I’ll begin by paraphrasing a classical Greek metaphysical challenge: “What generates the generator?”1 The philosopher’s question related to the origin or creation of the universe; in short, they wondered who moves the prime mover. Let’s interpret this as a modest question relevant to architecture for my purposes—how does someone generate or create something from nothing? This question lies at the core of the underlying inquiry that bubbles just below the design process’s surface—who is creating, and what is the nature of creating? The who refers to the agent or agents, and the what pertains to the generating or making, whether it’s an object or idea. Once, the query of “who is creating and how” simply concerned how an individual accomplished something; now, it is complicated by the many, both human and nonhuman, who collaborate on multiple tasks across various scales of interactions. I propose looking at the origins of the problem to unpack the question along various lines of inquiry.
