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<div class="page-header" > <h1>Federation through Images</h1> </div>
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Reimaging the Enlightenment</h2></div>
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<div class="col-md-7"><h3>Enlightening the everyday</h3>
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<p>Can you imagine a change in our socially sanctioned capability to comprehend that is comparable to the one that the Enlightenment brought?</p>
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<p>Can you imagine a similar dispelling of prejudices and illusions as the one that science brought to our comprehension of the natural phenomena – in our understanding and pursuit of love, happiness, religion, social justice and democracy?</p>
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<p>In these detailed pages of our presentation we provide food for this line of thought in several ways. In the first story of Federation through Stories we show how the developments in modern physics, and in science and philosophy at large, disrupted our notions of what knowledge and pursuit of knowledge are about; the notions that the 19th century science gave to our popular culture, which still persist.</p>
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<p>Necessarily, the [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] of modern science saw that what they were discovering was not only the behavior of small quanta of matter, or the social mechanisms by which our shared idea of reality is constructed, or the neurological mechanisms that govern our awareness – but that the bare foundations of our creation of truth and meaning were emerging from the ground. Having thus lost its self-image of "objective observer of reality", science acquired a whole new capability – to self-reflect. And through self-reflection to understand its own limitations, and the intrinsic limitations of our pursuit of knowledge at large. </p>
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<p> Here we show how to turn this disruption into a new construction – by which the project of science is extended to all themes that matter.</p>
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<h3>Our giant in residence</h3>
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</div> </div>
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<div class="col-md-6">
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<p>
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<blockquote>
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In spite of all the fruitfulness on particulars, dogmatic rigidity prevailed on the matter of principles:
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In the beginning (if there was such a thing), God created Newton's laws of motion together with the necessary masses and forces. This is all; everything beyond this follows from the development of appropriate mathematical methods by means of deduction.
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</blockquote>
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While we build on ideas of a whole generation of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]], in this condensed presentation they will be represented by a single one – Albert Einstein. Einstein will here appear in his usual role, of an <em>icon</em> for modern science.</p> </div>
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  <div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Einstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Albert Einstein]]</center></small></div>
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<p>The above lines from Einstein's Autobiographical Notes, where he describes physics at the point when he entered it as a graduate student, around the turn of last century, will set the stage for what is about to follow. It is a daring change "on the matter of principles" that made modern physics possible. We'll here see how this change can percolate further.</p></div>
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</div>
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----
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>These images are ideograms</h2></div>
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  <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Pictures that are worth one thousand words</h3>
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<p>Not all pictures are worth one  thousand words; but these [[ideograms|<em>ideograms</em>]] are!  </p>
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<p>Each of them will not only summarize for us the insights of a some of the last century's most original minds – but also allow us to "stand on their shoulders" and see beyond, see the vast creative frontier that their combined insights reveal. See the opportunities for <em>fundamental</em> contribution and achievement that this frontier now offers. </p>
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<p>By using the [[ideograms|<em>ideograms</em>]] we shall at the same time <em>demonstrate</em> big-picture science and its power. Recall that the philosophical systems of  Hegel and Husserl took thousands of <em>pages</em>! Here only a handful of [[ideograms|<em>ideograms</em>]] will suffice to summarize the philosophical findings of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]], and  combine them into a [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]. Our purpose being to ignite a conversation, this concise way of presenting will serve us best.</p> 
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</div></div>
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----
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Repurposing knowledge</h2></div>
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<div class="col-md-7"><h3>Mirror ideogram</h3>
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<p> </p>
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[[File:Magical_Mirror.jpg]] <br><small><center>Mirror ideogram</center></small>
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<p> </p>
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<blockquote><p>On every university campus there is a [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]] – although, being so busy with article deadlines and courses, we don't normally see it.</p>
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<p>When we look at this academic [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]], we see the same world that we see around us. But we also see <em>ourselves</em> in the mirror. And we see ourselves <em> in the world.</em> </p>
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<p>We then realize that we are not "the objective observers" of reality we believed we were, but people living <em>in</em> the world, creating the world – and responsible for it. </p>
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<p>And when we look deeper into the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]], we realize that the scientific concepts and methods and theories are not objectively true elements of reality our great predecessors <em>discovered</em>, but something they themselves <em>created</em>, which enabled us to make a quantum leap in our understanding of phenomena.</p>
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<p>Just like that mirror in  Louis Carroll's "Through the Looking Glass", this <em>academic</em> mirror too can be walked right through. And when we do that, we find ourselves in an unfamiliar academic reality, where so many things appear to be inverse images of the academic reality we've grown accustomed to. And yet when we take a moment to accustom ourselves to it, we begin realize how much more coherent and meaningful this new academic world is than the one that appeared to us as the <em>only</em> possible one – before we saw ourselves in the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]].</p> </blockquote> </div></div>
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  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
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<div class="col-md-6"><h3>Seeing ourselves in the mirror</h3>
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<p><blockquote>
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Physical concepts are free creations of the human mind, and are not, however it may seem, uniquely determined by the external world. In our endeavor to understand reality we are somewhat like a man trying to understand the mechanism of a closed watch. He sees the face and the moving hands, even hears its ticking, but he has no way of opening the case. If he is ingenious he may form some picture of a mechanism which could be responsible for all the things he observes, but he may never be quite sure his picture is the only one which could explain his observations. He will never be able to compare his picture with the real mechanism and he cannot even imagine the possibility or the meaning of such a comparison.</blockquote>
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This often quoted excerpt from  Einstein and Infeld's Evolution of Physics will serve us as a snapshot of that very moment when modern science saw itself in the metaphorical [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]].</p>
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<p>And when the scientists realized that both the scientific concepts and the scientific theories are their own, that is, <em>human</em> creation. That there is simply no way to verify that those theories <em>correspond</em> with the real thing. And that our reason is amiss when it even tries to imagine a procedure by which we could confirm such correspondence.</p></div>
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  <div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Einstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Albert Einstein]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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  <div class="col-md-7"><p><blockquote>
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During  philosophy’s  childhood  it  was  rather  generally  believed that it is possible to find everything which can be  known by means of mere reflection. (...) Someone, indeed,  might even raise the question whether, without something  of this illusion, anything really great can be achieved in the  realm of philosophical thought – but we do not wish to ask  this question. This  more  aristocratic  illusion  concerning  the  unlimited  penetrative power of thought has as its counterpart the more  plebeian illusion of naïve realism, according to which things  “are” as they are perceived by us through our senses. This  illusion dominates the daily life of men and animals; it is also  the point of departure in all the sciences, especially of the  natural sciences.
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</blockquote>
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This second excerpt, from Einstein's  comments on Bertrand Russell's theory of knowledge, will suggest that the common supposition that our conceptions of the world <em>correspond</em> to reality has been a result of illusions.</p>
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<p>But if the goal of our pursuit of knowledge is to distinguish reality from illusion – how can we base it on a criterion (correspondence with reality) that is impossible to verify? And which is itself commonly a product of illusion?</p>
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<h3>Seeing ourselves in the world</h3>
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<p>The just mentioned insight acquires brightness and even luster when by looking at this [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]] we see ourselves in the <em>contemporary</em> world, as it has become.</p>
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<p>We then instantly realize that our world is in dire need for knowledge; and not <em>any</em> knowledge, but "right" or "good" knowledge.</p>
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<p>We realize that there's nobody out there who can give the people such knowledge – but ourselves! This is really our social purpose, and our job – and how wonderfully creative, and urgent, this task has become!</p>
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<p>The space in front of the metaphorical [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]] then becomes a space for academic self-reflection.</p>
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<p>Why is our academic culture as it is now? Why do we produce so much of <em>a certain kind of knowledge</em>, and so little of everything else? Why do we limit ourselves to detailed results in traditional sciences – when there is so much to be done?</p>
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<p>And yet we realize that this self-reflection – however interesting and necessary it might be – is not leading us to solutions. The clock is ticking. The people out there are in dire need for knowledge. Whatever we may come up with, through self-reflection, will not give them such knowledge.</p>
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<p>But <em>what else can we do</em>?</p>
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<h3>Stepping through the mirror</h3>
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<p>It is only by (metaphorically speaking) <em>stepping through</em> this metaphorical academic [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]], that the solutions are readily found.</p>
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</div></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6">
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<p>What makes this apparent magic academically possible is what Villard Van Orman Quine called  [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]]. In "Truth by Convention", Quine posited that
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<blockquote>
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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.
