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Abstract:
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Teleology is "The doctrine that ends, final causes, or purposes are to be invoked as principles of explanation." A very general teleological statement might be that all things exist because they were designed for a purpose. There has long been disagreement about how or whether this could be true for natural objects, but it is fundamental to the idea of architecture. The design of buildings is architecture, and the materialization of forms based on purposes is design.
A key issue in teleological discussions is the distinction between function and purpose. Contrasted simply, function is an aspect of a thing's material nature; a matter of what it actually does or is physically capable of doing. Purpose, on the other hand, is an aspect of a thing's ideal form and the motive behind it; a matter of what it is supposed to do, something which, in any particular instance, it may or may not be physically capable of fulfilling. The consequences of these differences between function and purpose form the basis for the following discussion. |