Difference between revisions of "Holotopia"

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<p>But this, Engelbart observed, requires "new thinking": It requires that we use the technology to make our <em>systems</em> whole.</p>  
 
<p>But this, Engelbart observed, requires "new thinking": It requires that we use the technology to make our <em>systems</em> whole.</p>  
  
<p>[https://youtu.be/cRdRSWDefgw This three minute video clip], which we called "Doug Engelbart's Last Wish", will give us a chance to pause and reflect, and see what all this <em>practically</em> means. Think about the prospects of improving our institutional and civilizational <em>collective minds</em>. Imagine "the effects of getting 5% better", Engelbart commented with a smile. Then he put his fingers on his forehead and looked up: "I've always imagined that the potential was... large..."  The improvement that is both necessary and possible is not only large; it is <em>qualitative</em>—from a communication that doesn't work, to one that does.</p>  
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<p>[https://youtu.be/cRdRSWDefgw This three minute video clip], which we called "Doug Engelbart's Last Wish", will give us a chance to pause and reflect, and see what all this <em>practically</em> means. Think about the prospects of improving our institutional and civilizational <em>collective minds</em>. Imagine "the effects of getting 5% better", Engelbart commented with a smile. Then he put his fingers on his forehead and looked up: "I've always imagined that the potential was... large..."  The improvement that is both necessary and possible is not just stupendously large; it is <em>qualitative</em>—from communication that doesn't work, and <em>systems</em> that don't work, to ones that do.</p>  
  
<p>To Engelbart's dismay, our new "collective nervous system" ended up being used to only make the <em>old</em> processes and systems more efficient. The ones that evolved through the centuries of use of the printing press. The ones that <em>broadcast</em> information. </p>
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<p>To Engelbart's dismay, our new "collective nervous system" ended up being used to do no better than make the <em>old</em> processes and systems more efficient. The ones that evolved through the centuries of use of the printing press. The ones that <em>broadcast</em>, and overwhelm us with information.</p>
  
 
<p>  
 
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<p>Engelbart left us a simple and clear answer: [[bootstrapping|<em>Bootstrapping</em>]].</p>  
 
<p>Engelbart left us a simple and clear answer: [[bootstrapping|<em>Bootstrapping</em>]].</p>  
  
<p>His point was that only <em>writing</em> about what needs to be done would not have the intended effect (the tie between information and action having been broken). <em>Bootstrapping</em> means that we consider ourselves as <em>parts</em> in our <em>systems</em>; and that we <em>self-organize</em>, and <em>act</em> as it may best serve to restore them to <em>wholeness</em>.</p>
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<p>His point was that only <em>writing</em> about what needs to be done would not have the intended effect (the tie between information and action being broken). <em>Bootstrapping</em> means that we consider ourselves as <em>parts</em> in our <em>systems</em>; and that we <em>self-organize</em>, and <em>act</em> as it may best serve to restore them to <em>wholeness</em>.</p>
  
 
<blockquote><em>Bootstrapping</em> means that we either <em>create</em> new systems with the material of our own minds and bodies, or <em>help others</em> do that.</blockquote>  
 
<blockquote><em>Bootstrapping</em> means that we either <em>create</em> new systems with the material of our own minds and bodies, or <em>help others</em> do that.</blockquote>  
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<blockquote><b>Who</b>—what institution or <em>system</em>—will lead us through our unprecedentedly large creative challenges?</blockquote>   
 
<blockquote><b>Who</b>—what institution or <em>system</em>—will lead us through our unprecedentedly large creative challenges?</blockquote>   
  
<p>Both Erich Jantsch and Doug Engelbart believed "the university" would have to be the answer; and they made their appeals accordingly. But the universities ignored them—and also Vannevar Bush and Norbert Wiener before them, and others who followed. </p>  
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<p>Both Erich Jantsch and Doug Engelbart believed "the university" would have to be the answer; and they made their appeals accordingly. But the universities ignored them—as they ignored Vannevar Bush and Norbert Wiener before them, and others who followed. </p>  
  
 
<p>Why?</p>  
 
<p>Why?</p>  
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<blockquote>In the course of modernization, we made a <em>fundamental</em> error.</blockquote>   
 
<blockquote>In the course of modernization, we made a <em>fundamental</em> error.</blockquote>   
  
<p>From the traditional culture we have adopted a <em>myth</em> far more disruptive than the creation myth—that "truth" means "correspondence with reality"; and that the purpose of information, and of our pursuit of knowledge, is to "know reality objectively", as it truly is. </p>  
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<p>From the traditional culture we adopted a <em>myth</em> incomparably more disruptive of culture and its evolution than the creation myth—the belief that "truth" means "correspondence with reality"; and that the purpose of information, and of our pursuit of knowledge, is to "know reality objectively", as it truly is. </p>  
  
<p>This fundamental error was subsequently detected and reported, but not corrected. (We are once again witnessing that the link between information and action has been severed.) While we <em>federated</em> this all-important insight carefully, to be able to see it, it is sufficient to read Einstein (who in our <em>prototypes</em> has the role of the <em>icon</em> of "modern science"). </p>  
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<p>This fundamental error was subsequently detected and reported, but not corrected. (We are once again witnessing that the link between information and action has been severed.) While we <em>federated</em> this all-important insight carefully, to be able to reach it, one only needs to read Einstein (who in our <em>prototypes</em> has the role of the <em>icon</em> of "modern science"). </p>  
  
 
<p>  
 
<p>  
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<p><em>It is simply impossible</em>, Einstein remarked (while writing about "Evolution of Physics" with Leopold Infeld), to open up the 'mechanism of nature' and verify that our ideas and models <em>correspond</em> to the real thing!</p>
 
<p><em>It is simply impossible</em>, Einstein remarked (while writing about "Evolution of Physics" with Leopold Infeld), to open up the 'mechanism of nature' and verify that our ideas and models <em>correspond</em> to the real thing!</p>
  
<p>Results in the 20th century cognitive sciences and sociology support an entirely different view:</p>   
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<p>From the 20th century cognitive science and philosophy we learned to see "reality" in a completely new way:</p>   
  
<blockquote>The "reality" is not something we discover; it is something we <em>construct</em>. </blockquote>  
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<blockquote>"Reality" is not something we discover; it is something we <em>construct</em>. </blockquote>  
  
 
<p>This "social construction of reality"  played an essential role in the very 'mechanism' of the tradition.</p>  
 
<p>This "social construction of reality"  played an essential role in the very 'mechanism' of the tradition.</p>  
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<p>In the third [[vignette|<em>vignette</em>]], Antonio Damasio (a leading cognitive neuroscientist) completes this <em>thread</em> by explaining that we, humans, are <em>not</em> the rational decision makers the founding fathers of the Enlightenment made us believe we are. Damasio showed that each of us has an embodied cognitive filter, which determines what options we are able to rationally consider. This cognitive filter can be <em>programmed</em> through <em>socialization</em>.</p>  
 
<p>In the third [[vignette|<em>vignette</em>]], Antonio Damasio (a leading cognitive neuroscientist) completes this <em>thread</em> by explaining that we, humans, are <em>not</em> the rational decision makers the founding fathers of the Enlightenment made us believe we are. Damasio showed that each of us has an embodied cognitive filter, which determines what options we are able to rationally consider. This cognitive filter can be <em>programmed</em> through <em>socialization</em>.</p>  
  
<p>Damasio's insight allows us to understand why we civilized humans don't rationally consider taking off our clothes and walking into the street naked; <em>and</em> why we don't consider changing <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>.</p>  
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<p>Damasio's insight allows us to understand why we civilized humans don't rationally consider taking off our clothes and walking naked; <em>and</em> why we don't rationally consider changing <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>.</p>  
  
 
<p>The <em>socialized reality</em> insight adds substantial explanatory power to the <em>power structure</em> insight. We can now understand <em>why</em> we can be socialized to accept any societal order of things, however absurd and damaging it may be, as "the reality". </p>  
 
<p>The <em>socialized reality</em> insight adds substantial explanatory power to the <em>power structure</em> insight. We can now understand <em>why</em> we can be socialized to accept any societal order of things, however absurd and damaging it may be, as "the reality". </p>  
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<h3>Remedy</h3>  
 
<h3>Remedy</h3>  
  
<p>In the spirit of the <em>holoscope</em>, we render the above arguments as a metaphorical image, the Mirror <em>ideogram</em>—which expresses the essence of the <em>academic</em> situation we are in.</p>
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<p>In the spirit of the <em>holoscope</em>, we explain this proposal for a new academic direction with the help of a metaphorical image, the Mirror <em>ideogram</em>. This <em>ideogram</em> reflects the nature of the <em>academic</em> situation we are in—and points to a way in which this situation may need to be handled.</p>  
 
 
<p>As a metaphorical symbol and a <em>keyword</em>, the <em>mirror</em> invites us to stop and self-reflect—as Socrates reflected with his contemporaries, at the point of Academia's inception.</p>  
 
  
 
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<blockquote>The <em>mirror</em> invites us to stop and self-reflect.</blockquote>
  
<p>This self-reflection will readily lead to two insights.</p>  
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<p>What demands this self-reflection are two large changes in the determinants of our profession, which developed after its institutionalization took its present shape.</p>
 
+
<p>The first is a <em>fundamental</em> change, of our understanding of "language, truth and reality", which determined the notions of quality and rigor that underlie our work; and our very self-perception.</p>
<blockquote>We must abolish <em>reification</em>.</blockquote>  
+
<p>The second change is <em>pragmatic</em>—of the role we have in our society.</p>  
 
+
<p>Both changes are reflected by the <em>mirror</em> metaphor.  When we look at a mirror, we see ourselves <em>in the world</em>. We see that we are not <em>above</em> the world, looking at it "objectively". If earlier the state of the art of our <em>knowledge of knowledge</em> made it seem that to be "academic" we must adhere to the methods and interests of a traditional discipline—its <em>present</em> state of the art is  <em>liberating</em> us from the constraints of the disciplines. </p>  
<p>When we look at a mirror, we see ourselves <em>in the world</em>. We are not <em>above</em> the world, observing it "objectively". The disciplinary interests, methods and institutions are not something that objectively existed, which our predecessors only discovered. They <em>created</em> them—in certain historical circumstances. Hence it is academically legitimate to create new ones.</p>  
 
 
 
<blockquote>We must embrace <em>accountability</em>.</blockquote>  
 
  
<p>The world we see ourselves in, when we look at the <em>mirror</em>, is a world in dire need—for <em>new</em> ideas, new ways of thinking and being. By virtue of the role we have in that world, we are holding the key to its transformation.</p>
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<b>This text is being corrected and completed.</b>
 
 
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<p>Furthermore, the the world we see ourselves in, when we look at the <em>mirror</em>, is a world in dire need—for <em>new</em> ideas and new ways of thinking and being. When we look at the <em>mirror</em>, we see that we have a key role in that world, which we didn't have before. <em>We</em> are now holding the key to its transformation. </p>
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[[File:Whorf-insight.jpeg]]
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<p>With Whorf, we may acknowledge that we find ourselves in that new role "without intending to". We are in that role because we believed that the purpose of knowledge was to know the reality "objectively"; and because the successes of science in unraveling the secrets of nature convinced us that science, and not the Church and the tradition, was the way to such knowledge.</p> 
  
<p>We are then also compelled to ask:</p>  
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<p>We must ask:</p>  
  
<blockquote>How can we be accountable in our new social role, without sacrificing the academic rigor—which has been <em>the</em> distinguishing trait of our tradition?</blockquote>  
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<blockquote>How can we fulfill our new social role without sacrificing academic freedom and rigor—which have been <em>the</em> distinguishing traits of our profession?</blockquote>  
  
<p>The answer offers itself as an unexpected result of our metaphorical <em>self-reflection</em>:</p>
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<p>The answer—that we can do that by stepping <em>through</em> the <em>mirror</em>—is intended to convey that there is an unexpected, seemingly magical solution to this academic evolutionary entanglement. </p>  
  