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</blockquote>
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If that is how the sciences progress – why not allow our knowledge and knowledge work at large to progress in the same way?</p></div>
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  <div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Quine.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Willard V.O. Quine]]</center></small></div>
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<p>Truth by convention is the kind of truth that is common in mathematics: "Let <em>x</em> be... Then..." It is meaningless to ask whether <em>x</em> "really is" as stated.</p>
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<p>What makes 'the magic' possible, of 'walking through the mirror', is that the truth on the other side is (by convention) the truth by convention. We call this basic convention the [[methodology|<em>methodology</em>]]. </p>
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<h3>Truth becomes rigorous</h3>
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<p>It stands to reason that our foundation for creating truth and meaning must itself be as solid as possible.</p>
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<p>The foundations we've just outlined can be – and have been – made solid in three independent ways:
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<ul>
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<li>They are a convention – and what's asserted in this way is true by definition, irrespective of what happens "in reality"</li>
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<li>This convention express the state-of-the-art epistemological findings, and the insights of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]]</li>
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<li>The convention – called [[methodology|<em>methodology</em>]] – is conceived as a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]]; it has provisions for updating itself, when relevant new insights are reached</li>
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</ul></p>
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<h3>Knowledge becomes useful</h3>
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<p>Yet our core task is not to "philosophize" about truth and reality, but to give the people the kind of knowledge they need, the <em>useful</em> knowledge. And it is <em>this</em> task that is most easily and most <em>academically</em> served on the other side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]]. </p>
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<p>To see why, imagine we tried to do that <em>before</em> stepping through the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]], imagine someone said "look – it's really this other kind of knowledge that the people most urgently need; why don't we give it to them?" If you've ever set your foot on an academic soil, you will easily guess that in all likelihood <em>nothing</em> would happen, because everyone's too busy with business as usual to even consider such a question. And if the question <em>would</em> be considered, there'd be a host of other questions that wold make serious consideration impossible. "Who will provide the funding?" somebody would surely ask. Both the budget and the physical space of the university have already been divided among the conventional departments. And so on. In Federation through Stories we'll share from our collection of anecdotes or [[vignettes|<em>vignettes</em>]], instances where this actually <em>did</em> happen.</p>
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<p>Everything changes when we step through the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]]! Because there another kind of logic – and by far a more reasonable one – applies (as pointed to by our Modernity ideogram and our four [[keywords|<em>keywords</em>]] it defined). "The society has urgent need for new kinds of knowledge", the last century's [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] observed (as we summarized their insights with the help of the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] and those four [[keywords|<em>keywords</em>]]). And knowledge – that's <em>our</em> line of business, isn't it – so let's make sure that they have exactly what they need.</p>   
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<p>And to make this rigorous or "academic", on the other side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]] we can simply <em>assign</em> a purpose to knowledge, by making a convention!</p> 
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<p>If the chosen purpose is to provide orientation – then what logically follows is exactly what we are doing here, namely the [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]], and the [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as [[transdiscipline|<em>transdiscipline</em>]] and all the rest.</p>
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<p>By creating an [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] by convention, we can <em>both</em> liberate knowledge and knowledge work from its age-old subservience to "reality" (and therewith also with the age-old traditional procedures and methods which, as it has been assumed, secured that knowledge would correspond with reality) – and by the same sleight of hand assign it another purpose, such as the purpose of helping people orient themselves in the complex reality.</p>
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<p>By combining truth by convention with the creation of a [[methodology|<em>methodology</em>]] (which is an organized system of fundamental conventions), knowledge work becomes solidly established on the academic ground that Herbert Simon called "the sciences of the artificial" – which do not study what objectively exists in the natural world, but man-made things, with the goal of adapting them to the purposes they serve in the human world.</p>
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<p>Our [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] [[methodology|<em>methodology</em>]] – by which this reversal is made concrete, or even possible – is called [[Polyscopic Modeling]]. What we call [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] is the [[praxis|<em>praxis</em>]] this [[methodology|<em>methodology</em>]] fosters. Usually, however, we simply refer to both simply as [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]]. </p> 
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</div>
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</div>
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----
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Liberating knowledge</h2></div>
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  <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Creating the way we look at the world</h3>
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<p>Now that the purpose has been successfully reversed, on the academic space on the other side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]] we can reverse other facets of our knowledge and knowledge work to serve the new purpose. The first thing that comes to mind is the language and the method.</p>
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<p>Our theme – or better said our <em>reversal</em> here is (of) the way in which our concepts are methods, and even information itself, are conceived of, created and used.  We are about to witness a reversal of the way in which we look at the world.</p>
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<p> </p>
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[[File:Polyscopy.jpg]] <br><small><center>Polyscopy ideogram</center></small>
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<p> </p>
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<p><blockquote>
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Once we've realized that our concepts and methods are our or more precisely <em>human</em> creations, it becomes natural to recreate them freely – so that we may see more, and see what <em>needs to</em> be seen.</blockquote> </p>
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<p>Central in [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] is the notion of [[scope|<em>scope</em>]] – which is, by definition, whatever determines how we look at the world and how we see it. </p>
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<p>Not only our concepts and methods, but also our very models, or "pieces of information", are considered (by convention) to be just that – just ways of looking.</p> 
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<p>The Polyscopy [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] stands for the fact that at the point where we've come to see our [[scope|<em>scopes</em>]] as our own creation and not our discovery, it becomes natural to adapt them to the purpose of seeing what above all needs to be seen. </p> </div>
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</div>
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  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><h3>From the pen of our giant</h3>
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<p><blockquote>
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Science is the attempt to make the chaotic diversity of our sense-experience correspond to a logically uniform system of thought.
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</blockquote>
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This, and the next quotation of our chosen [[giants|<em>giant</em>]], will give us a clue how exactly we may use this approach to liberate our view of the world from disciplinary and terminological constraints.
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<blockquote>
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I shall not hesitate to state here in a few sentences my epistemological credo. I see on the one side the totality of sense experiences and, on the other, the totality of the concepts and propositions that are laid down in books. (…) The system of concepts is a creation of man, together with the rules of syntax, which constitute the structure of the conceptual system. (…) All concepts, even those closest to experience, are from the point of view of logic freely chosen posits, just as is the concept of causality, which was the point of departure for this inquiry in the first place.
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</blockquote></p></div>
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<div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Einstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Albert Einstein]]</center></small></div>
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<p>This is how Einstein stated his "epistemological credo" on the introductory pages of his Autobiographical Notes. Already the fact that a scientist should begin his personal account of the development of modern physics by stating an "epistemological credo" is significant – Isn't that exactly what we are doing here, on this page? </p>
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<p>You'll notice that there is no mention of "reality" in the above excerpts; only "the sense-experience" on the one side, and "the system of concepts" and "syntax" or method on the other. This latter part, posits Einstein, is "freely chosen", and even "the concept of causality" is freely chosen – which was the point of departure of traditional science (which has been conceived as an attempt to <em>explain</em> how the observed phenomena follow as a consequence of the inner workings of nature).</p>
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<h3>Simplicity and clarity are in the eyes of the beholder</h3>
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<p>As might be expected, [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] turns Einstein's "epistemological credo" into a convention.</p>
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<p>Combined with the [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] sketched above, this translates into an approach to knowledge where we design concepts and methods – by adapting them to the purpose, what needs to be seen.</p>
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<p>And where the conventional scientific approach to establishing and justifying facts is liberated from disciplinary constraints and made completely general.</p>
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<p>By convention, experience (or "reality") is not assumed to have any a priori structure. Rather, what is "out there" is considered as something like the inkblot in the Rorschach test – namely as something to which we <em>assign</em> meaning; and to which a multiplicity of meanings can be assigned (notably by creating suitable ways of looking or [[scope|<em>scopes</em>]]).</p>
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<p>The "aha experience" – that the provided [[scope|<em>scope</em>]] fits or interprets or explains experience – is then also considered as just another kind of experience, which can be communicated from the author to the reader.</p>
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<p>The "aha experiences" are especially valuable when they are shared – when they can orient our collective action. But they can also be dangerous, because we can keep us in one way of looking at things, and ignoring all others – at the expense of further creative exploration, and communication. [[polyscopy|<em>Polyscopy</em>]] emphasizes  that there are multiple ways of looking and multiple ways of making sense, and that an inner and a social [[dialogs|<em>dialog</em>]] – fine balance between grasping an offered interpretation and remaining open to other interpretations – is maintained. </p>
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<p>Since [[scope|<em>scopes</em>]] are human-made by convention, they can be as precise and rigorous as we desire – <em>on any level of generality</em>.</p>
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<p>Simplicity and clarity, by convention, are "in the eyes of the beholder" – (a consequence of our [[scope|<em>scope</em>]]). Hence we can freely and legitimately create them – even in a complex world!</p>
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<h3>Models are scopes</h3>
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<p>An interesting "philosophical" question is – What do we really mean when we make a statement, that something is so-and-so, if we are not claiming that this is how the reality "really is"?</p>
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<p>The answer provided by [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] is that our statements, and models, are (by convention) just [[scope|<em>scopes</em>]], just our own created ways of looking at experience and of organizing experience. They are a way of saying "See if you can see things (also) in this way, and if this way of looking may reveal to you something that you may otherwise have overlooked."</p>
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<p>As Piaget wrote, "Intelligence organizes the world by organizing itself"</p> 
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<h3>Multiple scopes are needed</h3>
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<p>Think about inspecting a cup you are holding in your hand, to see if it's whole or cracked. You must look at it from all sides, before you can give a conclusive answer. And if any of those points of view reveals a crack – then the cup <em>is</em> cracked!</p>
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<p>In [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy's</em>]] technical language we say that to acquire a correct [[gestalt|<em>gestalt</em>]], all relevant [[aspects|<em>aspects</em>]] need to be considered.</p>
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<h3>No experiences are automatically excluded</h3>
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<p>Another consequence of this approach to knowledge is that no experience is excluded because it fails to fit into our "reality picture".</p>
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<p>On the contrary – since the substance of information, and of knowledge, is ultimately human experience, then <em>all forms of experience are considered to be potentially valuable</em>. The method sketched here allows for combining a variety of heterogeneous insights and forms of experience to create a  [[high-level|<em>high-level</em>]] view. Examples of this are shared below.</p> </div></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><h3>General-purpose science</h3>
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<p>The overall result is a general-purpose method which – like a portable flashlight – can be pointed at any phenomenon or issue.</p>
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<blockquote>
 +
The objective of studies needs to be to direct the mind so that it brings solid and true judgments about everything that presents itself to it.
