8 th International Conference on Architecture Research and Design (AR+DC) November 1-2, 2016 Ethics after theory CHAN Kok Hui, Jeffrey a* a Assistant Professor, Department of Architecture, School of Design and Environment, National University of Singapore, 4 Architecture Drive, Singapore 117566, Singapore *Corresponding author. Tel.: +65-6601-1643; fax: +65-6779-3078. E-mail address: akickhj@nus.edu.sg Abstract Today, architectural theory has atrophied. Despite a perceived need for different theoretical ways of clarifying, explaining and understanding the complex phenomena of contemporary architectural production prior to a designer’s intervention, there are few existing theoretical frameworks. Without either the descriptive or projective enablement by theory, conscientious and critical practices in architecture will have few alternatives against the tide of neoliberal city-making. In this paper, I make a pun of Speaks’s (Speaks, 2006) paper titled, ‘Intelligence after theory’ by arguing that while (design) intelligence is necessary, it is however not sufficient. Ethics is also needed in architecture. Through a brief restatement of a canonical debate in the critical school of architectural theory, I argue why ethics is needed in architecture, and how ethics could be further developed through theory and theorization. Keywords: ethics; contemporary architecture; architectural theory; design intelligence 1. Introduction: the many ‘uses’ of theory and the crisis of place Despite a somewhat protracted history and despite that all schools of architecture have courses with the word ‘theory’ in them, the nature of theory and what ‘architectural theory’ means remain far from clear (Lang, 1987). According to the Beaux-Arts tradition, architectural theory was once limited to the set of rules and principles guiding the architect’s design compositions (Lavin, 1990; Lucan, 2012). But since the nineteenth century and further spurred by the academization of architecture in the 20 th century (Speaks, 2006), definitions of ‘architectural theory’ have expanded. Today, architectural theory is taken to mean any kind of intellectual discourse outside the activity of design, which is at least likely to comprise of the histories of buildings (or theories), and criticism of these histories and theories (L. Martin, 2012). Conversely, every kind of ideas and concepts associated to architecture still seeking their place could also be categorized under ‘architectural theory’. This openness of architectural theory promises intellectual democracy and conceptual vitality; but at the same time, there is also something apprehensive about a theoretical reality that is constantly amorphous—especially for an important field of knowledge and practice like architecture. It is therefore unsurprising to find even theorists themselves uneager to defend architectural theory (Speaks, 2005, 2006), or perhaps discovering theory to be quite ‘dead’ (Hight, 2009). But has theory truly “fallen into desuetude” (Speaks, 2006)? Because theory is the intellectual terrain that underpins design practices (Taylor & Levine, 2011), the real question is not whether theory has become ‘disused’ or even ‘dead’, but instead, what theories are useful or relevant for contemporary architecture today? Without theory— defined here as knowledge that can foreground units of analysis and explain hypotheses in architecture—it is not possible to abstract, contextualize, understand or even predict any built forms and their impacts on the human experience. Importantly, theory also permits one to understand architecture in relation to some larger intellectual