In a chapter of Artificial Intelligence and Architecture: From Research to Practice, edited by Stanislas Chaillou, I argue that while recent developments in artificial intelligence threaten to dislodge some of our basic assumptions about the nature and purpose of computational design tools, creative designers ought to welcome the disruption.

This paper argues that prevailing approaches to CAD software have been fashioned to support modes of reasoning only of secondary importance to design activity, and that, due to some recent developments in computer vision, this state of affairs may be about to change. Surveying the current state of CAD tools, a critical position is developed based upon the best current understanding of the cognitive processes related to design.

In a chapter of the edited volume Paradigms in Computing, I present a framework for understanding a shift discernible in contemporary design culture. Here, I describe a shift from a nostalgic notion of direct authorship, understood as a compositional relationship between a designer and the product of his work, to a multiplicity of deferred authorships, wherein the stakeholders in the production of a design are mediated by systems of collaboration.

The nature of design tools is related to the social relationships they serve. This paper speculates on the emergence of a new professional configuration - the synthesis of architect and engineer - and on the nature of new computational tools and methods that will be required to support such a reconfiguration.