<blockquote>We can walk right <em>through</em> the <em>mirror</em>!</blockquote>  
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<blockquote>By stepping <em>through</em> the <em>mirror</em>, we can <em>increase</em> freedom and rigor—<em>and</em> fulfill our new role!</blockquote>  
  
<p>This takes only two steps.</p>
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<p>What makes this possible is what Villard Van Orman Quine called "truth by convention"—which we adapted as one of our <em>keywords</em>.</p>   
 
 
<p>The first is to use what philosopher Villard Van Orman Quine called "truth by convention"—which we adapted as one of our <em>keywords</em>.</p>   
 
 
<p>
 
<p>
 
[[File:Quine–TbC.jpeg]]
 
[[File:Quine–TbC.jpeg]]
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<p>But if  <em>truth by convention</em> has been the way in which <em>the sciences</em> improve their logical foundations—why not use it to update the logical foundations of <em>knowledge work</em> at large?</p>  
 
<p>But if  <em>truth by convention</em> has been the way in which <em>the sciences</em> improve their logical foundations—why not use it to update the logical foundations of <em>knowledge work</em> at large?</p>  
  
<p>Having explored this direction, we can offer the following conclusion:</p>
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<p>As we are using this [[keyword|<em>keyword</em>]], the [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]] is the kind of truth that is common in mathematics: "Let <em>X</em> be <em>Y</em>. Then..." and the argument follows. Insisting that <em>X</em> "really is" <em>Y</em> is obviously meaningless. A  convention is valid only <em>within a given context</em>—which may be an article, or a theory, or a methodology.</p>
  
<blockquote><em>Truth by convention</em> is the new Archimedean point, by which we can once again empower knowledge to make a difference.</blockquote>
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<p>Based on evidence we organized and offered separately, we offer the following conclusion:</p>
  
<p>As we are using this [[keyword|<em>keyword</em>]], the [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]] is the kind of truth that is common in mathematics: "Let <em>X</em> be <em>Y</em>. Then..." and the argument follows. Insisting that <em>X</em> "really is" <em>Y</em> is obviously meaningless. A convention is valid only <em>within a given context</em>—which may be an article, or a theory, or a methodology.</p>
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<blockquote><em>Truth by convention</em> is the new Archimedean point, by which knowledge can once again be empowered to make a difference.</blockquote>   
  
<p>The second step is to use <em>truth by convention</em> to <em>define</em> an <em>epistemology</em>.</p>  
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<p>We used <em>truth by convention</em> to <em>define</em> a new and rigorous <em>foundation</em> for creating truth and meaning or <em>epistemology</em>.</p>  
  
<p>We defined [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]] by rendering the core of our proposal (to change the relationship we have with information—by considering it a human-made thing, and adapting information and the way we handle it to the functions that need to be served) as a convention.</p>
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<p>We defined [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]] by rendering the core of our proposal (to change the relationship we have with information—by considering it a human-made thing, and adapting information and the way we handle it to the functions that need to be served) as a convention.</p>   
 
 
<p>Notice that nothing has been changed in the traditional-academic scheme of things. The <em>academia</em> has only been <em>extended</em>; a new way of thinking and working has been added to it, for those who might want to engage in that new way. On the 'other side of the <em>mirror</em>', we see ourselves and what we do as (part of) the 'headlights' and the 'light'; and we self-organize, and act, and use our creativity freely-yet-responsibly, and create a variety of new methods and results—just as the founding father of science did, at the point of its inception. </p>   
 
  
 
<p>In the "Design Epistemology" research article (published in the special issue of the Information Journal titled "Information: Its Different Modes and Its Relation to Meaning", edited by Robert K. Logan) where we articulated this proposal, we made it clear that the <em>design epistemology</em> is only one of the many ways to manifest this approach. We drafted a parallel between the <em>modernization</em> of science that can result in this way and the emergence of modern art:  By defining an <em>epistemology</em> and a <em>methodology</em> by convention, we can do in the sciences as the artists did—when they liberated themselves from the demand to mirror reality, by using the techniques of Old Masters. </p>  
 
<p>In the "Design Epistemology" research article (published in the special issue of the Information Journal titled "Information: Its Different Modes and Its Relation to Meaning", edited by Robert K. Logan) where we articulated this proposal, we made it clear that the <em>design epistemology</em> is only one of the many ways to manifest this approach. We drafted a parallel between the <em>modernization</em> of science that can result in this way and the emergence of modern art:  By defining an <em>epistemology</em> and a <em>methodology</em> by convention, we can do in the sciences as the artists did—when they liberated themselves from the demand to mirror reality, by using the techniques of Old Masters. </p>  
  
<blockquote>As the artists did—we can become creative <em>in the very way in which we practice our profession.</em></blockquote>  
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<blockquote>As the modern artists, and also our forefathers who created the sciences—on the other side of the <em>mirror</em> we can be creative <em>in the very way in which we practice our profession.</em></blockquote>  
  
<p>To complete this proposal and make it concrete, we developed two <em>prototypes</em>: the <em>holoscope</em> models the <em>academic</em> reality on the other side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]]; the <em>holotopia</em> models the corresponding <em>social</em> reality.</p>  
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<p>Our main two <em>prototypes</em>, the <em>holoscope</em> and the <em>holotopia</em>, model the academic and the social reality on the other side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]].</p>  
  
<p>Let us illustrate these abstract ideas by brief and self-contained module, comprising an academically stated challenge, and two examples of its resolution—by using the techniques just described. Each of the examples includes both a concept definition <em>by convention</em>, and a <em>prototype</em> (of disciplinary or institutional re-definition) that was embedded and tested in academic practice, with encouraging results.</p>  
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<blockquote>Our call to action, to institutionalize and develop <em>knowledge federation</em> as an academic field and a real-life <em>praxis</em>, is a practical way to implement the changes that have become necessary. As an academic field, <em>knowledge federation</em> is conceived as the <em>academia</em>'s and the society's evolutionary organ; as a real-life <em>praxis</em>, it is the collective thinking we now need to develop.</blockquote>
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[[File:Jantsch-university.jpeg]]
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</p>
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<p>When making this call to action, we are not saying anything new; we are only echoing the call to action that <em>many</em> have made before us.</p>  
  
 +
<p>We, however, extend the action they were calling for to a fully developed academic <em>paradigm</em>—and hence establishing it firmly on the <em>academia</em>'s time-honored principles. And we also <em>operationalize</em> the action, by offering a fully developed institutional [[prototype|<em>prototype</em>]]—ready to be examined, improved and deployed.</p>
  
<p>The definition of <em>design</em> allowed us to capture the essence of our post-traditional cultural condition, and suggest how to adapt to it.</p>  
+
<p>Two concrete examples—our definitions of <em>design</em> and of <em>visual literacy</em>—will illustrate the immediate feasibility of the proposed approach. Each is an example of renewing the <em>foundation</em> of an already existing academic field, by abolishing <em>reification</em> of the existing practice and using <em>truth by convention</em> to point to a purpose. The fact that our proposals were welcomed by the target communities suggests that the implementation of this approach may not need to wait. </p>  
  
 
<p>We defined <em>design</em> as "alternative to <em>tradition</em>", where <em>design</em> and <em>tradition</em> are (by convention) two alternative ways to <em>wholeness</em>. <em>Tradition</em> relies on spontaneous, gradual, Darwinian-style evolution. Change is resisted, small changes are tried—and tested and assimilated through generations of use. We practice <em>design</em> when we consider ourselves <em>accountable</em> for <em>wholeness</em>. </p>  
 
<p>We defined <em>design</em> as "alternative to <em>tradition</em>", where <em>design</em> and <em>tradition</em> are (by convention) two alternative ways to <em>wholeness</em>. <em>Tradition</em> relies on spontaneous, gradual, Darwinian-style evolution. Change is resisted, small changes are tried—and tested and assimilated through generations of use. We practice <em>design</em> when we consider ourselves <em>accountable</em> for <em>wholeness</em>. </p>  
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<p>We showed the above <em>ideogram</em> as depicting a situation where two kinds of information—the <em>explicit information</em> with explicit, factual and verbal warning in a black-and-white rectangle, and the visual and "cool" rest—meet each other in a direct duel. The image shows that the <em>implicit information</em> wins "hands down" (or else this would not be a cigarette advertising). Our larger point was that while our legislation, ethical sensibilities and "official" culture at large are focused on <em>explicit information</em>, our culture is largely created through subtle <em>implicit information</em>. Hence we need a <em>literacy</em> to be able to decode those messages—and reverse the negative consequences of <em>reification</em>. </p>
 
<p>We showed the above <em>ideogram</em> as depicting a situation where two kinds of information—the <em>explicit information</em> with explicit, factual and verbal warning in a black-and-white rectangle, and the visual and "cool" rest—meet each other in a direct duel. The image shows that the <em>implicit information</em> wins "hands down" (or else this would not be a cigarette advertising). Our larger point was that while our legislation, ethical sensibilities and "official" culture at large are focused on <em>explicit information</em>, our culture is largely created through subtle <em>implicit information</em>. Hence we need a <em>literacy</em> to be able to decode those messages—and reverse the negative consequences of <em>reification</em>. </p>
 
<p>Lida Cochran, the only surviving IVLA founder, found that this definition expressed and served the founders' original intention.</p>   
 
<p>Lida Cochran, the only surviving IVLA founder, found that this definition expressed and served the founders' original intention.</p>   
 
  
 
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<div class="col-md-7"><h3><em>Scope</em></h3>
 
<div class="col-md-7"><h3><em>Scope</em></h3>
  
<p>We have just seen that the academic tradition—instituted as the modern university—finds itself in a much larger and more central social role than it was originally conceived for. We look up to the <em>academia</em>, and not to the Church and the tradition, for an answer to <em>the</em> pivotal question:</p>  
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<p>We have just seen that the academic tradition—instituted as the modern university—finds itself in a much larger and more central social role than it was originally conceived for. We look up to the <em>academia</em>, and not to the Church and the tradition, for answers to <em>the</em> pivotal question:</p>  
  
 
<blockquote><b>How</b> should we look at the world, to be able to comprehend and handle it?</blockquote>  
 
<blockquote><b>How</b> should we look at the world, to be able to comprehend and handle it?</blockquote>  
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<p>Of course, countess books and articles have been written about this theme since antiquity. But in spite of that—or should we say <em>because</em> of that—no consensus has emerged.</p>  
 
<p>Of course, countess books and articles have been written about this theme since antiquity. But in spite of that—or should we say <em>because</em> of that—no consensus has emerged.</p>  
  
<p>The way we the people look at the world, try to comprehend and handle it, shaped itself spontaneously—from scraps of science that were most visible around the middle of the 19th century, when Darwin and Newton as cultural heroes replaced Adam and Moses. What is today popularly considered as the "scientific worldview" took shape then—and remained largely unchanged.</p>
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<p>Since nobody felt accountable for supplying it, the way we the people look at the world, try to comprehend and handle it, shaped itself spontaneously—from odds and ends of science as they appeared to the public around the middle of the 19th century, when Darwin and Newton as cultural heroes were replacing Adam and Moses. What is today popularly considered as the "scientific worldview" took shape then—and remained largely unchanged.</p>
  
<p>As members of the <em>homo sapiens</em> species, this worldview would make us believe, we have the evolutionary privilege to be able to comprehend the world in causal terms, and to make rational choices accordingly. Give us a correct model of the world, and we'll know exactly how to satisfy our needs (which we can experience directly). But the traditional cultures got it all wrong: Not knowing how the nature works, they put a "ghost in the machine", and made us pray to him to give us what we needed. Science corrected this error—and now we can satisfy our needs by manipulating the mechanisms of nature directly, with the help of technology. </p>
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<p>As members of the <em>homo sapiens</em> species, this worldview would make us believe, we have the evolutionary privilege to be able to comprehend the world in causal terms, and to make rational choices accordingly. Give us a correct model of the world, and we'll know exactly how to satisfy our needs (which we also know, because we can experience them directly). But the traditional cultures got it all wrong: Not knowing how the nature works, they put a "ghost in the machine", and made us pray to him to give us what we needed. Science corrected this error—and now we can satisfy our needs by manipulating the mechanisms of nature directly, with the help of technology. </p>
  