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</blockquote>
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<p>René Descartes is often "credited" as the philosophical father of the limiting (reductionistic) aspects of science. This Rule 1 from his manuscript "Rules for the Direction of the Mind" (unfinished during his lifetime and published posthumously) shows that also Descartes might have preferred to be remembered as a supporter of [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]].</p>
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</div>
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  <div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Descartes.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[René Descartes]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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----
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Growing knowledge upward</h2></div>
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<div class="col-md-7"><h3>Science on a crossroads</h3>
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<p> </p>
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[[File:Crossroads.jpg]]<br><small><center>Science on a Crossroads ideogram</center></small>
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<p> </p>
 +
<p>The [[Science on a Crossroads ideogram]] points to the possibility to reverse the narrow and technical focus in the sciences – and create general insights and principles about any theme that matters. In the explanation of this ideogram we outline a method by which this can be achieved.</p>
 +
<p>The [[Science on a Crossroads ideogram]] depicts the point in the evolution of science when it was understood that the Newton's concepts and "laws" were not parts of the nature's inner machinery, which Newton <em>discovered</em> – but his own creation, and an approximation. Two directions of growth opened up to science – downward, and upward.  The sequence of scientists "converging to zero" in the ideogram suggests that only the "downward" option was followed.</p></div>
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</div>
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  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><h3>The moment when this happened</h3>
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<p>It has turned out that the very moment when science reached those crossroads has been recorded!</p>
 +
<p>In his "Autobiographical Notes", after describing how the successes of science that resulted from Newton's classical results led to a wide-spread belief that there wasn't really much more than that, as we saw above, Einstein discusses on a couple of pages the anomalies, results of experiments and observed phenomena that were not amenable to such explanation. He then concludes:
 +
<blockquote>Enough of this. Newton, forgive me; you found just about the only way possible in your age for a man of highest reasoning and creative power. The concepts that you created are even today still guiding our thinking in physics, although we now know that they will have to be replaced by others further removed from the sphere of immediate experience, if we aim at a profounder
 +
understanding of relationships.</blockquote></p></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Einstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Albert Einstein]]</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Why the direction "up" was ignored</h3>
 +
<p>The direction "up" is a natural direction for the growth of anything – and of knowledge in particular. Hans't the insight, the wisdom, the general principle, always been the very hallmark of knowledge? So why did science continue its growth only downward – toward more technical, more precise – and more obscure results?</p>
 +
<p>The reason is obvious, and it is also suggested by Einstein: It had to be done, "if we aim at a profounder understanding of relationships" – that is, of natural phenomena. They turned out to be far more complex than it was originally believed.</p>
 +
<p>The bottom-level reality picture turned out to be retreating ever deeper – as the scientists aimed "at a profounder understanding of relationships".</p>
 +
<p>So why not do as Newton did <em>in all walks of life</em> i.e. wherever solid knowledge is needed – create <em>approximate</em> models that serve us <em>well enough</em>? </p>
 +
<p>The answer is obvious. The disciplinary organization of knowledge had already taken shape. Einstein being "a physicist", his job was to study the physical phenomena, in terms of the masses and velocities and mathematical formulas. </p>
 +
<p>The job of updating the whole production of knowledge – <em>and</em> the job of creating high-level insights  –  happened to be in nobody's job description. And hence they remained undone.</p>
 +
<p>By giving those two lines of work a name, [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]], we undertake to call them into existence.</p>
 +
 +
<h3>Guided evolution of knowledge</h3>
 +
<p>The evolution of knowledge is further directed by defining the criteria, what knowledge needs to be like. The [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] definition includes four criteria, which are substituted for "the correspondence with reality".</p>
 +
<p>By convention, having a correct [[gestalt|<em>gestalt</em>]] is what "being informed" is all about. You may know the exact temperature i every room, and even the CO2 percentages in the air. But it is only when you know that your house is on fire that you know that you need to evacuate the house and call the fire brigade.</p>
 +
</div></div>
 +
----
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Knowledge federation in two pictures</h2></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Information</h3>
 +
<p> </p>
 +
[[File:Information.jpg]] <br><small><center>Information ideogram</center></small>
 +
<p> </p>
 +
<p>The [[Information ideogram]] points to the structure of the information that [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] aims to produce. Or metaphorically, our theme here is the construction of a suitable 'light bulb', and the nature its 'light'. In the explanation of this ideogram it is shown how the methodological ideas just described support this construction. Or more to the point, and metaphorically – this [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] shows how to create information that is structured (or 'three-dimensional'), not 'flat'.</p>
 +
<p>The “i” in this image (which stands for "information") is composed of a circle on top of a square. The square stands for the technical and detailed [[low-level|<em>low-level</em>]] information. The square also stands for examining a theme or an issue from all sides. The circle stands for the general and immediately accessible [[high-level|<em>high-level</em>]] information. This ideogram posits that  information must have both. And in particular that without the former, without the 'dot on the i', the information is incomplete and ultimately pointless.</p>
 +
<p>This [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] also suggests how to create high-level views based on low-level ones. And to <em>justify</em> high-level claims based on low-level ones – by 'rounding off' or 'cutting corners'. </p></div></div>
 +
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Knowledge</h3>
 +
<p> </p>
 +
  [[File:Holarchy.jpg]]<br><small><center>Knowledge ideogram</center></small>
 +
<p> </p>
 +
<p>The [[Knowledge ideogram]] depicts [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a process – and also the kind of knowledge that this process aims to produce.</p>
 +
<p>It follows from the fundamentals we've just outlined that (when our goal is to inform the people) [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] will do its best to federate knowledge according to relevance – and adapt its choice of [[scope|<em>scope</em>]] to that task. The rationale is that "the best available" knowledge will generally be better than no knowledge at all. Knowledge, and information, are envisioned to exist as a <em>holarchy</em> – where the [[low-level|<em>low-level</em>]]  "pieces of information" or <em>holons</em> serve as side views for creating [[high-level|<em>high-level</em>]] insights. Multiple and even contradictory views on any theme are allowed to co-exist. A core function of [[knowledge federation|<em>federation</em>]] as a process is to continuously negotiate and re-evaluate the relevance and the credibility of those views.</p></div>
 +
</div>
 +
----
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Two examples</h2></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Power structure</h3>
 +
<p> </p>
 +
[[File:Power_Structure.jpg]] <br><small><center>Power Structure ideogram</center></small>
 +
<p> </p>
 +
<p>As a way of looking at the world or [[scope|<em>scope</em>]], the [[power structure|<em>power structure</em>]] empowers us to conceive of the traditional notions of "power holder" and "political enemy" in an entirely new way – and to reorient our ethical sensibilities and our political action accordingly.</p>
 +
<p>The [[Power Structure ideogram]] depicts the [[power structures|<em>power structure</em>]] as a structure, where seemingly distinct and independent entities such as monetary or power interests, the ideas we have about the world, and our own condition or health are tied together with subtle links, so that they evolve and function in co-dependence and synchrony. </p> </div></div>
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-6"><p>
 +
In "A Century of Camps", from which we've quoted the above paragraph, Zygmunt Bauman explained how even massive and unthinkable cruelty (of which the Holocaust is an example) can happen as a result of no more than (what we are calling) the structure of the system – and people just "doing their jobs".</p>
 +
<p>The [[power structures|<em>power structure</em>]] model explains in what way exactly malignant societal structures can evolve by the conventional "survival of the fittest".</p> </div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Bauman.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Zygmunt Bauman]]</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-7">
 +
<p>To legitimize the view in which <em>a complex structure</em> (and not a person or group endowed with intelligence and identifiable interests) is considered "the enemy", insights from a range of technical fields including combinatorial optimization, artificial intelligence and artificial life are combined with insights from the humanities – including Bauman's just quoted one.</p>
 +
<p>An effect of this model (central to the [[paradigm strategy|<em>paradigm strategy</em>]] we are presenting as our larger motivating vision) is that it entirely changes the nature of the political game, from "us against them" to "all of us against the [[power structures|<em>power structure</em>]]". </p>
 +
<p>By revealing the subtle links between our ideas about the world and power interests, the [[power structures|<em>power structure</em>]] helps us understand further why a new phase of evolution of democracy, marked by liberation and conscious creation of the ways in which we look at the world, is a necessary part of our liberation from renegade and misdirected power.</p>
 +
</div>
 +
</div>
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7"><h3>Convenience paradox</h3>
 +
<p> </p>
 +
[[File:Convenience_Paradox.jpg]] <br><small><center>Convenience Paradox ideogram</center></small>
 +
<p> </p>
 +
<p>Redirecting our "pursuit of happiness" is of course a natural way to give a new direction to our 'bus'. Informing our "pursuit of happiness" is also a natural application where the ideas presented above can be put to test.</p>
 +
<p>The [[Convenience Paradox ideogram]] depicts a situation where the pursuit of a more convenient direction (down) leads to an increasingly less convenient condition. The human figure in the ideogram is deciding which way to go. He wants his way (of life) to be more easy and pleasant, or more <em>convenient</em>. If he follows the direction that <em>seems</em> more convenient, he will end up in a less convenient <em>condition</em> – and vice versa. </p>
 +
<p>By representing the way to happiness as yin (which stands for dark, or obscure) in the traditional yin-yang ideogram, it is suggested that the way to convenience or happiness must be illuminated by suitable information.</p>
 +
<p>This ideogram is of course only the [[high-level|<em>high-level</em>]] part, the circle or the 'dot on the i'. Its [[low-level|<em>low-level</em>]] part or [[justification|<em>justification</em>]] consists of a variety of insights emanating from a broad variety of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] and traditions. The rationale is to select the ones that resulted from the experience of working with large numbers of people – and which have something important to tell us about our civilized condition; and about ways in which this condition could be radically improved.</p>
 +
</div></div>
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-6">
 +
<p><blockquote>
 +
The  process  of  civilization,  according  to  Alexander,  has  contaminated man’s biological and sensory equipment, with  a resultant crippling in the responses of the whole organism.  Tension  and  conflict  are  more  and  more  substituted  for  coordination.
