Response to "A Methodological Playground: Fictional Worlds and Thought Experiments"

Anthony Dunne and Fiona Raby’s discussion about fictional worlds and the plausibility enabled by design was an eye opening piece especially considering the circumstances we are living in right now. Recently, on social media there has been a tremendous amount of trailers and fictional movie videos about this year and all the insane moments that made it up…so far. All of them feel surreal to watch as it all seems so dystopian. There’s a particular channel on the social media platform, TikTok, on which the creator posts edits of a regular scene out of his window and then turns the camera to the same scene edited to be darker and dystopian-like. It is eerie to watch as it looks and feels so real.

I definitely resonated with the authors when they questioned how “speculations move from behind the screen or from the pages of a book to coexist in the same space as the viewer.” With the power of design and creativity, it has now become feasible to take our ideas from books and our imagination and literally bring it to life. I think designers need to be given more credit and not be in denial of the reality of their ideas. If there’s anything that our present has taught us, it is that innovation in any form is worthy and can become real, whether it be good or bad. I definitely believe that there are endless possibilities of fictional worlds, some which are yet to be constructed, many that have already been ideated and are one step away.