 
<p>It is this causal or "scientific" understanding of the world that made us modern. Isn't that how we understood that women cannot fly on broomsticks?</p>  
 
<p>It is this causal or "scientific" understanding of the world that made us modern. Isn't that how we understood that women cannot fly on broomsticks?</p>  
Line 595: Line 590:
 
<p>The mechanistic way of looking at the world that Newton and his contemporaries developed in physics, which around the 19th century shaped the worldview of the masses, was later disproved and disowned by modern science. Research in physics showed that even the <em>physical</em> phenomena exhibit the <em>kinds of</em> interdependence that cannot be understood in "classical" or causal terms.</p>  
 
<p>The mechanistic way of looking at the world that Newton and his contemporaries developed in physics, which around the 19th century shaped the worldview of the masses, was later disproved and disowned by modern science. Research in physics showed that even the <em>physical</em> phenomena exhibit the <em>kinds of</em> interdependence that cannot be understood in "classical" or causal terms.</p>  
  
<p>In "Physics and Philosophy", Werner Heisenberg, one of the progenitors of this research, described how "the narrow and rigid" way of looking at the world that our ancestors adapted from the 19th century science was damaging to culture—and in particular to its parts on on which the "human quality" depended, such as ethics and religion. And how as a result the "instrumental" thinking and values, which Bauman called "adiaphorized", became prominent. Heisenberg believed that the dissolution of that "rigid and narrow frame" would be <em>the</em> most valuable gift of his field to humanity. </p>
+
<p>In "Physics and Philosophy", Werner Heisenberg, one of the progenitors of this research, described how "the narrow and rigid" way of looking at the world that our ancestors adapted from the 19th century science damaged culture—and in particular its parts on on which the "human quality" depended, such as ethics and religion. And how as a result the "instrumental" or (as Bauman called them) "adiaphorized" thinking and values became prominent. Heisenberg believed that the dissolution of that "rigid and narrow frame" would be <em>the</em> most valuable gift of modern physics to humanity. </p>
  
<p>In 2005, Hans-Peter Dürr (considered as Heisenberg's scientific "heir") co-wrote the Potsdam Manifesto, whose title and message is "We need to learn to think in a new way". The proposed new thinking is similar to the one that leads to <em>holotopia</em>: "The materialistic-mechanistic worldview of classical physics, with its rigid ideas and reductive way of thinking, became the supposedly scientifically legitimated ideology for vast areas of scientific and political-strategic thinking. (...) We need to reach a fundamentally new way of thinking and a more comprehensive under­standing of our <em>Wirklichkeit</em>, in which we, too, see ourselves as a thread in the fabric of life, without sacrificing anything of our special human qualities. This makes it possible to recognize hu­manity in fundamental commonality with the rest of nature (...)"</p>  
+
<p>In 2005, Hans-Peter Dürr (considered as Heisenberg's scientific "heir") co-wrote the Potsdam Manifesto, whose subtitle and message read "We need to learn to think in a new way". The proposed new thinking is similar to the one that leads to <em>holotopia</em>: "The materialistic-mechanistic worldview of classical physics, with its rigid ideas and reductive way of thinking, became the supposedly scientifically legitimated ideology for vast areas of scientific and political-strategic thinking. (...) We need to reach a fundamentally new way of thinking and a more comprehensive under­standing of our <em>Wirklichkeit</em>, in which we, too, see ourselves as a thread in the fabric of life, without sacrificing anything of our special human qualities. This makes it possible to recognize hu­manity in fundamental commonality with the rest of nature (...)"</p>  
  
 
<blockquote>The second reason is that even complex mechanisms ("classical" nonlinear dynamic systems) cannot be understood in causal terms.</blockquote>
 
<blockquote>The second reason is that even complex mechanisms ("classical" nonlinear dynamic systems) cannot be understood in causal terms.</blockquote>
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[[File:MC-Bateson-vision.jpeg]]
 
[[File:MC-Bateson-vision.jpeg]]
 
</p>
 
</p>
<p>It has been said that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Research in the systems sciences, one of which is cybernetics, explained this <em>scientifically</em>: The "hell" (which you may imagine as global issues, or the 'destination' toward which our 'bus' is diagnosed to be headed) tends to be a "side effect" of our best efforts and "solutions", reaching us through "nonlinearities" and "feedback loops" in the natural and social systems we are trying to manipulate. </p>  
+
<p>It has been said that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Research in the systems sciences, one of which is cybernetics, explained this <em>scientifically</em>: The "hell" (which you may imagine as global issues, or the 'destination' toward which our 'bus' is diagnosed to be headed) tends to be a "side effect" of our best efforts and "solutions", reaching us through "nonlinearities" and "feedback loops" in the natural and social systems we are trying to comprehend and manipulate. </p>  
 
<p>
 
<p>
 
[https://youtu.be/nXQraugWbjQ?t=57 Hear Mary Catherine Bateson] (cultural anthropologist and cybernetician, daughter of Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson who pioneered both fields) say:
 
[https://youtu.be/nXQraugWbjQ?t=57 Hear Mary Catherine Bateson] (cultural anthropologist and cybernetician, daughter of Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson who pioneered both fields) say:
Line 616: Line 611:
 
<blockquote><em>Truth by convention</em> allows us to explicitly <em>define</em> and academically <em>develop</em> new ways to look at the world.</blockquote>  
 
<blockquote><em>Truth by convention</em> allows us to explicitly <em>define</em> and academically <em>develop</em> new ways to look at the world.</blockquote>  
  
<p>We called the result a <em>methodology</em>, and our <em>prototype</em> the Polyscopic Modeling <em>methodology</em> or [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]]. </p>  
+
<p>We called the result a <em>methodology</em>, and our <em>prototype</em> the Polyscopic Modeling <em>methodology</em> or [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]]. </p>
 +
 
 +
<blockquote><em>Polyscopy</em> is a <em>general-purpose methodology</em>; it provides methods for creating insights about any chosen theme—on any level of generality.</blockquote> 
  
 
<p>A <em>methodology</em> is in essence a toolkit; anything that does the job would do. We, however, defined <em>polyscopy</em> by turning state of the art <em>epistemological</em> insights into conventions.</p>  
 
<p>A <em>methodology</em> is in essence a toolkit; anything that does the job would do. We, however, defined <em>polyscopy</em> by turning state of the art <em>epistemological</em> insights into conventions.</p>  
  
<blockquote>By creating a <em>methodology</em>, the severed link between fundamental scientific insights and the popular worldview can be restored.</blockquote>  
+
<blockquote>In this way, the severed link between fundamental scientific insights and the way we the people look at the world is restored.</blockquote>  
  
 
<p>The <em>polyscopy</em> definition comprises eight aphorismic postulates; by using [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]], each of them is given an interpretation.</p>  
 
<p>The <em>polyscopy</em> definition comprises eight aphorismic postulates; by using [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]], each of them is given an interpretation.</p>  
  
<p>The first postulate defines <em>information</em> as "recorded experience". It is thereby made explicit that the substance communicated by information is not "reality", but human experience. Since human experience can be recorded in a variety of ways (a chair is a record of experience related to sitting and chair making), the notion of <em>information</em> is extended well beyond written documents. The first postulate enables <em>knowledge federation</em> across cultural traditions and fields of interests; the barriers of language and method are bridged by reducing all that is of relevance to human experience, as 'common denominator'. </p>  
+
<p>The first postulate defines <em>information</em> as "recorded experience". It is thereby made explicit that the substance communicated by information is not "reality", but human experience. Since human experience can be recorded in a variety of ways (a chair is a record of experience related to sitting and chair making), the notion of <em>information</em> is extended well beyond written documents. The first postulate enables <em>knowledge federation</em> across cultural traditions and fields of interests; the barriers of language and method are removed by reducing all cultural artifacts to human experience—their 'common denominator'. </p>  
  
<p>The second postulate is that the [[scope|<em>scope</em>]] (the way we look) determines the <em>view</em> (what is seen). In <em>polyscopy</em> the experience (or "reality" or whatever is "behind" experience) is not assumed to have an a priori structure. We <em>attribute</em> to it a structure with the help of the concepts and other elements of our <em>scope</em>. This postulate enables us to create new ways of looking, and to make the basic approach of science generally applicable—as prototyped by the <em>holoscope</em>. </p>  
+
<p>The second postulate is that the [[scope|<em>scope</em>]] (the way we look) determines the <em>view</em> (what is seen). In <em>polyscopy</em> the experience (or "reality" or whatever is "behind" experience) is not assumed to have an a priori structure. We <em>attribute</em> to it a structure with the help of the concepts and other elements of our <em>scope</em>. This postulate enables us to create new ways of looking, and to extend the approach of science to questions of practical interest.</p>  
  
<p><em>Polyscopy</em> did not talk about knowledge. We may now improvise this new axiom:</p>  
+
<p><em>Polyscopy</em> did not talk about knowledge. We do that by adding the ninth <em>postulate</em>:</p>  
  
 
<blockquote><em>Knowledge</em> must be <em>federated</em>.</blockquote>  
 
<blockquote><em>Knowledge</em> must be <em>federated</em>.</blockquote>  
  
<p>This only states the intuitive or common-sense idea of "knowledge": If we should be able to say that we "know" something, we must <em>federate</em> not only supporting evidence, but also potential counter-evidence—and hence <em>information</em> in general. Academic peer reviews implement that principle in science; but this <em>federation</em> tends to be restricted to a discipline. An analogy with constitutional democracy also comes to mind—where even a hated criminal has the right for a fair trial. Like a dutiful attorney, <em>knowledge federation</em> does its best to gather suitable evidence, and back each <em>federated</em> insight with a convincing case.</p>  
+
<p>To be able to say that we "know" something, we must <em>federate</em> not only supporting evidence, but also potential counter-evidence—and hence <em>information</em> at large. Like a dutiful attorney, <em>knowledge federation</em> does its best to gather suitable evidence, and back each potentially relevant "experience" with a convincing case.</p>  
  
<p>A <em>methodology</em> allows us to state explicitly what information needs to be like; and what being "informed" means. We modeled this intuitive notion with the keyword [[gestalt|<em>gestalt</em>]]. To be "informed", one needs to have a <em>gestalt</em> that is appropriate to one's situation. "Our house is on fire" is a canonical example. The knowledge of <em>gestalt</em> is profoundly different from only knowing the data (such as the room temperatures and the CO2 levels.). To have an appropriate <em>gestalt</em> means to be moved to do the action that a situation is calling for.</p>  
+
<p>The <em>methodology</em> definition allows us to state explicitly what being "informed" means. We modeled this intuitive notion with the keyword [[gestalt|<em>gestalt</em>]]. To be "informed", one needs to have a <em>gestalt</em> that is appropriate to one's situation. "Our house is on fire" is a canonical example. The knowledge of <em>gestalt</em> is profoundly different from only knowing the data (such as the room temperatures and the CO2 levels.). To have an appropriate <em>gestalt</em> means to be moved to do the action that one's situation is calling for.</p>  
  
<blockquote>Can we be uninformed—in spite of all the information we have?</blockquote>  
+
<blockquote>The definition of <em>gestalt</em> allows us to see that we can be uninformed, in spite of all the information we have.</blockquote>  
  
<p>"One cannot not communicate", reads one of Paul Watzlawick's axioms of communication. Even when everything in a news report is <em>factually</em> correct, the <em>gestalt</em> it conveys <em>implicitly</em> can be profoundly deceptive—because we are told what Donald Trump has said, and not Aurelio Peccei.</p>  
+
<p>"One cannot not communicate", reads one of Paul Watzlawick's axioms of communication. Even when everything in a news report is <em>factually</em> correct, the <em>gestalt</em> it conveys <em>implicitly</em> can be <em>in</em>appropriate—because we are only told what Donald Trump has said, and not Aurelio Peccei.</p>  
  
 
<p><em>Polyscopy</em> offers a collection of techniques for communicating and 'proving' or <em>justifying</em> general or <em>high-level</em> insights and claims. <em>Knowledge federation</em> is conceived as the social process by which such insights can be created and maintained. To create the <em>methodology</em>, we <em>federated</em> methodological insights from a variety of fields:</p>  
 
