New Terrain in Interaction Design - Computers as Theatre - page 215

So in the case described previously, shortening the length of pheremone
evaporation radically changes the ability of the superorganism to succeed.
If we are to take advantage of the idea of simple rule sets, we can ex-
periment with changing one of the rules and see what happens. This mode
of development involves experimental design as we search for rule shifts that
are most likely to produce emergent behavior that is interesting and generative .
Emergent behavior happens in interactive media, from games to social net-
works. When it happens, we do well to observe it carefully. An example is
the affordance of the profi le picture allowed for the emergence of a visual
campaign in early 2013 on the day that the Supreme Court was to decide
whether to hear two important cases involving same-sex marriage. People
changed their profi le pictures to red backgrounds with pink or white “=”
signs in them to signify support for same-sex marriage. By the end of the
day, Facebook was plastered with these signs, creating positive reinforce-
ment by the group for a political stance with real-world implications. Two
days later, this “pheremone” trail was fading, but the use of the profi le pic-
ture for emergent collective behavior was established.
Design for the Good
As an actor, I had a personal ritual with Dionysian roots. Remembering that
the actors of ancient Greece had a sacred and civic duty, I tried to frame my
own work—comedy, tragedy, musical, or melodrama—in a similar way. Be-
fore I went onstage, I would say, may this work be for the Good. It didn't
matter whether I was playing Lady Macbeth or Little Mary Sunshine. I had
and have an ethical and spiritual relationship with the work.
One may glean from Aristotle's Ethics that happiness is virtue, and that
virtue is doing what needs to be done as well as you can. This is quite dif-
ferent from the hedonistic view associating happiness with pleasure. Hap-
piness in Aristotle's sense arises from the proper exercise of our best ethical
natures. The condition of our lives (e.g., security versus fear and depriva-
tion) can infl uence happiness, but it cannot eat away at the core of virtue.
In philosophy, another view holds sway with me as well. Rob Tow,
summarizing a section of Foucault's The Care of the Self (Foucault 1986
154-155), points out a key difference between Epicurean and Stoic philoso-
phies. It was held that Epicureans might marry, but that Stoics must marry,
in order to be fully present in the world. The important distinction here,
at least for me, is not about marriage, but about being in the world , present
with all of life's delights and challenges.