 +
</blockquote>
 +
An example is the above core insight of F. M. Alexander, the founder of a therapy school called "Alexander Technique", which is now being taught worldwide.</p>
 +
</div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Alexander.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[F. M. Alexander]]</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7">
 +
<p>A more spectacular examples are from various Oriental traditions who pointed to the nature of "the way" (to happiness or fulfillment, represented by the dark Yin part of the ideogram), while calling it different names such as "Tao" or "Do" or "Yoga" or "Dharma" or "Tariqat". Taken together, they enable us to model the most interesting range of possibilities we are calling "happiness between one and plus infinity" – which is a direction in which our civilization's "progress" may most naturally continue. </p>
 +
<p>We'll say more about both of these themes, and how they are related, in Federation through Conversations – where we'll also initiate a conversation to collectively refine them and develop them further.</p>  </div>
 +
</div>
 +
 +
 +
---- OLDER ----
 +
 +
<div class="page-header" > <h1>Federation through Images</h1> </div>
 +
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Rebuilding knowledge work</h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7"><h3>The issue of epistemology</h3>
 +
<p>Our understanding of what constitutes good knowledge have evolved since antiquity, and they now find their foremost expression in science and philosophy. During the past century fundamental insights have been reached in science and philosophy that now enable us to develop knowledge work on entirely new principles – and on that basis repurpose knowledge and knowledge work, so that they may be adapted to their increasingly vital social role, of informing people. We shall summarize those insights briefly in our very first story in Federation through Stories. Here, however, we shall represent them largely by a single person and his insights – Albert Einstein. That turns out to be sufficient for our purpose. Einstein here appears in his usual role of an icon – representing "modern science"</p>
 +
<h3>Blueprint of a socio-technical lightbulb</h3>
 +
<p>If the word "epistemology" does not mean much to you, consider what is being told here as simply a description of a new principle of operation for the socio-technical lightbulb. That fire can provide us light, that we've known since before the civilization. But now we'll see that, metaphorically speaking, electricity can provide us an even much stronger light, which we can point at will to illuminate whatever needs to be seen. What will be described is both what 'electricity' here means, and how a lightbulb with suitable properties may be constructed.</p>
 +
<h3>Steps toward big picture science</h3>
 +
<p>We'll show how the characteristic approach to knowledge that has been developed in the sciences can be generalized and made applicable to any theme or issue. And most importantly, we shall see how this approach can be adapted to the need of creating big-picture information, and provide insight and orientation.</p>
 +
<p>We shall at the same time use some elements of this big-picture science, notably the [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]]. As we have seen, the [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] play in this generalization of science a similar role as mathematical formulas do in physics – they provide a general message about how the things are related, that can be recognized at a glance. An important use of [[ideograms|<em>ideograms</em>]] here is to provide a [[gestalt|<em>gestalt</em>]] – an insight into a nature of situation, which points to a way in which the situation may need to be handled.</p>
 +
----
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Repurposing science</h2>
 +
</div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7"><h3>The academic mirror</h3>
 +
<p> </p>
 +
[[File:Magical_Mirror.jpg]] <br><small><center>Mirror ideogram</center></small></div>
 +
<p> </p>
 +
<blockquote>On every university campus there is a [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]]. Busy with article deadlines and courses, we do not normally see it. But it <em>is</em> there! When we see ourselves in this [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]], we see the same world that we see around us. But we also see ourselves in the world.<blockquote>
 +
<p>The [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]] here stands for the insight, reached in so many different ways in 20th century's science and philosophy (which, as mentioned, we'll summarize very briefly in Federation through Stories), that we cannot really build our knowledge work solidly on the age-old assumption that the purpose of knowledge is to mirror the reality "objectively", i.e. as it truly is. </p>
 +
<p>When we see ourselves in the metaphorical academic [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]], we see that it is really <em>us</em> that have created both our knowledge and the methods by which knowledge is created. We see that we are not disembodied spirits hovering over the world and looking at it objectively – but people living in the world, and responsible for it.</p>
 +
<p>As the case is in Louis Carroll's familiar story, thus academic [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]] turns out to have some magical properties. For example, it is possible to walk right through it! And when we do, we find ourselves in an entirely different academic reality. (You may now understand [[knowledge federation|<em>Knowledge federation</em>]] as a model or [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] of that reality.)</p>
 +
<h3>A very brief justification</h3>
 +
 +
 +
 +
 +
<h3>A new foundation for knowledge</h3>
 +
<p>We are careful to walk our talk and present here only the big picture, and leave all the technical details and points of reference for the detailed views that bear the names of the ideograms. We will, however,  make an exception here and just name a single key technical idea that makes it all work most beautifully. What makes 'the magic' possible, of 'walking through the mirror', is what Villard Van Orman Quine called "truth by convention". By waving this 'magical wand', the age-old preoccupation with truth and meaning can be <em>consistently</em> transferred to what Herbert Simon called "sciences of the artificial" – which is really what, in technical terms, 'the reality behind the mirror' signifies. We let the interested reader discover the details with the help of the provided documents.</p></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-3">
 +
</div>
 +
 +
<!--
 +
---- LIBERATING SCIENCE ----
 +
 +
  <div class="col-md-6"><p>“I shall not hesitate to state here in a few sentences my epistemological credo. I see on the one side the totality of sense experiences and, on the other, the totality of the concepts and propositions that are laid down in books. (…) The system of concepts is a creation of man, together with the rules of syntax, which constitute the structure of the conceptual system. (…) All concepts, even those closest to experience, are from the point of view of logic freely chosen posits, just as is the concept of causality, which was the point of departure for this inquiry in the first place." It is significant that Einstein begins his Autobiographical Notes by stating his "epistemological credo". Isn't he doing  exactly what is being proposed here – spelling out his fundamental assumptions, instead of taking them for granted? There is a good reason why Einstein does that – he is preparing the ground for explaining his own contributions, and for the development of modern physics. In subtle yet ultimately obvious ways, the <em>point of departure</em> of modern physics was to challenge the age-old "epistemological credo" of traditional physics, and its worldview and concepts.</p></div>
 +
 +
<div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Einstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Albert Einstein]]</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
 +
------- GROWING KNOWLEDGE UPWARD
 +
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– Enough of this. Newton, forgive me...</h4></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-6"><p>Here a single text will provide sufficient illustration and support – Einstein's "Autobiographical Notes". In a similar way as Heisenberg does in Physics and Philosophy, Einstein first describes the successes of science that resulted by following the classical or Newton's way. Then he points to the discrepancies or anomalies, the phenomena that could not be explained in that way, and that needed completely new thinking. Then he concludes: "Enough of this. Newton, forgive me; you found just about the only way possible in your age for a man of highest reasoning and creative power. The concepts that you created are even today still guiding our thinking in physics, although we now know that they will have to be replaced by others further removed from the sphere of immediate experience, if we aim at a profounder
 +
understanding of relationships."</p></div>
 +
 +
  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Einstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Albert Einstein]]</center></small></div>
 +
 +
</div>
 +
 +
 +
 +
A [[historical introduction to epistemology]].
 +
 +
INSERT THIS
 +
 +
<p>Defines the meaning and purpose and value of information and knowledge</p>
 +
<p>If you understand the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] as pointing to a need, then [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]] is an academic way to do the same. We let this [[keywords|<em>keyword</em>]], [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]], mean considering knowledge and knowledge work as functional parts in a larger whole. We let it mean letting the extent in which knowledge informs and completes our lives and our society determine its value – not whether it's been created as some tradition requires; or whether it fits the worldview that some tradition has bestowed on us.</p>
 +
<p>Notice that the point of departure of any [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] is a new way in which knowledge is conceived of and valued. Galilei was not tried for claiming that the Earth was in motion, that was just a technicality. It was his [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] that got him in trouble – his belief "that one may hold and defend an opinion as probable after it has been declared contrary to Holy Scripture."  Galilei was required to "abjure, curse and detest" such dangerous beliefs. By conversing about the [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]], we'll be talking about the possibility of <em>yet another</em> such change.</p>
 +
<p><small><b>Subtleties</b> Liberation from hindrances to creativity (1) candles as institutions and institutionalized patterns of work and judgment etc. (2) reifications – that our worldview mirrors reality, and that our ways of exploring it give us access to objective reality (in sciences, media informing etc.). (3) The action  'design' here is made possible by [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]] – or postulation or convention making. We liberate language and method - AND make it applicable in general – by building on scientific methods and insights. More about this in Federation through Images below. 