<p><em>Polyscopy</em> offers a collection of techniques for communicating and 'proving' or <em>justifying</em> general or <em>high-level</em> insights and claims. <em>Knowledge federation</em> is conceived as the social process by which such insights can be created and maintained. To create the <em>methodology</em>, we <em>federated</em> methodological insights from a variety of fields:</p>  
 
<ul>  
 
<ul>  
<li>[[pattern|<em>Patterns</em>]] have a closely similar function as mathematics does in traditional sciences—and at the same time completely generalize the implementation of this function</li>  
+
<li>[[pattern|<em>Patterns</em>]] have a similar role as mathematical functions do in traditional sciences—and completely generalize its range of application</li>  
 
<li>[[ideogram|<em>Ideograms</em>]] allow us to include the expressive power and the insights and techniques from art, advertising and communication design</li>  
 
<li>[[ideogram|<em>Ideograms</em>]] allow us to include the expressive power and the insights and techniques from art, advertising and communication design</li>  
 
<li>[[vignette|<em>Vignettes</em>]] implement the basic technique from media informing, where an insight or issue is made accessible by telling illustrative and engaging or "sticky"  real-life people and situation stories</li>  
 
<li>[[vignette|<em>Vignettes</em>]] implement the basic technique from media informing, where an insight or issue is made accessible by telling illustrative and engaging or "sticky"  real-life people and situation stories</li>  
<li>[[thread|<em>Threads</em>]] implement Vannevar Bush's technical idea of "trails" as a way to combine specific ideas into higher-level units of meaning</li>  
+
<li>[[thread|<em>Threads</em>]] implement Vannevar Bush's technical idea of "trails", and provide a way to combine specific ideas into higher-level units of meaning</li>  
 
</ul>  
 
</ul>  
  
  
<p>We conclude by telling a [[vignette|<em>vignette</em>]]—which will illustrate some of the further nuances of this <em>methodological</em> approach to information and knowledge.</p>  
+
<p>We conclude by telling a [[vignette|<em>vignette</em>]]—which will illustrate some of the nuances of the <em>methodological</em> approach to knowledge.</p>  
  
<p>A situation with overtones of a crisis, closely similar to the one we now have in our handling of information at large, arose in the early days of computer programming. The buddying industry undertook ambitious software projects—which resulted in thousands of lines of "spaghetti code", which nobody was able to 'detangle' (understand and correct). The solution was conceived as "computer programming methodology"; [https://holoscope.info/2019/02/07/knowledge-federation-dot-org/#InformationHolon the longer story] is interesting, but we only highlight a couple of lessons learned from the "object oriented methodology", developed in the 1960s by Ole-Johan Dahl and Krysten Nygaard.</p>
+
<p>To see the practical relevance of what we are about to say, imagine a highly talented young person, let's call him Pierre Bourdieu to be concrete, about to become a researcher. The <em>academia</em> will give Bourdieu a certain document template to render his results (traditional books and articles, with their formatting rules etc.), which he'll be using throughout his career. The "usability" or the <em>usefulness</em> of Bourdieu's life work will largely depend on that template—and it will not be in his power to change it.</p>  
  
 +
<blockquote>Could the way in which we render research results—and hence the usability and <em>usefulness</em> of those results—be substantially improved?</blockquote>
  
<blockquote>The designers of a computer programming language made themselves accountable for the "usability" of the results, and developed a methodology.</blockquote>  
+
<p>We introduce our answer to this question by this <em>vignette</em>.</p>  
  
<p>Any sufficiently complete programming language, even the "machine language" of the computer, will allow the programmers to create <em>any</em> application program. The creators of the object oriented methodology, however, took it upon themselves to provide the programmers the kind of programming tools that would enable them, or even <em>compel</em> them, to write comprehensible, reusable and well-structured code. </p>  
+
<p>A situation with overtones of a crisis, closely similar to the one we now have in our handling of information at large, arose in the early days of computer programming. The buddying computer industry undertook ambitious software projects—which resulted in thousands of lines of "spaghetti code", which no-one could understand and correct.</p>
 +
 
 +
<p>The solution was found in creating "computer programming methodology". [https://holoscope.info/2019/02/07/knowledge-federation-dot-org/#InformationHolon The longer story] is interesting, but we here only highlight a couple of insights that we <em>federated</em> from the "object oriented methodology", developed in the 1960s by Ole-Johan Dahl and Krysten Nygaard.</p>
 +
 
 +
 
 +
<blockquote>The designers of computer programming methodologies made themselves accountable for the "usability" of programs.</blockquote>
 +
 
 +
<p>Any sufficiently complete programming language will allow the programmers to create <em>any</em> application program. The creators of the object oriented methodology, however, took it upon themselves to provide the programmers the kind of programming tools that would enable them, or even <em>compel</em> them, to write comprehensible, reusable and well-structured code. </p>  
  
 
<p>  
 
<p>  
Line 666: Line 671:
 
<p>The object oriented methodology provided a structuring template called "object"—which "hides implementation and exports function". What this means is that an object can be "plugged into" more general objects based on the functions it produces—without the burden of the details of its code. </p>  
 
<p>The object oriented methodology provided a structuring template called "object"—which "hides implementation and exports function". What this means is that an object can be "plugged into" more general objects based on the functions it produces—without the burden of the details of its code. </p>  
  
<p>We have seen, in <em>socialized reality</em>, that the <em>academia</em> too needs to consider itself accountable for the tools and processes by which information and knowledge are handled—<em>both</em> for the ones used by academic researchers, <em>and</em> for the ones used by people at large. To see what those two lessons learned may mean practically, Imagine a highly talented young person, let's call him Pierre Bourdieu to be concrete, about to become a researcher. The <em>academia</em> will give Bourdieu a certain way to render his results, which he'll be using throughout his career. The "usability", comprehensibility and in a word—the <em>usefulness</em> of Bourdieu's life work will largely depend on the format in which he'll render his results. This format, however, will not be in his power to change, and it is unlikely that even Bourdieu would even think about doing that.</p>
+
<p>We have seen, in <em>socialized reality</em>, that the <em>academia</em> needs to consider itself accountable for the tools and processes by which information and knowledge are handled—<em>both</em> by academic researchers, <em>and</em> by people at large. </p>  
 
 
<p>Bourdieu is, of course, only a drop in the ocean.</p>  
 
  
 
</div> </div>  
 
</div> </div>  
Line 677: Line 680:
  
  
<p>The solution for structuring information we devised in <em>polyscopy</em> is called <em>information holon</em>. An <em>information holon</em> is closely similar to the "object" in object oriented methodology. Information, represented in the Information <em>ideogram</em> as an "i", is depicted as a circle on top of a square. The circle represents the point of it all ('the cup has a crack'); the square represents the details, the side views. </p>  
+
<p>The solution for structuring information we devised in <em>polyscopy</em> is called <em>information holon</em>. An <em>information holon</em> is closely similar to the "object" in object oriented methodology. Information, represented as the "i" in the Information <em>ideogram</em>, is depicted as a circle on top of a square. The circle represents the point of it all ('the cup is broken'); the square represents the details and the side views. </p>  
  
<p>When the <em>circle</em>  is a general insight or a <em>gestalt</em>, it allows that insight to be integrated or "exported" as a "fact" into <em>higher-level</em> insights (while the contributing insights and data remain "hidden" in the <em>square</em>). When the <em>circle</em> is a <em>prototype</em>, the multiplicity of insights that comprise the <em>square</em> are given direct <em>systemic</em> impact, and hence agency.</p>  
+
<p>When the <em>circle</em>  is a general insight or a <em>gestalt</em>, the details that comprise the <em>square</em> are given the power to influence our awareness of issues, and the way in which we handle them. When the <em>circle</em> is a <em>prototype</em>, the multiplicity of insights that comprise the <em>square</em> are given direct <em>systemic</em> impact, and hence agency.</p>  
 
</div> <div class="col-md-3">
 
</div> <div class="col-md-3">
 
[[File:Information.jpg]]<br>
 
[[File:Information.jpg]]<br>
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<div class="col-md-7">  
 
<div class="col-md-7">  
  
<p>The Holotopia <em>prototype</em> may now be understood as the <em>circle</em> by which our <em>knowledge federation</em> proposal is being <em>federated</em>. The <em>holotopia</em> vision is hereby not only described—but also turned into a collaborative strategy game, whose goal is to "change course".</p>  
+
<p>The Holotopia <em>prototype</em> may now be understood as the <em>circle</em> by which our <em>knowledge federation</em> proposal is being <em>federated</em>. </p>  
  
<p>A <em>prototype</em> <em>polyscopic</em> book manuscript titled "<em>Information</em> Must Be <em>Designed</em>" is structured as an <em>information holon</em>. Here the claim made in the title (which is the same we made in the opening of this presentation by talking about the bus with candle headlights) is <em>justified</em> in four chapters of the book—each of which presents a specific angle of looking at it. The book's four chapters present four <em>aspects</em> of our handling of information; they identify anomalies and propose remedies—which are the <em>design patterns</em> of the proposed <em>methodology</em>. </p>  
+
<p>A <em>prototype</em> <em>polyscopic</em> book manuscript titled "<em>Information</em> Must Be <em>Designed</em>" is structured as an <em>information holon</em>. Here the claim made in the title (which is the same we made in the opening of this presentation by talking about the bus with candle headlights) is <em>justified</em> in the four chapters of the book. The book's chapters represent four <em>aspects</em> of our handling of information. Each points to anomalies, and completes them to <em>design patterns</em> by proposing solutions. </p>  
  
<p>It is customary in programming language design to showcase the language by creating its first compiler in the language itself. In this book we described the <em>paradigm</em> that is modeled by <em>polyscopy</em>,  and then used <em>polyscopy</em> to make a case for that <em>paradigm</em>.</p>  
+
<p>It is customary in programming language design to showcase the language by creating its first compiler in the language itself. In this book we described the <em>paradigm</em> that is modeled by <em>polyscopy</em>,  and used <em>polyscopy</em> to make a case for that <em>paradigm</em>.</p>  
  
<p>The book's [http://folk.uio.no/dino/IDBook/Introduction.pdf introduction] is available online. What we (at the time this manuscript was written) branded <em>information design</em>, has subsequently been completed and rebranded as <em>knowledge federation</em>. </p>  
+
<p>The book's [http://folk.uio.no/dino/IDBook/Introduction.pdf introduction] is available online. (This document, long with multiple others, has just been removed by the university's technical support; we are working on restoring it.) What we at the time this manuscript was written branded <em>information design</em>, has subsequently been completed and rebranded as <em>knowledge federation</em>. </p>  
  
 
</div> </div>  
 
</div> </div>  
 
  
 
<div class="row">
 
<div class="row">
Line 712: Line 714:
 
<p>We approach this theme also from another angle: Suppose we developed the <em>praxis</em> of <em>federating</em> information—and used it to combine <em>all</em> relevant heritage and insights, from sciences, world traditions, therapy schools... </p>  
 
<p>We approach this theme also from another angle: Suppose we developed the <em>praxis</em> of <em>federating</em> information—and used it to combine <em>all</em> relevant heritage and insights, from sciences, world traditions, therapy schools... </p>  
  
<blockquote>Suppose we used <em>real</em> information to guide our choices, not advertising. What changes would develop? What difference would they make?</blockquote>  
+
<blockquote>If <em>federated</em> information, and used it instead of advertising to guide our choices, and to develop a culture—what changes would develop? What difference would that make?</blockquote>  
  
 
<p>The Renaissance replaced the original sin and the eternal reward as preoccupations, by happiness and beauty here and now.</p>  
 
<p>The Renaissance replaced the original sin and the eternal reward as preoccupations, by happiness and beauty here and now.</p>  
Line 720: Line 722:
 
