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We introduce knowledge federation as an approach to knowledge that suits our times and conditions.

Not all images are worth one thousand words. But these ideograms are! They play a similar role in knowledge federation as mathematical formulas do in traditional science – they condense a wealth of insight into a single expression, recognizable at a glance. Think about Einstein's E=mc2: That's already an ideogram. But the possibilities of condensing. We use them here to condense a multitude of


The bus represents our technologically advanced and fast-moving civilisation. The candle headlights represent the way information is created and used, which we have indiscriminately inherited from the past.

As a practical message, this image suggests that the ways of creating and sharing information we have inherited will not fulfil the purposes we now urgently need to take care of, notably the purpose of illuminating the way. By designing instead of inheriting what we do with information, suggests this image, we can now make the difference between a hazardous ride into the future, and using our technology to take us to places or conditions where we may justifiably wish to be.

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Cap;tion

In an academic or fundamental sense, the bus metaphor is pointing to an epistemological stance where information is no longer considered an objective image of reality, but as a part of this reality, or a system within a system, whose purpose is to fulfil certain specific roles. Under this epistemology, the creative acts to reconfigure what we do with information become basic research – as “the discovery of natural laws” have been in the traditional sciences. The bus metaphor further points to the necessity of what we are calling systemic innovation, where we apply our creative capabilities, and our technology, to fulfil the purposes that must be served, rather than to reproduce the habitual practices and ways of working. The bus points to the need to turn our basic institutions or socio-technical “candles” into “lightbulbs”, and to the opportunity to invent and create on this larger, systemic scale. By doing that, suggests the bus metaphor, we may make a similar difference in the ream of our institution as the conventional innovation made by designing technical objects, since the age of the candle.

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The “i” in the above metaphorical image, composed of a circle on top of a square, renders the information that polyscopy undertakes to create in a nutshell. The purpose of this information is to provide direction-setting high-level insights (represented by the circle), based on a multiplicity of lower-level insights (represented by the square), which illuminate an issue or phenomenon from multiple sides.

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ideogram