A new model of conceptual design based on Scientific Ontology and intentionality theory. Part II: The process model

To address the logical incoherence issue related to existing design models, this paper employs the conceptual foundation developed before to establish a new process model of conceptual design, i.e., the Need-Function-Principle-System model, which elaborates a conceptual design process with five major stages, i.e., clarification, synthesis, embodiment, analysis and prediction. The new process model can explain how a need in the intentional world is transformed into a function and then into an abstract principle in the semi-objective world, and finally into a model system in the objective world. The conceptual design of a hair-drying system is employed to demonstrate the developed design model. A discussion demonstrates that our process model of conceptual design is more logically coherent than existing design models.