<h3>Diagnosis</h3>  
 
<h3>Diagnosis</h3>  
  
<blockquote>In the course of <em>modernization</em> we made a <em>cardinal</em> error—by elevating <em>convenience</em> (what <em>feels</em> attractive or pleasant) to the status of our cardinal value.</blockquote>  
+
<blockquote>In the course of <em>modernization</em> we made a <em>cardinal</em> error—by adopting <em>convenience</em> as our cardinal value.</blockquote>  
  
<p>This error can easily be understood if we consider that we've been looking at the world through the <em>narrow frame</em>—which elevated (direct) causality to the status of our chosen ("scientific") way to create truth and meaning. <em>Convenience</em> indeed <em>appears</em> to make us happy—and we take it for granted that it indeed does. </p>  
+
<p>This error can easily be understood if we consider that we've adopted direct causality as our chosen way to truth and meaning. The value of <em>convenience</em> (favoring what <em>feels</em> attractive or pleasant) then readily follows as a consequence, and may even appear as a real-life adaptation of the scientific experiment. </p>  
  
<p>The value of <em>convenience</em> is endlessly reinforced by advertising.</p>  
+
<p><em>Convenience</em> now orients even our choice of—information!</p>  
  
<p>We let <em>convenience</em> orient even our choice of—information!</p>  
+
</div> </div>
  
<p>The consequences are sweeping.</p>
+
<!-- XXX
 
 
<p>When <em>convenience</em> is the criterion by which we measure life quality, <em>the systems in which we live and work</em> easily appear as the best possible ones. We lose interest in "cultural revival", and "human quality". We believe that we can simply <em>feel</em> what we want—and that the rest is <em>a practical matter</em> of getting it.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>When we recognize that <em>convenience</em> is a deceptive value—we are compelled to acknowledge that we have no reliable basis for deciding what our goals should be.</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p>A cultural frontier opens up—where <em>real</em> information is created and used for making choices. </p>
 
 
 
</div> </div>
 
  
 
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<h3>Remedy</h3>  
 
<h3>Remedy</h3>  
  
<p>We point to the remedy by the Convenience Paradox <em>ideogram</em>. Like all of us, the person in the picture wants his life to be convenient. But he made a wise choice: Instead of simply following the direction downwards, which <em>feels</em> easier, he paused to reflect whether this direction leads to a more convenient <em>condition</em>. </p>  
+
<p>We point to the remedy by the Convenience Paradox <em>ideogram</em>. Like most of us, the person in the picture wants his life to be pleasant and easy. But he made a wise choice: Instead of simply following the direction downwards, which <em>feels</em> easier, he paused to reflect whether this direction leads to a more convenient <em>condition</em>. </p>  
  
 
<blockquote>It doesn't.</blockquote>  
 
<blockquote>It doesn't.</blockquote>  
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</div> </div>  
 
</div> </div>  
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 +
 +
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<p>The handling of each of the anomalies, we have shown, <em>requires</em> the specific choices or <em>design patterns</em> that our <em>prototype</em>, which forms the substance of our proposal, embodies.</p>  
 
<p>The handling of each of the anomalies, we have shown, <em>requires</em> the specific choices or <em>design patterns</em> that our <em>prototype</em>, which forms the substance of our proposal, embodies.</p>  
  
<p>We can now offer the following conclusion.</p>
+
xxxx
 
 
 
 
<blockquote>Our call to action, to institutionalize and develop <em>knowledge federation</em> as an academic field and a real-life <em>praxis</em>, is a practical way to implement the changes that have become necessary. As an academic field, <em>knowledge federation</em> is conceived as the <em>academia</em>'s and the society's evolutionary organ; as a real-life <em>praxis</em>, it is the collective thinking we now need to develop.</blockquote>
 
<p>
 
[[File:Jantsch-university.jpeg]]
 
</p>
 
<p>When making this call to action, we are not saying anything new; we are only echoing the call to action that <em>many</em> have made before us.</p>
 
  
<p>We, however, also <em>federate</em> that call to action, by organizing together a broad variety of insights that motivate it; and we <em>operationalize</em> the action, by evolving [[prototype|<em>prototypes</em>]].</p>
 
  
  

Revision as of 14:10, 26 September 2020

Imagine...

You are about to board a bus for a long night ride, when you notice the flickering streaks of light emanating from two wax candles, placed where the headlights of the bus are expected to be. Candles? As headlights?

Of course, the idea of candles as headlights is absurd. So why propose it?

Because on a much larger scale this absurdity has become reality.

The Modernity ideogram renders the essence of our contemporary situation by depicting our society as an accelerating bus without a steering wheel, and the way we look at the world, try to comprehend and handle it as guided by a pair of candle headlights.

Modernity.jpg Modernity ideogram

Our proposal

The core of our knowledge federation proposal is to change the relationship we have with information.

What is our relationship with information presently like?

Here is how Neil Postman described it:

"The tie between information and action has been severed. Information is now a commodity that can be bought and sold, or used as a form of entertainment, or worn like a garment to enhance one's status. It comes indiscriminately, directed at no one in particular, disconnected from usefulness; we are glutted with information, drowning in information, have no control over it, don't know what to do with it."

Postman.jpg
Neil Postman

What would information and our handling of information be like, if we treated them as we treat other human-made things—if we adapted them to the purposes that need to be served?

By what methods, what social processes, and by whom would information be created? What new information formats would emerge, and supplement or replace the traditional books and articles? How would information technology be adapted and applied? What would public informing be like? And academic communication, and education?

The substance of our proposal is a complete prototype of knowledge federation, where initial answers to relevant questions are proposed, and in part implemented in practice.
Our call to action is to institutionalize and develop knowledge federation as an academic field, and a real-life praxis (informed practice).
Our purpose is to restore agency to information, and power to knowledge.

All elements in our proposal are deliberately left unfinished, rendered as a collection of prototypes. Think of them as composing a 'cardboard model of a city', and a 'construction site'. By sharing them we are not making a case for a specific 'city'—but for 'architecture' as an academic field, and a real-life praxis.


A proof of concept application

The Club of Rome's assessment of the situation we are in, provided us with a benchmark challenge for putting the proposed ideas to a test.

Four decades ago—based on a decade of this global think tank's research into the future prospects of mankind, in a book titled "One Hundred Pages for the Future"—Aurelio Peccei issued the following call to action:

"It is absolutely essential to find a way to change course."


Peccei also specified what needed to be done to "change course":

"The future will either be an inspired product of a great cultural revival, or there will be no future."

Peccei.jpg
Aurelio Peccei

This conclusion, that we are in a state of crisis that has cultural roots and must be handled accordingly, Peccei shared with a number of twentieth century thinkers. Arne Næss, Norway's esteemed philosopher, reached it on different grounds, and called it "deep ecology". In what follows we shall assume that this conclusion has been federated—and focus on the more interesting questions, such as how to "change course"; and in what ways may the new course be different.

In "Human Quality", Peccei explained his call to action:

"Let me recapitulate what seems to me the crucial question at this point of the human venture. Man has acquired such decisive power that his future depends essentially on how he will use it. However, the business of human life has become so complicated that he is culturally unprepared even to understand his new position clearly. As a consequence, his current predicament is not only worsening but, with the accelerated tempo of events, may become decidedly catastrophic in a not too distant future. The downward trend of human fortunes can be countered and reversed only by the advent of a new humanism essentially based on and aiming at man’s cultural development, that is, a substantial improvement in human quality throughout the world."

The Club of Rome insisted that lasting solutions would not be found by focusing on specific problems, but by transforming the condition from which they all stem, which they called "problematique".

Could the change of 'headlights' we are proposing be "a way to change course"?


A vision

Holotopia is a vision of a possible future that emerges when proper 'light' has been 'turned on'.

Since Thomas More coined this term and described the first utopia, a number of visions of an ideal but non-existing social and cultural order of things have been proposed. In view of adverse and contrasting realities, the word "utopia" acquired the negative meaning of an unrealizable fancy.

As the optimism regarding our future waned, apocalyptic or "dystopian" visions became common. The "protopias" emerged as a compromise, where the focus is on smaller but practically realizable improvements.

The holotopia is different in spirit from them all. It is a more attractive vision of the future than what the common utopias offered—whose authors either lacked the information to see what was possible, or lived in the times when the resources we have did not yet exist. And yet the holotopia is readily attainable—because we already have the information and other resources that are needed for its fulfillment.

The holotopia vision is made concrete in terms of five insights, as explained below.


A principle

What do we need to do to "change course" toward holotopia?

The five insights point to a simple principle or rule of thumb—making things whole.

This principle is suggested by the holotopia's very name. And also by the Modernity ideogram. Instead of reifying our institutions and professions, and merely acting in them competitively to improve "our own" situation or condition, we consider ourselves and what we do as functional elements in a larger system of systems; and we self-organize, and act, as it may best suit the wholeness of it all.

Imagine if academic and other knowledge-workers collaborated to serve and develop planetary wholeness – what magnitude of benefits would result!

A method

"The arguments posed in the preceding pages", Peccei summarized in One Hundred Pages for the Future, "point out several things, of which one of the most important is that our generations seem to have lost the sense of the whole."

To be able to make things wholewe must be able to see things whole!

To highlight that the knowledge federation methodology described and implemented in the proposed prototype affords that very capability, to see things whole, in the context of the holotopia we refer to it by the pseudonym holoscope.

While the characteristics of the holoscope—the design choices or design patterns, how they follow from published insights and why they are necessary for 'illuminating the way'—will become obvious in the course of this presentation, one of them must be made clear from the start.


Holoscope.jpeg
Holoscope ideogram

To see things whole, we must look at all sides.

The holoscope distinguishes itself by allowing for multiple ways of looking at a theme or issue, which are called scopes. The scopes and the resulting views have similar meaning and role as projections do in technical drawing. The views that show the entire whole from a certain angle are called aspects.

This modernization of our handling of information—distinguished by purposeful, free and informed creation of the ways in which we look at a theme or issue—has become necessary in our situation, suggests the bus with candle headlights. But it also presents a challenge to the reader—to bear in mind that the resulting views are not "reality pictures", contending for that status with one other and with our conventional ones.

In the holoscope, the legitimacy and the peaceful coexistence of multiple ways to look at a theme is axiomatic.

To liberate our worldview from the inherited concepts and methods and allow for deliberate choice of scopes, we used the scientific method as venture point—and modified it by taking recourse to insights reached in 20th century science and philosophy.

Science gave us new ways to look at the world: The telescope and the microscope enabled us to see the things that are too distant or too small to be seen by the naked eye, and our vision expanded beyond bounds. But science had the tendency to keep us focused on things that were either too distant or too small to be relevant—compared to all those large things or issues nearby, which now demand our attention. The holoscope is conceived as a way to look at the world that helps us see any chosen thing or theme as a whole—from all sides; and in proportion.

A way of looking or scope—which reveals a structural problem, and helps us reach a correct assessment of an object of study or situation—is a new kind of result that is made possible by (the general-purpose science that is modeled by) the holoscope.

We will continue to use the conventional way of speaking and say that something is as stated, that X is Y—although it would be more accurate to say that X can or needs to be perceived (also) as Y. The views we offer are accompanied by an invitation to genuinely try to look at the theme at hand in a certain specific way (to use the offered scopes); and to do that collaboratively, in a dialog.


Scope


What is wrong with our present "course"? In what ways does it need to be changed? What benefits will result?

FiveInsights.JPG
Five Insights ideogram

We apply the holoscope and illuminate five pivotal themes, which determine the "course":

  • Innovation—the way we use our ability to create, and induce change
  • Communication—the social process, enabled by technology, by which information is handled
  • Epistemology—the fundamental assumptions we use to create truth and meaning; or "the relationship we have with information"
  • Method—the way in which truth and meaning are constructed in everyday life, or "the way we look at the world, try to comprehend and handle it"
  • Values—the way we "pursue happiness", which in the modern society directly determines the course

In each case, we see a structural defect, which led to perceived problems. We demonstrate practical ways, partly implemented as prototypes, in which those structural defects can be remedied. We see that their removal naturally leads to improvements that are well beyond the elimination of problems.

The holotopia vision results.

In the spirit of the holoscope, we here only summarize the five insights—and provide evidence and details separately.


