give me two whole days from now. I’ve decided not to show up at work too much tomorrow and tuesday - so I can skip the “Happy New Years” as much as possible. All these people will keep me of my task: I have to concentrate here! So, that’s about it as far as the baseline goes.

The one thing I am not sure of yet is whether I should say anything about the content of what I am writing at all in this process report… The danger is I will be re-writing the whole thing in this blog, and I do not want to spend time on writing in here, that could be spend on writing the damned thing (Ehr, I mean: the To-Be-Canonized Work) itself. For now, I’ll just give you two of the pictures that will go into chapter 1, just to give you some context…

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Mijn pamflet over een nieuwe op te richten partij lokte redelijk wat reacties uit op Sargasso.nl. Grappig ook om te zien dat een zijdelingse opmerking over het huwelijk wordt geintepreteerd alsof ik mijn scheiding aan het verwerken ben, LOL.Een flink aantal negatieve/kritische reacties. Ik schrik er niet meer zo van, want ik had al eerder meegemaakt hoe lekker negatief en bot mensen willen zijn op zo’n weblog. Vooral mijn verwijzing naar Robert Pirsig deed het bloed koken (en dat omdat hem verweten wordt een solipsist te zijn. Zucht).”O dear”, het is wel lastig voor mensen om goed en met aandacht te lezen. Nou ja, je kunt ook zeggen (en sommige reageerders zeggen dat) dat ik de boodschap niet goed kan overbrengen. Who is to blame? Ik sta er niet om bekend vage teksten te produceren: ja, ik sta er zelfs enigszins om bekend helder te kunnen formuleren! Was het zo’n vage tekst? Er komen wel moeilijke woorden in voor, en de zinnen zijn soms langer dan zeven woorden, dat is waar.Ach, ik geef de lezers deels de schuld, en ik wijt het aan het fenomeen  dat iedereen alsmaar een *mening* over alles wil hebben. Je leest een stuk, vooral zo’n openbaar blog, als iets om het mee ‘eens’ of ‘oneens’ te zijn. (Niet iedereen trouwens). En dan kom je een trefwoord tegen dat in jouw opinie in het ‘eens’ of ‘oneens’ vakje thuis hoort (bijv: ‘Robert Pirsig’) en hopla, er gaat een filter over je waarnemingsvermogen van heb ik jou daar. Ik doe dat ook vaak, dus ik heb zelf iets geleerd. Ik ga nog meer proberen om zoveel mogelijk alleen nog maar te willen *begrijpen* wat iemand zegt, en te doorgronden waarom hij/zij dat zegt.Een probleem dat ik nog wel heb is dat ik niet weet waar ik met het idee van humor en ironie naar toe moet. Ik houd erg van humor, maar ik ben nu redelijk humorloos bezig. Humor lijkt een beetje in strijd met ‘er helemaal voor gaan’ en ook tegenstrijdig met ‘open en ontvankelijk proberen te doorgronden wat de ander bedoelt’. Humor hoort juist een beetje bij ‘het allemaal niet zo serieus nemen’, ‘er afstand van houden’, ‘de ander voor gek zetten’ of ‘er de draak mee steken’.Hier ga ik nog eens over nadenken.

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