Does Form Really Follow Function?
by Joshua Porter | 16 Comments | shortlink: http://bokardo.com/p/589 In his book The Evolution of Useful Things, Henry Petroski challenges the widely-held notion that “form follows function”. Using the example of knives and forks vs. chopsticks, Petroski shows how the development of eating tools was as much the result of cultural and social issues as about the task itself. Investigating how Eastern and Western cultures have evolved completely different designs that do essentially the same task (conveying food to mouth), Petroski asserts that the difference is crucial. “Putting implements such as the common knife and fork and chopsticks into an evolutionary perspective, tentative as it necessarily must be, gives a new slant to the concept of their design, for they do not spring fully-formed from the mind of some maker but, rather, become shaped and reshaped through the (principally negative) experiences of their users within the social, cultural, and technological contexts in which they