Scope

What might constitute "a way to change course"?

"Man has acquired such decisive power that his future depends essentially on how he will use it", observed Peccei. Imagine if some malevolent entity, perhaps an insane dictator, took control over that power!

The power structure insight is that no dictator is needed.

While the nature of the power structure will become clear as we go along, imagine it, to begin with, as our institutions; or more accurately, as the systems in which we live and work (which we simply call systems).

Notice that systems have an immense power—over us, because we have to adapt to them to be able to live and work; and over our environment, because by organizing us and using us in certain specific ways, they decide what the effects of our work will be.

The power structure determines whether the effects of our efforts will be problems, or solutions.

Diagnosis

How suitable are the systems in which we live and work for their all-important role?

Evidence shows that the power structure wastes a lion's share of our resources. And that it either causes problems, or make us incapable of solving them.

The root cause of this malady is in the way systems evolve.

Survival of the fittest favors the systems that are predatory, not those that are useful.

This excerpt from Joel Bakan's documentary "The Corporation" (which Bakan as a law professor created to federate an insight he considered essential) explains how the most powerful institution on our planet evolved to be a perfect "externalizing machine" ("externalizing" means maximizing profits by letting someone else bear the costs, notably the people and the environment), just as the shark evolved to be a perfect predator. This scene from Sidney Pollack's 1969 film "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?" will illustrate how the power structure affects our own condition.

The systems provide an ecology, which in the long run shapes our values and "human quality". They have the power to socialize us in ways that suit their needs. "The business of business is business"; if our business is to succeed in competition, we must act in ways that lead to that effect. Whether we bend and comply, or get replaced—will have no effect on the system.

Bauman-PS.jpeg

A consequence, Zygmunt Bauman diagnosed, is that bad intentions are no longer needed for bad things to happen. Through socialization, the power structure can co-opt our duty and commitment, and even heroism and honor.

Bauman's insight that even the holocaust was a consequence and a special case, however extreme, of the power structure, calls for careful contemplation: Even the concentration camp employees, Bauman argued, were only "doing their job"—in a system whose character and purpose was beyond their field of vision, and power to change.

While our ethical sense is tuned to the power structures of the past, we are committing (in all innocence, by acting only through power structures that bind us together) the greatest massive crime in history.

Our children may not have a livable planet to live on.

Not because someone broke the rules—but because we follow them.

Remedy

The fact that we will not solve our problems unless we develop the capability to update our systems has not remained unnoticed.

Jantsch-vision.jpeg

The very first step that the The Club of Rome's founders did after its inception, in 1968, was to convene a team of experts, in Bellagio, Italy, to develop a suitable methodology. They gave making things whole on the scale of socio-technical systems the name "systemic innovation"—and we adapted that as one of our keywords.

The work and the conclusions of this team were based on results in the systems sciences. In the year 2000, in "Guided Evolution of society", systems scientist Béla H. Bánáthy surveyed relevant research, and concluded in a true holotopian tone:

We are the first generation of our species that has the privilege, the opportunity and the burden of responsibility to engage in the process of our own evolution. We are indeed chosen people. We now have the knowledge available to us and we have the power of human and social potential that is required to initiate a new and historical social function: conscious evolution. But we can fulfill this function only if we develop evolutionary competence by evolutionary learning and acquire the will and determination to engage in conscious evolution. These two are core requirements, because what evolution did for us up to now we have to learn to do for ourselves by guiding our own evolution.

In 2010 Knowledge Federation began to self-organize to enable further progress on this vitally important frontier. The procedure we developed is simple: We create a prototype of a system, and a transdisciplinary community and project around it to update it continuously. The insights in participating disciplines can in this way have real or systemic effects.

Our very first prototype, the Barcelona Innovation Ecosystem for Good Journalism in 2011, was of a public informing that identifies systemic causes and proposes corresponding solutions (by involving academic and other experts) of perceived problems (reported by people directly, through citizen journalism).

A year later we created The Game-Changing Game as a generic way to change systems—and hence as a "practical way to craft the future"; and based on it The Club of Zagreb, as an update to The Club of Rome.

Each of about forty prototypes in our portfolio illustrates systemic innovation in a specific domain. Each of them is composed in terms of design patterns—problem-solution pairs, ready to be adapted for other applications and domains.

The Collaborology prototype, in education, will highlight some of the advantages of this approach.

An education that prepares us only for traditional professions, once in a lifetime, is an obvious obstacle to systemic change. Collaborology implements an education that is in every sense flexible (self-guided, life-long...), and in an emerging area of interest (collaborative knowledge work, as enabled by new technology). By being collaboratively created itself (Collaborology is created and taught by a network of international experts, and offered to learners world-wide), the economies of scale result that dramatically reduce effort. This in addition provides a sustainable business model for developing and disseminating up-to-date knowledge in any domain of interest. By conceiving the course as a design project, where everyone collaborates on co-creating the learning resources, the students get a chance to exercise their "human quality". This in addition gives the students an essential role in the resulting 'knowledge-work ecosystem' (as 'bacteria', extracting 'nutrients') .


Scope

We have just seen that our key evolutionary task is to make institutions whole.

Where—with what institution or system—shall we begin?

The handling of information, or metaphorically our society's 'headlights', suggests itself as the answer for two reasons.

One of them is obvious: If information and not competition will be our guide, then our information will need to be different.

In his 1948 seminal "Cybernetics", Norbert Wiener pointed to another reason: In social systems, communication—which turns a collection of independent individual into a coherently functioning entity— is in effect the system. It is the communication system that determines how the system as a whole will behave. Wiener made that point by talking about the colonies of ants and bees. Cybernetics has shown—as its main point, and title theme—that "the tie between information and action" has an all-important role, which determines (Wiener used the technical keyword "homeostasis", but let us here use this more contemporary one) the system's sustainability. The full title of Wiener's book was "Cybernetics or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine". To be able to correct their behavior and maintain inner and outer balance, to be able to "change course" when the circumstances demand that, to be able to continue living and adapting and evolving—a system must have suitable communication-and-control.

Diagnosis

Presently, our core systems, and with our civilization as a whole, do not have that.

The tie between information and action has been severed, Wiener too observed.

Our society's communication-and-control is broken; it needs to be restored.

Bush-Vision.jpg

To make that point, Wiener cited an earlier work, Vannevar Bush's 1945 article "As We May Think", where Bush diagnosed that the tie between scientific information, and public awareness and policy, had been broken. Bush urged the scientists to make the task of revising their communication their next highest priority—the World War Two having just been won.

These calls to action remained without effect.

"As long as a paradox is treated as a problem, it can never be dissolved," observed David Bohm. Wiener too entrusted his insight to the communication whose tie with action had been severed. We have assembled a collection of examples of similarly important academic results that shared a similar fate—to illustrate a general phenomenon we called the Wiener's paradox.

As long as the link between communication and action is broken—the academic results that challenge the present "course" or point to a new one will tend to be ignored!

To an academic researcher, it may feel disheartening to see that so many best ideas of our best minds have been ignored.

This sentiment is, however, transformed to holotopian optimism, as soon we see 'the other side of the coin'—the vast creative frontier that is opening up. We are invited to, we are indeed obliged to reinvent the systems in which we live and work, and our own, academic system to begin with—by reconfiguring the communication that holds them together, and enables them to interoperate.

And optimism will turn into enthusiasm, when we consider also this widely ignored fact:

The core elements of the information technology we now use to communicate were created to enable a paradigm change on that frontier.
The 'lightbulb' has already been created—for the purpose of giving our society the right kind of 'headlights'.
But it has not yet been put to use!

Vannevar Bush pointed to the need for this new paradigm already in his title, "As We May Think". His point was that "thinking" means making associations or "connecting the dots". And that given our vast volumes of information—technology and processes must be devised to enable us to "connect the dots" or think together, as a single mind does. He described a prototype system called "memex", based on microfilm as technology.

Douglas Engelbart took Bush's idea in a whole new direction—by observing (in 1951!) that when each of us humans are connected to a personal digital device through an interactive interface, and when those devices are connected together into a network—then the overall result is that we are connected together as the cells in a human organism are connected by the nervous system.

All earlier innovations in this area—from the clay tablets to the printing press—required that a physical medium with the message be transported.

This new technology allows us to "create, integrate and apply knowledge" concurrently, as cells in the human organism do.

We can develop insights and solutions together.


We can become "collectively intelligent".

Engelbart conceived this new technology as a key step toward enabling us (or more precisely our systems) to tackle the "complexity times urgency" of our problems, which he saw as growing at an accelerated rate.

DE-one.jpeg

But this, Engelbart observed, requires "new thinking": It requires that we use the technology to make our systems whole.

This three minute video clip, which we called "Doug Engelbart's Last Wish", will give us a chance to pause and reflect, and see what all this practically means. Think about the prospects of improving our institutional and civilizational collective minds. Imagine "the effects of getting 5% better", Engelbart commented with a smile. Then he put his fingers on his forehead and looked up: "I've always imagined that the potential was... large..." The improvement that is both necessary and possible is not just stupendously large; it is qualitative—from communication that doesn't work, and systems that don't work, to ones that do.

To Engelbart's dismay, our new "collective nervous system" ended up being used to do no better than make the old processes and systems more efficient. The ones that evolved through the centuries of use of the printing press. The ones that broadcast, and overwhelm us with information.

Giddens-OS.jpeg

This observation by Anthony Giddens points to the effects that our dazzled and confused collective mind had on our culture; and on "human quality".

Our sense of meaning having been drowned in an overload of data, in a reality whose complexity is well beyond our comprehension—we have no other recourse but "ontological security". We find a sense of meaning in learning a profession, and performing in it a competitively.

But that is exactly what binds us to power structure!


Remedy

How can we restore the severed link between communication and action?

How can we change our collective mind—as our situation demands, and our technology enables?

Engelbart left us a simple and clear answer: Bootstrapping.

His point was that only writing about what needs to be done would not have the intended effect (the tie between information and action being broken). Bootstrapping means that we consider ourselves as parts in our systems; and that we self-organize, and act as it may best serve to restore them to wholeness.

Bootstrapping means that we either create new systems with the material of our own minds and bodies, or help others do that.

The Knowledge Federation transdiscipline was conceived by an act of bootstrapping, to enable bootstrapping.

What we are calling knowledge federation is an umbrella term for a variety of activities and social processes that together comprise a well-functioning collective mind. Their development and dissemination obviously requires a new body of knowledge, and a new institution.

The critical task is, however, to bootstrap—i.e. to self-organize so as to enable the state of the art knowledge and technology to be woven directly into systems.

BCN2011.jpg
Paddy Coulter, Mei Lin Fung and David Price speaking at our "An Innovation Ecosystem for Good Journalism" workshop in Barcelona

We use the above triplet of photos ideographically, to highlight that we are doing that.

In 2008, when Knowledge Federation had its inaugural meeting, two closely related initiatives were formed: Program for the Future (a Silicon Valley-based initiative to continue and complete "Doug Engelbart's unfinished revolution") and Global Sensemaking (an international community of researchers and developers, working on technology and processes for collective sense making). The featured participants of our 2011 workshop in Barcelona, where our public informing prototype was created, are Paddy Coulter (the Director of Oxford Global Media and Fellow of Green College Oxford, formerly the Director of Oxford University's Reuter Program in Journalism) Mei Lin Fung (the founder of Program for the Future) and David Price (who co-founded both the Global Sensemaking R & D community, and Debategraph—which is now the leading global platform for collective thinking).

Other prototypes contributed other design patterns for restoring the severed link between information and action. The Tesla and the Nature of Creativity TNC2015 prototype showed how to federate a research result that has general interest for the public, which is written in an academic vernacular (of quantum physics). The first phase of this prototype, where the author collaborated with our communication design team, turned the academic article into a multimedia object, with intuitive, metaphorical diagrams and explanatory interviews with the author. The second phase was a high-profile live streamed dialog, where the result was announced and discussed. The third phase was online collective thinking about the result, by using Debategraph.