 +
</small></p>
 +
 +
 +
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>A new ground for academic excellence</h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7"><h3>What distinguishes academic knowledge</h3>
 +
<p>No rational person will claim that knowledge should not be useful. And yet there are good reasons why the instruction in practical skills such as cooking and automobile repair – and at times even design and architecture – were not admitted to universities. Academic knowledge is the knowledge of principles; it is knowledge that is rigorously founded in time-tested scientific methods and procedures.</p>
 +
<h3>New insights are calling for an update</h3>
 +
<p>We here look at the [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] modeled by [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] from its fundamental side. Although it may at first glance appear as a disruption or a revolution, we shall see that it is indeed a natural continuation or <em>evo</em>lution of the revolutionary processes that began in science a century ago. We show how this development may <em>both</em> allow us to overcome the epistemological or fundamental incongruences that resulted from the disruptive insights that were reached in science – <em>and</em> give us the people the information we need.</p>
 +
<h3>Rebooting IT innovation</h3>
 +
<p>It needs to be emphasized – especially for the benefit of our members and colleagues who perceive [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as mainly a technical and technological field of interest – that what is being presented here is not at all a departure from that interest. On the contrary! The common practice is to use technology in general, and information technology in particular, to automate and enhance what the people are <em>already</em> doing (observe for ex. that your physical desktop, filing cabinet and mailbox have just been re-implemented in the digital medium). It is only when we go back to the purpose of what we do, or even further, to the underlying principles, and determine what information and the way we handle it may need to be like – that we become able to truly innovate. And truly benefit from technology. The Incredible History of Doug, presented in Federation through Stories, will illustrate this point.</p></div>
 +
</div>
 +
----
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>The nature of our images</h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7"><h3>Not all images are worth one thousand words</h3>
 +
<p>But the [[ideograms]] are! They play a similar role in [[knowledge federation]] as mathematical formulas do in traditional science. An ideogram can condense a wealth of insights and many pages of text into an image whose message can be recognized at a glance. Recall the Newton's formula, or Einstein's ubiquitous E=mc&sup2;  – those too are ideograms! But the possibilities behind the ideographic approach are endless, and they vastly surpass the conventional maths.</p>
 +
<p>The creative possibilities of [[ideograms|<em>ideograms</em>]] also surpass ''our'' illustrations – and are yet to be developed through creative use of new media.</p>
 +
<p>The ideogram we are about to see next renders the essential ideas behind our initiative in a nutshell.</p></div>
 +
</div>
 +
----
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>A case for informed creativity</h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-6"><h3>Modernity ideogram</h3>
 +
<p>The [[Modernity ideogram]] is a visual definition of the challenge to which we offer [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as an answer.</p>
 +
[[File:Modernity.jpg]] <br><small><center>Modernity ideogram</center></small>
 +
</div>
 +
</div>
 +
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7">
 +
<p>Imagine us riding in a bus with candle headlights, through obscure and uncharted terrain, and at an accelerating speed. By representing our civilization as a bus, and our handling of information as its candle headlights, the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] points to an incongruence. Could it indeed be possible (aren't we living in the Age of Information?) that information is that one centrally important thing that we've somehow forgotten to modernize?</p>
 +
<p>To be meaningfully directed and sustainable, posits the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]], our movement into the future must be suitably informed. The knowledge work we have inherited will not fulfill that role. It has evolved based on an old principle of operation and technology, and for an entirely different purpose. A new <em>approach</em> to knowledge is needed, which combines the new purpose with new technology.</p>
 +
<p>The Modernity ideogram is also a visual definition of some of our core [[keywords|<em>keywords</em>]].</p>
 +
<h3>Knowledge federation</h3>
 +
<p>You may now easily understand [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] of a socio-technical 'light bulb'. You may understand our proposal as an initiative to create new 'headlights', and to put them to practical use.</p>
 +
<p>No sequence of improvements of the candle will produce the light bulb. Hence we found it necessary to produce this [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] as a proof of concept. The claim we now submit to our dialog is "Suitable 'headlights' <em>can</em> indeed be created, in accordance with time-honored academic values and insights – and here is how."</p>
 +
<h3>Systemic innovation</h3>
 +
<p>The headlights are just a tiny part of the bus. Their monetary value is negligible in comparison. And yet they will determine the actual value of the whole big thing! The design of the headlights will ultimately decide whether the 'bus' will be a mass-suicide machine, or a vehicle taking us safely to any place or condition where we may reasonably want to be.</p>
 +
<p>We define [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] as "innovation toward [[wholeness|<em>wholeness</em>]]".  [[systemic innovation|<em>Systemic innovation</em>]] is the innovation whose goal is to secure the wholeness or proper functioning of the system or systems in which what is being innovated has a role. [[knowledge federation|<em>Knowledge federation</em>]] may now be understand as (a result of) [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] in knowledge work.</p>
 +
<p>Notice that [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] depends on a profound change of values. It is an alternative to treating information, or anything else, as a commodity. And to allowing "shareholder value" or  "market needs" to orient what we do, and trusting that "the invisible hand" will transport us deftly to the best possible world.</p>
 +
<h3>Guided evolution of society</h3>
 +
<p>The [[Modernity ideogram]] is also a straightforward illustration of Bela H. Banathy's keyword [[guided evolution of society|<em>guided evolution of society</em>]] – which we'll use here as (roughly) a synonym to "sustainable development". The [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] points to [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as an initiative to provide "evolutionary guidance"; and as a natural first step on this new evolutionary course.</p>
 +
<h3>Design epistemology</h3>
 +
<p>The [[design epistemology|<em>Design epistemology</em>]] is a set of values that can orient knowledge work in this new direction. Information and knowledge are seen as a system within a system, and handled and prioritized accordingly.</p>
 +
<p>A salient characteristic of this epistemological stance is that it not legitimizes the line of work that is the subject of our proposal as "academic" – but it even elevates its status to "basic research".</p> </div>
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</div>
 +
----
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>How to turn a candle into a light bulb</h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7"><h3>Philosophy in pictures</h3>
 +
<p>"And what is the use of a book, thought Alice, without pictures or conversations." Here we'll turn the philosophical ideas that [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] is based on into pictures. And in Federation through Conversations we'll also make them a subject of our conversation. </p>
 +
<p>Click on the name of the [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] to open the document where the reversal or the practice is justified and explained by pointing to core insights of selected 20<sup>th</sup> century [[giants|<em>giants</em>]].</p></div>
 +
</div>
 +
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2></h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-6"><h3>Changing the purpose</h3>
 +
<p>The  [[Mirror ideogram]] points to the possibility of reversing the conventional assumptions about the purpose of knowledge work. Since they determines how we valuate and prioritize knowledge work, and give its results credibility and status, we call this set of assumptions [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]].</p>
 +
<p>"On every university campus there is a [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]] – although, busy with our article deadlines and courses, we do not normally see it," reads the explanation of this [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]].  "When we see ourselves in the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]], we see the same world that we see around us. But we also see ourselves in the world." The [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]] here symbolizes the insights reached in 20th century's science and philosophy, which challenged the age-old belief that our purpose in knowledge work is to describe the reality "objectively", i.e. as it truly is – and even the underlying assumption that such a description is possible.</p>
 +
<p>As the case is in Louis Carroll's familiar story, it is possible to walk right through the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]]! And when one does, one finds himself in an entirely different academic reality, which is in a number of ways a reverse image of the reality we've grown accustomed to. [[knowledge federation|<em>Knowledge federation</em>]] may be understood as a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] of that new reality.</p>
 +
<p>We are careful to walk our talk and present here only the big picture, and leave all the technical details and points of reference for the detailed views that bear the names of the ideograms. We will, however,  make an exception here and just name a single key technical idea that makes it all work most beautifully. What makes 'the magic' possible, of 'walking through the mirror', is what Villard Van Orman Quine called "truth by convention". By waving this 'magical wand', the age-old preoccupation with truth and meaning can be <em>consistently</em> transferred to what Herbert Simon called "sciences of the artificial" – which is really what, in technical terms, 'the reality behind the mirror' signifies. We let the interested reader discover the details with the help of the provided documents.</p></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Magical_Mirror.jpg]] <br><small><center>Mirror ideogram</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2></h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-6"><h3>Changing the principle of operation</h3>
 +
<p>And so 'on the other side of the mirror', we can freely yet academically create new methods or methodologies, by stating them as conventions. [[polyscopy|<em>Polyscopy</em>]] is conceived and offered as a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]]. Think of it as a generalization of the "scientific method", adapted to the purpose of providing information according to (new) needs. If you feel passionate (or religious) about the traditional scientific method, please don't consider this an assault. By calling it a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]], we make it clear that it's just a way to spell out the rules, and then democratically and academically continue to update them forever.</p>
 +
<p>The reversal pointed to by the [[Polyscopy ideogram]] is of the supposition that to be "academic" or "scientific", we must adhere to the hereditary terminology and methods of an established academic discipline. Our design team simplified this [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] by deleting the two eyes that were originally on the left-hand side of each of the conic tubes, to suggest that they represent "ways of looking" or [[scope|<em>scopes</em>]]. The message is that when we've understood that <em>any</em> language and method are our own that is, human creation, and that they necessarily <em>limit</em> what we are able to see and communicate, it becomes natural to adjust them so that we may see more, and see what needs to be sees.</p>
 +
<p>We show how this may be achieved in the creative space on other side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]], by creating a general-purpose methodology – which allows us "to direct the mind so that it brings solid and true judgments about everything that presents itself to it", as Descartes already claimed we should. But the reversal pointed to by this [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] reaches indeed much further than that!</p>
