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The Phenomenon of Life: Nature of Order, Book 1: An Essay on the Art of Building and the Nature of the Universe (The Nature of Order) | 
 enlarge | Author: Christopher Alexander
Publisher: Center for Environmental Structure
Category: Book
Buy New: $75.00
New (7) Used (6) from $65.95
Rating:  14 reviews
Sales Rank: 82706
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 476
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2.8
Dimensions (in): 10.9 x 8 x 1.1
ISBN: 0972652914
Dewey Decimal Number: 720.1
EAN: 9780972652919
ASIN: 0972652914
Publication Date: September 1, 2004
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Product Description
What is happening when a place in the world has life? And what is happening when it does not? In Book 1 of this four-volume work, Alexander describes a scientific view of the world in which all space-matter has perceptible degrees of life, and sets this understanding of living structure as an intellectual basis for a new architecture. He identifies fifteen geometric properties which tend to accompany the presence of life in nature, and also in the buildings and cities we make. These properties are seen over and over in nature, and in cities and streets of the past, but have all but disappeared in the deadly developments and buildings of the last one hundred years. The book shows that living structure depends on features which make a close connection with the human self, and that only living structure has the capacity to support human well-being. The other three volumes of The Nature of Order continue this thesis with three complementary views giving a masterful prescription for the processes which allow us to generate living structure in the world. They show us what such a world must gradually come to look like, and describe the modified cosmology in which "life" as an essential quality, together with our inner connection to the world around us-towns, streets, buildings, and artifacts-are central to a proper understanding of the scientific nature of the universe. ". . . Five hundred years is a long time, and I don't expect many of the people I interview will be known in the year 2500. Christopher Alexander may be an exception."-David Creelman, author, interviewer and editor, HR Magazine, Toronto Christopher Alexander is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, architect, builder and author of many books and technical papers. He is the winner of the first medal for research ever awarded by the American Institute of Architects, and after 40 years of teaching is Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 9 more reviews...
Interesting Thesis September 7, 2008
I've read both of Alexander's "A Pattern Language" and "The Timeless Way of Being". "The Nature of Order" is similar. Alexander has spent a good part of his life developing a philosophy of aesthetics as it relates to structure. I am not an architect but I tend to deal with project design and many of the ideas he presents as applied to architecture can be applied in other areas as well. The notion of what constitutes "goodness" is universal.
I have posted his 15 principles on my filing cabinet and intend to give his arguments some thought before going ahead to the second book. It is interesting to consider that what we appreciate most, be it an inanimate object such as a rock or a piece of music, the layout of a building or the complexities of human relationship is the degree to which each exhibit "life". Alexander took years to come up with his categorizations and conclusions so it is natural that one should take a bit of time to digest what he says. I do hope the publisher keeps this series in print so that I can return to it later. (Judging by the # of comments on and sales rank of successive volumes 2-4 I sense a dwindling audience or at least cautious audience.)
I recommend this book to artists, architects, those interested in the philosophy of aesthetics, and designers of all kinds. Alexander's work is poetic and mystical and relies heavily on internal insights and so will not appeal to everyone, however I regard myself as fairly grounded in realism, spreadsheets and decision making and find his work worthy of consideration.
 Gordon L. Prescott come to life? September 25, 2006
4 out of 41 found this review helpful
Read 'The Fifteen Properties' excerpted in the 'First Nomination for Book of the Century' customer review, or any other excerpt, and then consider the words of Gordon L. Prescott from 'The Fountainhead':
"The flowing life which comes from the sense of order in chaos, or, if you prefer, from unity in diversity, as well as vice-versa, which is the realization of the contradiction inherent in architecture, is here absolutely absent. I am really trying to express myself as clearly as I can, but it is impossible to present a dialectic state by covering it up with an old fig leaf of logic just for the sake of the mentally lazy layman."
I wish I could give a 'no star' review, but amazon doesn't have that option.
 Some of these reviews are flawed December 3, 2005
9 out of 12 found this review helpful
Anne Broadbent's review below is completely unjustified. She writes "At the beginning of the first book, Alexander shows a beautiful pagoda - but I still think I wouldn't want to have one near me, in the guise of a shopping centre, school, house, gym, restaurant, bank or whatever: I'd rather see it in its original cultural setting." Alexander agrees completely with this point. His whole theory involves local adaptation following the fundamental properties and transformations that he has outlined in these books. Nowhere does he suggest that we should use the pagoda's form in any other cultural context. If you look at some of the examples he gives from nature you will understand this. He discusses the way sand dunes form following some of the fundamental properties. Does this mean he claims we should create sand dunes in the jungle? Of course not. Examples of buildings, places, and natural phenomena, are used as a means of displaying these fundamental properties and how these properties occur universally in phenomena which the majority of humans, and all other life forms would agree contain the quality of life. Throughout the series of books, Alexander provides hundreds of examples of human creations and natural creations to support his thesis. This may or may not be news to Miss Broadbent, but this is widely acknowledged as good scientific method.
 Dissapointing November 16, 2005
25 out of 40 found this review helpful
I very much enjoyed 'Pattern Language' and had great hopes for this series, however, after finishing book one, I am not sure I will invest in further volumes. I give the author credit for the time and effort spent in trying to develop his 'unified field theory' of good design, but unlike some of the common sense examples in Pattern language, this book moves to a level of metaphysical abstraction that seems to stretch the ideas past their breaking point. Not-Separateness? The Void? Though he makes a valiant effort, I just couldn't shake the fact that I was reading an after-the-fact justification of the authors pre-conceived tastes. Which essentially boil down to: old = good, new = bad.
Most off-putting also, were the scrawled, barely legible sketches that were meant to illustrate some of the principles. They are so poorly rendered as to be distracting and not very helpful to boot. I would expect more graphic sense from someone purporting to explain the universal secrets of good design. I really wanted to love this book, but I find it simply frustrating.
 The actual physical book is not up to the ideals of the content August 1, 2005
12 out of 36 found this review helpful
I haven't finshed reading the content of this book - this is more a comment on the delivery medium...
The 'hardcover' book more closely resembles a cardboard cover book. Mine is easily bent and permanently warped in multiple dimensions - makng it much more like your typical large paperback book than a $75 hardback book. It seems harder and harder for publishers to strike that balance between quantity and quality of pictorial content on the one hand, and quality and flashiness of the cover on the other.
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