The Lighthouse 2016 prototype is conceived as a direct remedy for the Wiener's paradox, created for and with the International Society for the Systems Sciences. This prototype models a system by which an academic community can federate an answer to a socially relevant question (combine their resources in making it reliable and clear, and communicate it to the public).

The question in this case was whether can rely on "free competition" to guide our systems; or whether the alternative—the information developed in the systems sciences—needs to be used.

Scope

"Act like as if you loved your children above all else",
Greta Thunberg, representing her generation, told the political leaders at Davos. Of course political leaders love their children—don't we all? But Greta was asking them to 'hit the brakes'; and when the 'bus' they are believed to be 'driving' is inspected, it becomes clear that the 'brakes' too are dysfunctional.

The job of the politicians is to keep 'the bus on course' (the economy growing) for yet another four years. Changing the 'course' or the system is beyond what they are able to do, or even imagine doing.

The COVID-19 pandemic may require systemic changes now.

Who—what institution or system—will lead us through our unprecedentedly large creative challenges?

Both Erich Jantsch and Doug Engelbart believed "the university" would have to be the answer; and they made their appeals accordingly. But the universities ignored them—as they ignored Vannevar Bush and Norbert Wiener before them, and others who followed.

Why?

Isn't the prospect of restoring agency to information and power to knowledge deserving of academic attention?

It is tempting to conclude that the university institution followed the general trend, and evolved as a power structure. But to see solutions, we must look at deeper causes.

We find them in the very foundations on which our handling of information has been developed.

Or in other words, in the relationship we have with information.


Diagnosis


In the course of modernization, we made a fundamental error.

From the traditional culture we adopted a myth incomparably more disruptive of culture and its evolution than the creation myth—the belief that "truth" means "correspondence with reality"; and that the purpose of information, and of our pursuit of knowledge, is to "know reality objectively", as it truly is.

This fundamental error was subsequently detected and reported, but not corrected. (We are once again witnessing that the link between information and action has been severed.) While we federated this all-important insight carefully, to be able to reach it, one only needs to read Einstein (who in our prototypes has the role of the icon of "modern science").

Einstein-Watch.jpeg

It is simply impossible, Einstein remarked (while writing about "Evolution of Physics" with Leopold Infeld), to open up the 'mechanism of nature' and verify that our ideas and models correspond to the real thing!

From the 20th century cognitive science and philosophy we learned to see "reality" in a completely new way:

"Reality" is not something we discover; it is something we construct.

This "social construction of reality" played an essential role in the very 'mechanism' of the tradition.

The socialized reality construction has served as the 'DNA', which enabled the traditional cultures to reproduce themselves and evolve.

Information has, in other words, always served as 'headlights'. The purpose of the traditional myths was to found principles and norms, and oriented behavior.

The consequences of radically changing our conception of reality—while continuing to use reification as foundation—cannot be overrated:

  • Reification of institutions. Our "science", "democracy", "public informing" and other institutions do not have explicitly stated purposes, against which their current implementations may be evaluated; they simply are their implementations.
  • Severed link between information and action. The perceived purpose of information being to complete the 'reality puzzle'—every new "piece of information" appears to be just as relevant as any other; and also necessary for completing the 'puzzle'. In the sciences and in the media, enormous amounts of information are produced "disconnected from usefulness"—as Postman diagnosed.
  • Stringent limits to creativity. A vast global army of selected, trained and publicly sponsored creative men and women are obliged to confine their creative action to observing the world—by looking at it through the methods and concepts of traditional disciplines.
  • Loss of cultural heritage. To see it, join us on an imaginary visit to a cathedral: There is awe-inspiring architecture; Michelangelo's Pietà meets the eye, and his frescos are near by. Allegri's Miserere reaches us from above. And then there is the ritual. All this, and a lot more, comprises a human-made 'ecosystem' called "culture", in which "human quality" grows. In important respects, this 'ecosystem' resembles the biophysical one; but there is a difference: We have nothing equivalent to the temperature and the CO2 measurements, to be able to diagnose problems, and propose policies.

All this, however, is only one half of the issue at hand.

The other half is the way in which culture is created; and the role that power, or the power structure, plays in that creation.

In "Social Construction of Reality", Berger and Luckmann left us an analysis of the social process by which the reality is constructed—and pointed to the role that "universal theories" (which explain the origin and the nature of the universe for us; and determine how truth and meaning are to be created) play in maintaining a given social and political status quo. An example, but not the only one, is the Biblical worldview of Galilei's prosecutors.

To organize and sum up what we above all need to know about the nature of socialization, and about the relationship between power and culture, we created the Odin–Bourdieu–Damasio thread, consisting of three short real-life stories or vignettes. (The thread is an adaptation of Vannevar Bush's technical idea for organizing collective mind work, which he called "trail".)

The first, Odin the Horse vignette, points to the nature of turf struggle, by portraying the turf behavior of horses.

The second vignette, featuring Pierre Bourdieu (a leading sociologist) shows that we humans exhibit a similar behavior—and that our culture may be perceived as a complex 'turf'.

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Bourdieu used interchangeably two keywords—"field" and "game"—to refer to this 'turf'. By calling it a field, he portrayed it as something akin to a magnetic field, which orients our seemingly random or "free" behavior, without us noticing. By calling it a game, he portrayed it as something that structures or "gamifies" our social existence, by giving each of us certain "action capabilities" (Bourdieu called them "habitus"), pertaining to our social role. The habitus, according to Bourdieu, tends to be transmitted from body to body directly. Everyone bows to the king, and we do too. With time, we become socialized to accept our role and other people's roles as "reality". Bourdieu used the keyword "doxa" to point to the common experience that our social reality is as immutable and as real as the physical reality.

In the third vignette, Antonio Damasio (a leading cognitive neuroscientist) completes this thread by explaining that we, humans, are not the rational decision makers the founding fathers of the Enlightenment made us believe we are. Damasio showed that each of us has an embodied cognitive filter, which determines what options we are able to rationally consider. This cognitive filter can be programmed through socialization.

Damasio's insight allows us to understand why we civilized humans don't rationally consider taking off our clothes and walking naked; and why we don't rationally consider changing the systems in which we live and work.

The socialized reality insight adds substantial explanatory power to the power structure insight. We can now understand why we can be socialized to accept any societal order of things, however absurd and damaging it may be, as "the reality".

To see the consequences of this other half of our issue, it suffices to look around: Advertising is everywhere. And explicit advertising too is only a tip of an iceberg, the bulk of which consists of a variety of ways in which "symbolic power" is used to socialize us in ways that suit the power structure interests. Scientific techniques are used; the story of Edward Bernays, Freud's American nephew who became "the pioneer of modern public relations and propaganda", is iconic.

This conclusion suggests itself.

The Enlightenment did not liberate us from power-related reality construction, as it is believed.
Our socialization only changed hands—from the kings and the clergy, to the corporations and the media.

Remedy

In the spirit of the holoscope, we explain this proposal for a new academic direction with the help of a metaphorical image, the Mirror ideogram. This ideogram reflects the nature of the academic situation we are in—and points to a way in which this situation may need to be handled.

The mirror invites us to stop and self-reflect.

What demands this self-reflection are two large changes in the determinants of our profession, which developed after its institutionalization took its present shape.

The first is a fundamental change, of our understanding of "language, truth and reality", which determined the notions of quality and rigor that underlie our work; and our very self-perception.

The second change is pragmatic—of the role we have in our society.

Both changes are reflected by the mirror metaphor. When we look at a mirror, we see ourselves in the world. We see that we are not above the world, looking at it "objectively". If earlier the state of the art of our knowledge of knowledge made it seem that to be "academic" we must adhere to the methods and interests of a traditional discipline—its present state of the art is liberating us from the constraints of the disciplines.

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Mirror ideogram

Furthermore, the the world we see ourselves in, when we look at the mirror, is a world in dire need—for new ideas and new ways of thinking and being. When we look at the mirror, we see that we have a key role in that world, which we didn't have before. We are now holding the key to its transformation.

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With Whorf, we may acknowledge that we find ourselves in that new role "without intending to". We are in that role because we believed that the purpose of knowledge was to know the reality "objectively"; and because the successes of science in unraveling the secrets of nature convinced us that science, and not the Church and the tradition, was the way to such knowledge.

We must ask:

How can we fulfill our new social role without sacrificing academic freedom and rigor—which have been the distinguishing traits of our profession?

The answer—that we can do that by stepping through the mirror—is intended to convey that there is an unexpected, seemingly magical solution to this academic evolutionary entanglement.

By stepping through the mirror, we can increase freedom and rigor—and fulfill our new role!

What makes this possible is what Villard Van Orman Quine called "truth by convention"—which we adapted as one of our keywords.

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Quine opened "Truth by Convention" by observing:

"The less a science has advanced, the more its terminology tends to rest on an uncritical assumption of mutual understanding. With increase of rigor this basis is replaced piecemeal by the introduction of definitions. The interrelationships recruited for these definitions gain the status of analytic principles; what was once regarded as a theory about the world becomes reconstrued as a convention of language. Thus it is that some flow from the theoretical to the conventional is an adjunct of progress in the logical foundations of any science."

But if truth by convention has been the way in which the sciences improve their logical foundations—why not use it to update the logical foundations of knowledge work at large?

As we are using this keyword, the truth by convention is the kind of truth that is common in mathematics: "Let X be Y. Then..." and the argument follows. Insisting that X "really is" Y is obviously meaningless. A convention is valid only within a given context—which may be an article, or a theory, or a methodology.

Based on evidence we organized and offered separately, we offer the following conclusion:

Truth by convention is the new Archimedean point, by which knowledge can once again be empowered to make a difference.

We used truth by convention to define a new and rigorous foundation for creating truth and meaning or epistemology.

We defined design epistemology by rendering the core of our proposal (to change the relationship we have with information—by considering it a human-made thing, and adapting information and the way we handle it to the functions that need to be served) as a convention.

In the "Design Epistemology" research article (published in the special issue of the Information Journal titled "Information: Its Different Modes and Its Relation to Meaning", edited by Robert K. Logan) where we articulated this proposal, we made it clear that the design epistemology is only one of the many ways to manifest this approach. We drafted a parallel between the modernization of science that can result in this way and the emergence of modern art: By defining an epistemology and a methodology by convention, we can do in the sciences as the artists did—when they liberated themselves from the demand to mirror reality, by using the techniques of Old Masters.

As the modern artists, and also our forefathers who created the sciences—on the other side of the mirror we can be creative in the very way in which we practice our profession.

Our main two prototypes, the holoscope and the holotopia, model the academic and the social reality on the other side of the mirror.

Our call to action, to institutionalize and develop knowledge federation as an academic field and a real-life praxis, is a practical way to implement the changes that have become necessary. As an academic field, knowledge federation is conceived as the academia's and the society's evolutionary organ; as a real-life praxis, it is the collective thinking we now need to develop.

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When making this call to action, we are not saying anything new; we are only echoing the call to action that many have made before us.

We, however, extend the action they were calling for to a fully developed academic paradigm—and hence establishing it firmly on the academia's time-honored principles. And we also operationalize the action, by offering a fully developed institutional prototype—ready to be examined, improved and deployed.

Two concrete examples—our definitions of design and of visual literacy—will illustrate the immediate feasibility of the proposed approach. Each is an example of renewing the foundation of an already existing academic field, by abolishing reification of the existing practice and using truth by convention to point to a purpose. The fact that our proposals were welcomed by the target communities suggests that the implementation of this approach may not need to wait.

We defined design as "alternative to tradition", where design and tradition are (by convention) two alternative ways to wholeness. Tradition relies on spontaneous, gradual, Darwinian-style evolution. Change is resisted, small changes are tried—and tested and assimilated through generations of use. We practice design when we consider ourselves accountable for wholeness.

When tradition cannot be relied on, design must be used.

The situation we are in, which we rendered by the bus with candle headlights metaphor, can now be understood as a result of a transition: We are no longer traditional (our technology evolves by design); but we are not yet designing ("the relationship we have with information" is still traditional). Our call to action can be understood as a practical way to complete modernization.