 +
<p>In [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]]  (by convention) no reality claims are possible. Hence our concepts, and models, become just [[scope|<em>scopes</em>]] – ways of looking at experience, and ways of organizing and communicating what we see. To see how this fits with our purpose, think of inspecting a hand-held cup, to see if it's cracked or whole. You must be able to see it from all sides! And if you discover one side that is cracked – then the whole thing <em>is</em> cracked! In [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] the traditional challenge of producing "the right" view is replaced by the challenge of producing a collection of simple and clear views that together give us a correct idea of the whole. This challenge may be understood if we think of using projective geometry to draw the design of a cup. The consequences are interesting, and we let the interested reader explore them with the help of provided documents. </p></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Polyscopy.jpg]] <br><small><center>Polyscopy ideogram</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2></h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-6"><h3>Extending the outreach</h3>
 +
<p>The [[Science on a Crossroads ideogram]] points to the possibility to reverse the narrow and technical focus in the sciences – and create general insights and principles about any theme that matters. In the explanation of this ideogram we outline a method by which this can be achieved.</p>
 +
<p>The [[Science on a Crossroads ideogram]] depicts the point in the evolution of science when it was understood that the Newton's concepts and "laws" were not parts of the nature's inner machinery that Newton discovered – but his own creation, and an approximation. Two directions of growth opened up to science. One direction was "downward" –  to fix the "Newton's Laws" by making the concepts and the formulas less intuitive but more exact. The other direction, "upward", was to do in all walks of life what Newton did in physics – create approximate but precise-enough concepts and models, which can vastly improve our understanding of the most <em>relevant</em> issues, and correspondingly orient and improve the way we handle them. The sequence of scientists "converging to zero" in the ideogram suggests that only the "downward" option was followed.</p>
 +
<p>Again it's the design of [[scope|<em>scopes</em>]], through convention making, that makes the creation of high-level views possible. In [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] models don't need to be low-level and technical to be "scientific" or rigorous. Being our own creation, all models (that is, on all levels of detail or abstraction) are defined just as clearly as we may want them to be. </p></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Crossroads.jpg]]<br><small><center>Science on a Crossroads ideogram</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2></h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-6"><h3>Improving the light</h3>
 +
<p>The [[Information ideogram]] points to the structure of the information that [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] aims to produce. Or metaphorically, our theme here is the construction of a suitable 'light bulb', and the nature its 'light'. In the explanation of this ideogram it is shown how the methodological ideas just described support this construction. Or more to the point, and metaphorically – this [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] shows how to create information that is structured (or 'three-dimensional'), not 'flat'.</p>
 +
<p>The “i” in this image (which stands for "information") is composed of a circle on top of a square. The square stands for the technical and detailed [[low-level|<em>low-level</em>]] information. The square also stands for examining a theme or an issue from all sides. The circle stands for the general and immediately accessible [[high-level|<em>high-level</em>]] information. This ideogram posits that  information must have both. And in particular that without the former, without the 'dot on the i', the information is incomplete and ultimately pointless.</p>
 +
<p>This [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] also suggests how to create high-level views based on low-level ones. And to <em>justify</em> high-level claims based on low-level ones – by 'rounding off' or 'cutting corners'. </p></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Information.jpg]] <br><small><center>Information ideogram</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2></h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-6"><h3>Putting the pieces together</h3>
 +
<p>The [[Knowledge ideogram]] depicts [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a process – and also the kind of knowledge that this process aims to produce.</p>
 +
<p>It follows from the fundamentals we've just outlined that (when our goal is to inform the people) [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] will do its best to federate knowledge according to relevance – and adapt its choice of [[scope|<em>scope</em>]] to that task. The rationale is that "the best available" knowledge will generally be better than no knowledge at all. Knowledge, and information, are envisioned to exist as a <em>holarchy</em> – where the [[low-level|<em>low-level</em>]]  "pieces of information" or <em>holons</em> serve as side views for creating [[high-level|<em>high-level</em>]] insights. Multiple and even contradictory views on any theme are allowed to co-exist. A core function of [[knowledge federation|<em>federation</em>]] as a process is to continuously negotiate and re-evaluate the relevance and the credibility of those views.</p></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Holarchy.jpg]]<br><small><center>Knowledge ideogram</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
----
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Selected examples</h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7"><p>A significant part of [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] and its presentation here as a proof of concept is to show that it can make a difference in real-life applications. The Modernity ideogram is suggesting that when proper 'headlights' are put in place, then 'the bus' will naturally change its course. Is this really the case?</p>
 +
<p>While waiting for a proper answer to be given in Federation through Stories, where a complete portfolio of our [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]] will be displayed, we here show only three examples as taste bits and illustration.</p></div>
 +
</div>
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<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-6"><h3>Redirecting innovation</h3>
 +
<p> By redirecting knowledge work and innovation, the [[Modernity ideogram]] itself is already a significant part of the answer. The explanations are given above, and they don't need to be repeated.</p></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Modernity2.jpg]]<br><small><center>Modernity ideogram</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7"><h3>Redirecting the pursuit of happiness</h3>
 +
<p>Giving direction to our "pursuit of happiness" is of course another obviously rich domain of application of these ideas. Presently this most pivotal of our pursuits is a prime exemplar of what Einstein branded "a plebeian illusion" (that the world "really is" as perceived by us through our senses). We may caricature it by the image of someone who discovered he liked the taste of chocolate cake, and then "pursued happiness" by eating chocolate cake to the point where his tummy began to hurt; and <em>nothing</em> tasted well, including the chocolate cake. Add to this the half-a-trillion-dollars-a-year global advertising industry (which combines science with communication design to make us want <em>even more</em> 'chocolate cake', because the 'chocolate cake industry' depends on that); add also us, academic scientists, looking the other way (because this is none of our business, and because we have more important matters to occupy ourselves with) – and you'll have a complete picture of how the creation, and evolution, of our culture are presently handled.</p></div>
 +
</div>
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-6"><p>The [[Convenience Paradox ideogram]] shows how this theme may be taken up with the help of the techniques pointed to above.  The ideogram depicts a situation where the pursuit of a more convenient direction (down) leads to an increasingly less convenient condition. By representing the way that in the long run leads us to either happiness or misery as the yin (which stands for dark, or obscure) in the traditional yin-yang ideogram, it is suggested that the way to convenience or happiness must be illuminated by suitable information.</p>
 +
<p>But this ideogram is of course only the high-level part, the circle, or the 'dot on the i'. Its low-level part or justification consists of a variety of insights from a diverse range of fields (which brings together <em>experiences</em> from physiotherapy traditions such as Feldenkrais and Alexander, modern psychoanalysis, Buddhism and other similar traditions...) to establish the [[convenience paradox|<em>convenience paradox</em>]] as a [[patterns|<em>pattern</em>]]. The high-level part brings the low-level views together and gives them relevance (they provide us exactly the information we need to be able to truly improve our condition). </p></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Convenience_Paradox.jpg]] <br><small><center>Convenience Paradox ideogram</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Redirecting politics</h3>
 +
<p>Another strong pursuit that gives direction to our societal and cultural evolution is our pursuit of justice. But who is the enemy?</p>
 +
<p>The question opened up here – and in several other points of this presentation as well – might be "now that we live in democracy (or those of us who have been so fortunate) – is this the end point of our historical pursuit for a just and humane social organization? Or is there still something we may discover, which may give new direction and even meaning to this pursuit?</p>
 +
<p>The [[Power Structure ideogram]] depicts the [[power structure|<em>power structure</em>]] as a new or a designed way to conceive of the traditional notions "power holder" and "political enemy". The power structure is a structure which combines power interests (represented by the dollar sign), our values and ideas (represented by the book) and our condition of wellbeing (represented by the stethoscope). A point of the ideogram is that those visible entities evolve together and depend on one another – but this dependence is subtle, and needs to be illuminated by suitable information.</p>
 +
<p>The justification combines insights from a spectrum of areas ranging from sociology (for ex. the works of Bauman and Bourdieu) to artificial intelligence and combinatorial optimization.</p>
 +
<p>Two key insights result: That "the enemy is us"... and that our social-systemic evolution, when abandoned to "the survival of the fittest", tends to result in growing and strengthening power structures...</p>
 +
</div>
 +
<div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Power_Structure.jpg]] <br><small><center>Power Structure ideogram</center></small></div>
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</div>
 +
----
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<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h2>See also</h2></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-7"><h3>Further methodological ideas and details</h3>
 +
<p>A good place to begin might be the blog post [https://polyscopy.wordpress.com/2010/02/07/return-to-reason/ Return to Reason]. This blog post is an explanation of the ''historicity'' of our conventional academic standards and practices (that they are not eternal ways to truth, but a product of specific circumstances and historical incidents that gave them their present shape) – which builds upon an expert opinion (Stephen Toulmin, whose book "Return to Reason" is surveyed and commented in the blog post, was a reputed philosopher of science). The book manuscript Informing Must be Designed (whose [https://folk.uio.no/dino/IDBook/Introduction.pdf introduction] is open but whose chapters need to be unlocked with the password "Dubrovnik") introduces the methods and techniques of polyscopy, and then applies them to justify the claim made in its title (which is the same as the main message of the Modernity ideogram).  Chapter 4 introduces a novel way of understanding the power and politics – and shows why the new approach to knowledge is a <em>necessary</em> part of our "societal immune system". A more recent presentation of the foundations and method of [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] titled "What might play the role of Copernicus" (hear [https://soundcloud.com/dinokarabeg/polyscopy-v1-no2-copernicus this recording] while viewing [https://www.dropbox.com/s/yj34myh776opdxe/PolyScopy%20Philosophy.pdf?dl=0 these slides]) is a play on the theme of another metaphor, Archimedes claim that he could "move the world" if he'd be given a lever and "a firm place to stand". An approach to knowledge is described that is capable of 'moving' our social and cultural world (a task to which we must give priority, now that we've acquired to "move" our physical world, albeit not always in the best possible way...).</p>
