Thinking with visualizations

The best visualizations are not static images to be printed in books, but fluid, dynamic artifacts that respond to the need for a different view or for more detailed information. Visualization can be an interface to a simulation of a complex system; the visualization, combined with the simulation, can create a powerful cognitive augmentation. The visualization is a two-way interface, although highly asymmetric, with far higher bandwidth communication from the machine to the human than in the other direction. The high-bandwidth visualization channel is then used to deliver the results of modeling exercises and database searches. One way to approach the design of an information system is to consider the cost of knowledge. The result of this approach is a kind of cognitive information economics. Activities are analyzed according to the value of what is gained and the cost incurred. There are two kinds of costs: resource costs and opportunity costs. The chapter explores both of these and the economics of cognition and the cognitive cost of knowledge.