最近幾年，由於「設計」這個學門受到社會各界的關注，使得目前台灣的各大學也設立了設計學的博士課程，但是對於設計博士教育的內容、規範以及其發展方向，仍然還有討論的空間。本文的目的是希望藉著對「設計」的反思與論述，引起大眾對「設計」本質的重視與討論。同時對於從事設計研究者而言，也應以「設計」的本質為基礎出發，對於設計研究題目與方法的構思，使研究成為能貢獻「設計」之有用的研究。本文主要內容雖然分成七節，但重點在於論述設計的本質與範疇，其中對於設計的定義、設計的價值以及詮釋等等的討論，都是為了使「本質」更為清楚，在「範疇」中，本文提出設計的範疇包括理論、技術、歷史、創作等四個面向，同時也提設計的本體是「創作」的看法。今後，有關「設計學」的研究，由於科技的革新以及社會多元的發展，將結合其他的領域，形成嶄新的學術領域。

Recently, since the discipline of “design” has received increasing attention from various fields in society, many universities in Taiwan have established Ph.D. course of Design Science. However,concerning the Design Ph.D. education’s content, standard and direction of development, that is still have some room for discussion.The objective of this paper intends to invoke the general public’s emphasis and discussion of “design” essence through the introspection and discourse of “design”. At the same time, the design researchers should also develop thinking on designing research topics and methodologies based on the essence of “design”, so that the research will become to useful studies and could be contribute to design field.The main body of the paper is divided into seven sections. However, the emphasis of this paper is focus on the essence and category of Design Science. In particular, the discussion of the definition,value and interpretation of Design Science is conducted to make the essence of “design” clearer.Moreover, the paper proposes the categories of Design Science including the four facets of theory, technique, history and creation, and the paper also proposes that the essence of design is “creation”. In the future, due to the revolution of technology and diverse social development, design-related studies will be combined with other fields to form new academic disciplines.