 +
</div>
 +
</div>
 +
 +
 +
 +
<!-- OLD STUFF
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 +
----
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>We can liberate knowledge and creativity from disciplinary straitjackets.</h4></div>
 +
 +
  <div class="col-md-5"><p>The first reversal on the other side of the metaphorical mirror is of the way the language and the method are handled.</p>
 +
 +
<p>To see what we are talking about, let us briefly revisit our conventional approach: To obtain an academic license, we are <em>disciplined</em> to adhere to the language and the methods of an established academic discipline (by becoming "philosophy doctors"). We are then instructed to look at the world with the attitude of impartial, disinterested or "objective" observers. The rationale is that we then become able to depict the world as it truly is.</p>
 +
 +
<p>The reversal pointed to by this ideogram is so thorough and so germane to [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] that we are calling the ideogram the Polyscopy ideogram. Our design team simplified this ideogram by deleting the eye that was originally  on the left-hand side of each of the conic tubes, to suggest that they represent "ways of looking" or [[scope|<em>scopes</em>]]. The idea, represented by the <em>ideogram</em>, is that when we've identified the language and methods of scientific disciplines as something that <em>limits</em> what we are able to see, it becomes natural to make adjustments so that we may see more, and see what needs to be seen. In the creative space on the other side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]], this is enabled by allowing for the concepts and methods, and even for the fundamental assumptions and values which orient and determine what we do, to be defined by convention. </p>
 +
 +
<p>This reversal empowers us to once again be creative on the level on which the great forefathers of science were creative – instead of turning their methods into an orthodoxy, and repeating them forever.</p></div>
 +
 +
<div class="col-md-4"> [[File:Polyscopy.jpg]] <br><small><center>Polyscopy ideogram</center></small></div>
 +
 +
</div>
 +
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>We can <em>create</em> concepts and methods.</h4></div>
 +
 +
  <div class="col-md-9"><p>To see the extent and the depth of change, consider the present-day academic value matrix: The most valued work, the so-called "basic research", is the study of the mechanisms of nature <em>by using the standaredized disciplinary terminology and procedures</em>. But does this really make sense on the other side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]]? This reversal introduces a whole new dimension of possibilities, where we are allowed to and encouraged to be creative on the level of concepts and method. And where even the re-creation of the conventional routines is considered a NEW notion of "basic research".</p>
 +
 +
<p>Isn't that what we've been showing all along? And isn't that in essence the new frontier our readers are being invited to develop? Don't be deceived by the informal "raggedy" language we are speaking – the work we are doing to establish this frontier is academically thorough in the best old-fasioned academic sense...</p></div>
 +
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</div>
 +
 +
<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>Multiple ways of looking can be more useful than a one-way "reality picture".</h4></div>
 +
 +
  <div class="col-md-9"><p>[[polyscopy|<em>Polyscopy</em>]] reverses even the very meaning of information. If we are not claiming the reality of our models – then what is it really that we are saying, when we make a statement or a claim? The answer is that those are <em>scopes</em> – ways of looking, which we share with one another to see more and better. And ultimately to see what needs to be seen.</p>
 +
 +
<p>The Polyscopy ideogram points to a reversal of even the very attitude we have toward claims and ideas. Instead of rejecting whatever fails to agree with our dominant worldview, instead of devising ways to convince or coerce the trespassers, our attitude conforms to the new ethical doex of the [[dialog|<em>dialog</em>]]: We <em>suspend</em> judgement and keep at bay own propensity to reject and criticize. On the other side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]] crusading for a single worldview is understood as an impediment to both communication and creativity. Our propensity to be exclusive about our worldview is readily seen as a product of our socialization. Hence we do our best to see things in the way that's been offered, through the offered <em>scope</em>. </p> </div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>We can broaden the scientific method; we can make it applicable to any question or issue.</h4></div>
 +
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  <div class="col-md-9"><p>In <em>polyscopy</em> the terms of the language can be freely – yet rigorously and precisely – created by convention. We call them [[keywords|<em>keywords</em>]]. When we want to emphasize that a concept is intended to be interpreted as defined, we italicize it. This enables us to create  precise and even rigorous ways to look at any chosen subject. We not only do not <em>impose</em> our way of looking at things, but we indeed consider it an obligation, and an integral part of the ethos of communication, to explain or <em>justify</em> the <em>scope</em> (why have we chosen to look at the given theme, and why in exactly that specific way or ways). The rationale is that less relevant themes and ways of looking should not take away the attention from the more relevant ones.</p>
 +
 +
<p>The [[Polyscopic Modeling]] [[methodology|<em>methodology</em>]] is conceived as a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] of a general-purpose methodology – it allows us to create or federate insights and ideas about any subject, and at any level of generality or abstraction. Instead of choosing our subject of study according to the habitual areas of interest and language and method of a discipline, we become free to direct our attention and to prioritize our interests by other concern, notably by their relevance to knowledge work, and to society. What new themes, what types of insights and results are thereby made possible? The [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] prototype elaborates the various consequences of this more creative and more responsible or responsive approach to creative work in quite a bit of detail.</p>
 +
 +
<p>Similarly, [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] is conceived as a set of technologies and technology-enabled social processes that allow even contradictory ideas  to co-exist in the same knowledge-work space. As a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]],  it is a continuously evolving set of practices and social processes, which amount to "collective thinking". The veracity, relevance and compatibility of the stated ideas are continuously brought into relationships, re-evaluated and re-negotiated.</p></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– I see on the one side the totality of sense experiences and, on the other, the totality of the concepts and propositions that are laid down in books. </h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><p>“I shall not hesitate to state here in a few sentences my epistemological credo. I see on the one side the totality of sense experiences and, on the other, the totality of the concepts and propositions that are laid down in books. (…) The system of concepts is a creation of man, together with the rules of syntax, which constitute the structure of the conceptual system. (…) All concepts, even those closest to experience, are from the point of view of logic freely chosen posits, just as is the concept of causality, which was the point of departure for this inquiry in the first place." It is significant that Einstein begins his Autobiographical Notes by stating his "epistemological credo". Isn't he doing  exactly what is being proposed here – spelling out his fundamental assumptions, instead of taking them for granted? There is a good reason why Einstein does that – he is preparing the ground for explaining his own contributions, and for the development of modern physics. In subtle yet ultimately obvious ways, the <em>point of departure</em> of modern physics was to challenge the age-old "epistemological credo" of traditional physics, and its worldview and concepts.</p></div>
 +
 +
<div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Einstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Albert Einstein]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>We can turn Einstein's "epistemological credo" into a convention.</h4></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-9"><p><em>Which</em> inquiry was Einstein pointing to in the just-quoted excerpt? Well, obviously, the inquiry of science... Causality is <em>the</em> chosen principle of explanation in the sciences: We understand how the nature works, and we explain how the observed phenomena are <em>caused</em> by the underlying mechanisms. But for all we know, says Einstein, <em>even causality</em> is a human-made concept, and a human-made way of looking at things.</p>
 +
 +
<p>The point of departure of [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]]  is to turn Einstein's "epistemological credo" into a convention. Why? Because it is by spelling out the underlying assumptions that we can create a solid basis for changing the rules, the values and the practices as well. And also because by making <em>experience</em> rather than "reality" (as "reflected" by the repertoire of results in the traditional sciences) be the ultimate ground on which the veracity and the value of an insight will rely, we become able to "prove" or as we prefer to say [[justify|<em>justify</em>]]  models in all walks of life – simply by showing that they are consistent with human experience.</p>
 +
 +
<p>Experience can – and does – take very many forms. All of them count. The procedure (whose details are provided in the documents linked below) for establishing a claim as trustworthy or "true" is a combination of the traditional scientific method and the trial by jury. As the experience with [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] shows, this democratizes the truth and meaning profoundly, and opens up to some most interesting cultural and other consequences – ultimately enabling us to aim toward the large and sweeping societal paradigm shift. </p></div>
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</div>
 +
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.</h4></div>
 +
  <div class="col-md-6"><p>We've seen it written that all of philosophy had been footnotes to Plato – and then came Wittgenstein... Wittgenstein is a natural icon for the philosophy's view of the point we are making here, that language imposes restrictions on communication. Although the quoted statement is from the Tractacus, which Wittgenstein later disclaimed, we share it here as an ideographic summary of his Philosophical Investigations as well. By describing the "language games" (masons passing to one another commands from the limited range including "block", "pillar", "slab" and "beam") Wittgenstein pointed to the intrinsic limitations which philosophy may share with science and with any other generalization – when the words we use to generalize or "philosophize" are 'lifted up' from the social context where they originated, they tend to lose their original meaning. They no longer make a well-defined sense! It would appear that we cannot really communicate at all outside of the traditional 'language games' – which might well mean that we cannot deliberately and consciously find a way out of the existing paradigm and begin a new one. But fortunately there's a way out, as we have seen – the truth by convention, or [[scope design|<em>scope design</em>]] as polyscopy has been calling it.</p>
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</div>
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  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Wittgenstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Ludwig Wittgenstein]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– The nineteenth century developed an extremely rigid frame for natural science which formed not only science but also the general outlook of great masses of people. </h4></div>
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 +