Reification can now be understood as the foundation for truth and meaning that suits the tradition; truth by convention is what empowers us to design.

We proposed this definition to the academic design community, as part of an answer to its quest for logical foundations. The fact that Danish Designers chose our presentation to be repeated as opening keynote at their tenth anniversary conference suggests that this praxis—of assigning a purpose to a discipline and a community by using ruth by convention—may have immediate interest and applications.

The definition of implicit information and of visual literacy as "literacy associated with implicit information for the International Visual Literacy Association was in spirit similar—but its point was different.

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We showed the above ideogram as depicting a situation where two kinds of information—the explicit information with explicit, factual and verbal warning in a black-and-white rectangle, and the visual and "cool" rest—meet each other in a direct duel. The image shows that the implicit information wins "hands down" (or else this would not be a cigarette advertising). Our larger point was that while our legislation, ethical sensibilities and "official" culture at large are focused on explicit information, our culture is largely created through subtle implicit information. Hence we need a literacy to be able to decode those messages—and reverse the negative consequences of reification.

Lida Cochran, the only surviving IVLA founder, found that this definition expressed and served the founders' original intention.


Scope

We have just seen that the academic tradition—instituted as the modern university—finds itself in a much larger and more central social role than it was originally conceived for. We look up to the academia, and not to the Church and the tradition, for answers to the pivotal question:

How should we look at the world, to be able to comprehend and handle it?

That role, and that question, carry an immense power!

It was by providing a completely new answer to that question, that the last "great cultural revival" came about.


Diagnosis

So how should we look at the world, to be able to comprehend and handle it?
Nobody knows!

Of course, countess books and articles have been written about this theme since antiquity. But in spite of that—or should we say because of that—no consensus has emerged.

Since nobody felt accountable for supplying it, the way we the people look at the world, try to comprehend and handle it, shaped itself spontaneously—from odds and ends of science as they appeared to the public around the middle of the 19th century, when Darwin and Newton as cultural heroes were replacing Adam and Moses. What is today popularly considered as the "scientific worldview" took shape then—and remained largely unchanged.

As members of the homo sapiens species, this worldview would make us believe, we have the evolutionary privilege to be able to comprehend the world in causal terms, and to make rational choices accordingly. Give us a correct model of the world, and we'll know exactly how to satisfy our needs (which we also know, because we can experience them directly). But the traditional cultures got it all wrong: Not knowing how the nature works, they put a "ghost in the machine", and made us pray to him to give us what we needed. Science corrected this error—and now we can satisfy our needs by manipulating the mechanisms of nature directly, with the help of technology.

It is this causal or "scientific" understanding of the world that made us modern. Isn't that how we understood that women cannot fly on broomsticks?

From our collection of reasons why this way of looking at the world is neither scientific nor functional, we here mention only two.

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The first reason is that the nature is not a mechanism.

The mechanistic way of looking at the world that Newton and his contemporaries developed in physics, which around the 19th century shaped the worldview of the masses, was later disproved and disowned by modern science. Research in physics showed that even the physical phenomena exhibit the kinds of interdependence that cannot be understood in "classical" or causal terms.

In "Physics and Philosophy", Werner Heisenberg, one of the progenitors of this research, described how "the narrow and rigid" way of looking at the world that our ancestors adapted from the 19th century science damaged culture—and in particular its parts on on which the "human quality" depended, such as ethics and religion. And how as a result the "instrumental" or (as Bauman called them) "adiaphorized" thinking and values became prominent. Heisenberg believed that the dissolution of that "rigid and narrow frame" would be the most valuable gift of modern physics to humanity.

In 2005, Hans-Peter Dürr (considered as Heisenberg's scientific "heir") co-wrote the Potsdam Manifesto, whose subtitle and message read "We need to learn to think in a new way". The proposed new thinking is similar to the one that leads to holotopia: "The materialistic-mechanistic worldview of classical physics, with its rigid ideas and reductive way of thinking, became the supposedly scientifically legitimated ideology for vast areas of scientific and political-strategic thinking. (...) We need to reach a fundamentally new way of thinking and a more comprehensive under­standing of our Wirklichkeit, in which we, too, see ourselves as a thread in the fabric of life, without sacrificing anything of our special human qualities. This makes it possible to recognize hu­manity in fundamental commonality with the rest of nature (...)"

The second reason is that even complex mechanisms ("classical" nonlinear dynamic systems) cannot be understood in causal terms.

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It has been said that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Research in the systems sciences, one of which is cybernetics, explained this scientifically: The "hell" (which you may imagine as global issues, or the 'destination' toward which our 'bus' is diagnosed to be headed) tends to be a "side effect" of our best efforts and "solutions", reaching us through "nonlinearities" and "feedback loops" in the natural and social systems we are trying to comprehend and manipulate.

Hear Mary Catherine Bateson (cultural anthropologist and cybernetician, daughter of Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson who pioneered both fields) say:

"The problem with Cybernetics is that it is not an academic discipline that belongs in a department. It is an attempt to correct an erroneous way of looking at the world, and at knowledge in general. (...) Universities do not have departments of epistemological therapy!"

Remedy

Truth by convention allows us to explicitly define and academically develop new ways to look at the world.

We called the result a methodology, and our prototype the Polyscopic Modeling methodology or polyscopy.

Polyscopy is a general-purpose methodology; it provides methods for creating insights about any chosen theme—on any level of generality.

A methodology is in essence a toolkit; anything that does the job would do. We, however, defined polyscopy by turning state of the art epistemological insights into conventions.

In this way, the severed link between fundamental scientific insights and the way we the people look at the world is restored.

The polyscopy definition comprises eight aphorismic postulates; by using truth by convention, each of them is given an interpretation.

The first postulate defines information as "recorded experience". It is thereby made explicit that the substance communicated by information is not "reality", but human experience. Since human experience can be recorded in a variety of ways (a chair is a record of experience related to sitting and chair making), the notion of information is extended well beyond written documents. The first postulate enables knowledge federation across cultural traditions and fields of interests; the barriers of language and method are removed by reducing all cultural artifacts to human experience—their 'common denominator'.

The second postulate is that the scope (the way we look) determines the view (what is seen). In polyscopy the experience (or "reality" or whatever is "behind" experience) is not assumed to have an a priori structure. We attribute to it a structure with the help of the concepts and other elements of our scope. This postulate enables us to create new ways of looking, and to extend the approach of science to questions of practical interest.

Polyscopy did not talk about knowledge. We do that by adding the ninth postulate:

Knowledge must be federated.

To be able to say that we "know" something, we must federate not only supporting evidence, but also potential counter-evidence—and hence information at large. Like a dutiful attorney, knowledge federation does its best to gather suitable evidence, and back each potentially relevant "experience" with a convincing case.

The methodology definition allows us to state explicitly what being "informed" means. We modeled this intuitive notion with the keyword gestalt. To be "informed", one needs to have a gestalt that is appropriate to one's situation. "Our house is on fire" is a canonical example. The knowledge of gestalt is profoundly different from only knowing the data (such as the room temperatures and the CO2 levels.). To have an appropriate gestalt means to be moved to do the action that one's situation is calling for.

The definition of gestalt allows us to see that we can be uninformed, in spite of all the information we have.

"One cannot not communicate", reads one of Paul Watzlawick's axioms of communication. Even when everything in a news report is factually correct, the gestalt it conveys implicitly can be inappropriate—because we are only told what Donald Trump has said, and not Aurelio Peccei.

Polyscopy offers a collection of techniques for communicating and 'proving' or justifying general or high-level insights and claims. Knowledge federation is conceived as the social process by which such insights can be created and maintained. To create the methodology, we federated methodological insights from a variety of fields:

  • Patterns have a similar role as mathematical functions do in traditional sciences—and completely generalize its range of application
  • Ideograms allow us to include the expressive power and the insights and techniques from art, advertising and communication design
  • Vignettes implement the basic technique from media informing, where an insight or issue is made accessible by telling illustrative and engaging or "sticky" real-life people and situation stories
  • Threads implement Vannevar Bush's technical idea of "trails", and provide a way to combine specific ideas into higher-level units of meaning


We conclude by telling a vignette—which will illustrate some of the nuances of the methodological approach to knowledge.

To see the practical relevance of what we are about to say, imagine a highly talented young person, let's call him Pierre Bourdieu to be concrete, about to become a researcher. The academia will give Bourdieu a certain document template to render his results (traditional books and articles, with their formatting rules etc.), which he'll be using throughout his career. The "usability" or the usefulness of Bourdieu's life work will largely depend on that template—and it will not be in his power to change it.

Could the way in which we render research results—and hence the usability and usefulness of those results—be substantially improved?

We introduce our answer to this question by this vignette.

A situation with overtones of a crisis, closely similar to the one we now have in our handling of information at large, arose in the early days of computer programming. The buddying computer industry undertook ambitious software projects—which resulted in thousands of lines of "spaghetti code", which no-one could understand and correct.

The solution was found in creating "computer programming methodology". The longer story is interesting, but we here only highlight a couple of insights that we federated from the "object oriented methodology", developed in the 1960s by Ole-Johan Dahl and Krysten Nygaard.


The designers of computer programming methodologies made themselves accountable for the "usability" of programs.

Any sufficiently complete programming language will allow the programmers to create any application program. The creators of the object oriented methodology, however, took it upon themselves to provide the programmers the kind of programming tools that would enable them, or even compel them, to write comprehensible, reusable and well-structured code.

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To understand a complex system, abstraction must be used. We must be able to create views of the complex whole on distinct levels of generality.

The object oriented methodology provided a structuring template called "object"—which "hides implementation and exports function". What this means is that an object can be "plugged into" more general objects based on the functions it produces—without the burden of the details of its code.

We have seen, in socialized reality, that the academia needs to consider itself accountable for the tools and processes by which information and knowledge are handled—both by academic researchers, and by people at large.


The solution for structuring information we devised in polyscopy is called information holon. An information holon is closely similar to the "object" in object oriented methodology. Information, represented as the "i" in the Information ideogram, is depicted as a circle on top of a square. The circle represents the point of it all ('the cup is broken'); the square represents the details and the side views.

When the circle is a general insight or a gestalt, the details that comprise the square are given the power to influence our awareness of issues, and the way in which we handle them. When the circle is a prototype, the multiplicity of insights that comprise the square are given direct systemic impact, and hence agency.

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Information ideogram

The Holotopia prototype may now be understood as the circle by which our knowledge federation proposal is being federated.

A prototype polyscopic book manuscript titled "Information Must Be Designed" is structured as an information holon. Here the claim made in the title (which is the same we made in the opening of this presentation by talking about the bus with candle headlights) is justified in the four chapters of the book. The book's chapters represent four aspects of our handling of information. Each points to anomalies, and completes them to design patterns by proposing solutions.

It is customary in programming language design to showcase the language by creating its first compiler in the language itself. In this book we described the paradigm that is modeled by polyscopy, and used polyscopy to make a case for that paradigm.

The book's introduction is available online. (This document, long with multiple others, has just been removed by the university's technical support; we are working on restoring it.) What we at the time this manuscript was written branded information design, has subsequently been completed and rebranded as knowledge federation.

Scope

We turn to culture and to "human quality", and ask:

Why is "a great cultural revival" realistically possible?

What insight, and what strategy, may divert our "pursuit of happiness" from material consumption and opportunism to human cultivation?

We approach this theme also from another angle: Suppose we developed the praxis of federating information—and used it to combine all relevant heritage and insights, from sciences, world traditions, therapy schools...

If federated information, and used it instead of advertising to guide our choices, and to develop a culture—what changes would develop? What difference would that make?

The Renaissance replaced the original sin and the eternal reward as preoccupations, by happiness and beauty here and now.

What values might the next "great cultural revival" bring to the fore?

Diagnosis

In the course of modernization we made a cardinal error—by adopting convenience as our cardinal value.

This error can easily be understood if we consider that we've adopted direct causality as our chosen way to truth and meaning. The value of convenience (favoring what feels attractive or pleasant) then readily follows as a consequence, and may even appear as a real-life adaptation of the scientific experiment.

Convenience now orients even our choice of—information!