From doing to being: bringing emotion into interaction ªCogito, ergo sumºÐª I think, therefore I amº declared the seventeenth century philosopher Rene  Descartes. Descartes' experience of his thinking con®rmed his existence, but almost four centuries on we are today more inclined to the position that ªI feel, therefore I amº. In the ®rst Star Trek series, Dr Spock thought feelings were only a detriment to thinking, and as such found it hard to understand human behaviour. Why then has the study of Human±Computer Interaction (HCI) hardly evolved beyond a Dr Spock view of the universe, when feeling is so obviously central to our humanity? If Descartes had been an early pioneer in HCI, he may well have changed his dictum to ªI think, therefore this user interface is too hardº. While the real Descartes took thought as the proof of his existence, in most early HCI today it has been seen as potential evidence for usability problems! Interaction nirvana for many usability purists is attained by the transparency of effortless interaction, where problem solving and the attendant thought must be pared down to the absolute minimum (whatever that is). In this puritanical school of usability, we only interact to work and yet perversely we should not work to interact. If instrumental HCI had a Descartes style dictum, it would have to be ªI interact, therefore I doº. Why else would anyone interact with a computer, except as part of an honest day's work?
In many ways, instrumental HCI has succeeded and we indeed regularly interact with near minimal cognitive effort. With little thought to con®rm our existence in our increasing virtual digital world, how then do we know we exist as Descartes once did with certainty? Must the dictum of a digital Descartes be ªI interact, therefore I amº? If so, the question must be asked how we must interact in order to be, that is to be really human? Such a question replaces the assumption of technophobia with spiritual starvation ± the computer averse may well not be afraid of computers, but instead they may be starved of their humanity as they stare at the screen and press random pieces of plastic. What would it take to make interaction part of such people's lives rather than an alienating amputation?
Away from the puritan emphasis on ef®cient and effective interaction, people have always been touched by some aspects of computersÐfrom the teletype print outs of Snoopy in the 1970s to the empathic communities of the 1990s internet (Preece, 1999), and from the ®rst interactive computer games to the brand-intensive websites of the e-business revolution. The design of these computer artefacts aims as much at experience as at outcome. User experiences here can be fun, exciting, enthralling, thrilling, compelling, self-realising and a whole host of other emotional states. There always has