<div class="col-md-6"><p>In his 1958 book-essay "Physics and Philosophy" [[Werner Heisenberg]] explains how "The nineteenth century developed an extremely rigid frame for natural science which formed not only science but also the general outlook of great masses of people. (...) This frame was so narrow and rigid that it was difficult to find a place in it for many concepts of our language that had always belonged to its very substance, for instance, the concepts of mind, of the human soul, or of life." The entire monograph is an historical account explaining how this worldview become dominant, and how ''the modern physics rigorously disproved it''. Heisenberg concludes that  "one may say that the most important change brought about by the results of modern physics consists in the dissolution of this rigid frame of concepts of the nineteenth century".</p>
 +
 +
<p>The <em>most important</em> change? Heisenberg is not talking only about the limitations of the scientific language (however important the language might be), but about the evolution of our culture, including our values and way of being in the world – which of course determine the course our civilization has taken, and our future. We have made an error, says Heisenberg, in spite of our best intentions, and for understandable and justifiable reasons. We have given the people a narrow, excluding worldview that damaged some of the most vital parts of our culture. Fortunately, we are now in the position to correct that error, because science has discovered the error, it has proven that "the rigid frame" was wrong. </p>
 +
 +
<p> Let us highlight here what may be obvious, because this consequence of Heisenberg's 1958 insight is far too important to be missed: We have <em>an obligation</em> to correct  this error.</p></div>
 +
 +
  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Heisenberg.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Werner Heisenberg]]</center></small></div>
 +
</div>
 +
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– It needs but half an eye to see in these latter days that science, the Grand Revelator of modern Western culture, has reached, without having intended to, a frontier.</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><p>[[Benjamin Lee Whorf]] diagnosed the resulting situation as follows (already in the 1940s!): "It needs but half an eye to see in these latter days that science, the Grand Revelator of modern Western culture, has reached, without having intended to, a frontier. Either it must bury its dead, close its ranks, and go forward into a landscape of increasing strangeness, replete with things shocking to a culture-trammelled understanding, or it must become, in Claude Houghton’s expressive phrase, the plagiarist of its own past."</p>
 +
 +
<p>This brief diagnosis by this visionary thinker hardly needs interpretation. It does, however, merit a moment of reflection, to digest the nuances it is pointing to – and we encourage the reader to pause and honor this opportunity. </p></div>
 +
 +
  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Whorf.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Benjamin Lee Whorf]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
 +
  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– The objective of studies needs to be to direct the mind so that it brings solid and true judgments about everything that presents itself to it.</h4></div>
 +
 +
  <div class="col-md-6"><p>René Descartes is often "credited" as the philosophical father of the limiting (reductionistic) side of science. This Rule 1 from his manuscript "Rules for the Direction of the Mind" (unfinished during his lifetime and published posthumously) shows that even Descartes might have rather be remembered as a supporter of [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]].</p>
 +
</div>
 +
 +
  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Descartes.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[René Descartes]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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 +
----
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>Knowledge can grow upward.</h4></div>
 +
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  <div class="col-md-5"><p>The second reversal is of the direction in which knowledge is growing.</p>
 +
 +
<p>To see what we are talking about, consider the familiar orientation on technical work and details in the sciences. Consider the focus of media informing on events – however insignificant... The point is that both are "reality" – and isn't that what good knowledge and knowledge work are about?"</p>
 +
 +
<p> The vertical axis and the direction "up" have a distinguished role in <em>polyscopy</em>.  A characteristic result of pursuing this direction is a general insight, principle, rule of thumb... Think of walking up a mountain. What we see down below is the forests, but not the trees. From this venture point we become able to see where the ways are leading to, and choose the one we might want to follow. Later, when we descend from the mountain, we acquire again the more detailed view, which we need to be able to navigate the chosen way.</p>
 +
 +
<p>There's an obvious reason why the direction "down" has acquired prominence: It is <em>there</em> that the presumed "bottom-level reality" is to be found!</p>
 +
 +
<p>In contrast to that, it is by pursuing the direction "up" that we find insights, values, new opinions... and in a word – culture! "Up" is the domain of artistic expression...</p>
 +
 +
<p>The Science on a Crossroads ideogram depicts the point when it was understood that the Newton's concepts and "laws" were not a discovery of the inner workings of nature, but his own creation and an approximation. Two directions of development opened up to science. One direction was to to develop science "downward" – away from daily-life and even intuitive concepts and concerns, and toward greater rigor, precision and detail. The other direction, "upward", was to do in all walks of life what Newton did in physics – create approximate but precise enough concepts and models, which can vastly improve our understanding of <em>new</em> issues, and suitably redirect our action. The sequence of scientists "converging to zero" in the ideogram is there to indicate that only the former option was followed. And that the result of pursuing this direction "to the limit" was that both science and scientists became 'smaller'. </p></div>
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<div class="col-md-4"> [[File:Crossroads.jpg]] <br><small><center>Science on a Crossroads ideogram</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– Enough of this. Newton, forgive me...</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><p>Here a single text will provide sufficient illustration and support – Einstein's "Autobiographical Notes". In a similar way as Heisenberg does in Physics and Philosophy, Einstein first describes the successes of science that resulted by following the classical or Newton's way. Then he points to the discrepancies or anomalies, the phenomena that could not be explained in that way, and that needed completely new thinking. Then he concludes: "Enough of this. Newton, forgive me; you found just about the only way possible in your age for a man of highest reasoning and creative power. The concepts that you created are even today still guiding our thinking in physics, although we now know that they will have to be replaced by others further removed from the sphere of immediate experience, if we aim at a profounder
 +
understanding of relationships."</p></div>
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  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Einstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Albert Einstein]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>Why knowledge grows downward</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-9"><p>Observe that "up" is a good and natural direction of growth for knowledge as well – toward insight, wisdom, general principle that cover many specific cases... Notice that this – the capability to formulate such principles – was what made science great, what gave it the high esteem we scientists now enjoy. It was why scientific knowledge was accepted as the standard of good knowledge.  How in the world did this get reversed?</p>
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<p>
 +
A long story made very short (but the long story is important, and we offer it to this conversation it in the documents pointed to below) – the answer must be sought in the peculiar way in which science <em>federates knowledge</em>. Indeed, the traditional science too may be understood as a specific way to federate knowledge – by completing a coherent representation of the basic mechanism of nature, how it all works, and by explaining how the observed phenomena follow as a consequence. This approach, this way of exploring the world, was initially so successful, that it naturally acquired a highest status and became standard! But then something unexpected happened! The insight that compelled an impressive array of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] to speak out (Einstein in Autobiographical Notes; Heisenberg in Physics and Philosophy; Oppenheimer in Uncommon Sense; Feynman in The Character of Physical Law...) – is that the results of this approach to truth and knowledge were sufficiently developed, the result was a disproof of the original assumptions.</p></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>Why knowledge <em>must</em> grow upward</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-9">
 +
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<p>There are three <em>kinds of</em> disadvantages of the traditional-scientific approach to knowledge (federation):
 +
<ul>
 +
<li>Evidence goes against the assumption that the underlying model will eventually be completed (there are good reasons to believe that it cannot). Let's leave a proper analysis for another occasion and provide only two hints: (1) the nature is not a mechanism (that's essentially the message that modern physics has given us...); (2) the splitting of the atom is a good metaphor for this situation: the etymological  meaning of "atom" is "indivisible" – it was supposed to be the ultimate particle of matter in terms of which the larger things could be described. So when the molecules and atoms were scientifically discovered, the scientists naturally said "well, here it is!" But the atom <em>did</em> get divided – first into electrons, protons and neutrons, and with time into more than one hundred "subatomic particles". Today the atom is Humpty Dumpty that nobody can put back together again... Our causal explanation of "how it all works" turned out to be retreating downwards, just when it appeared to be within our grip...</li>
 +
 +
<li>The second reason is complexity – understood now in several ways including complex dynamic systems, computational complexity... The point here is that <em>even if</em> we could create a complete model, the interesting consequences would not follow from it; they would probably not even be computable from its mathematical description.</li>
 +
 +
<li>And finally and most importantly – the knowledge we now most urgently and even vitally need is not at all of the "how it all works" kind; and this knowledge will not come into being <em>even if</em> we did find a complete representation of how it all works, and computed its consequences...</li>
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</ul>
 +
</p>
 +
 +
<p>
 +
Revisiting Einstein's Autobiographical Notes will give us some additional insights. Einstein describes how the classical science, and specifically the Newton's Laws, turned out to be so successful in explaining the natural phenomena, that it became natural to believe that all of nature would soon be understood in a similarly clear and predictable way, just as we might understand the workings of a clockwork. And when it turned out that the things were not at all that simple, at that point the division and organization of the academic or more generally creative work had  <em>already</em> taken place. Einstein, naturally, considered himself "a physicist". Following the other direction was nobody's job!</p>
 +
 +
<p> Notice that what we are talking about is not only a matter of high practical importance, but also a deeper issue of the academic self-perception and self-identity, which is <em>the</em> core theme pointed to by the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]]. At this deeper level, those two directions of growth represent two ways of defining what "good" knowledge and "good" knowledge work represent. One means doing <em>what</em>  Newton did – namely modeling physical phenomena in terms of "physics concepts" such as mass, velocity etc. The other means allowing ourselves to do <em>as</em> Newton did – and create concepts and methods to model, approximately but precisely enough, whatever under the Sun may need our (that is, people's) attention and understanding.
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</p></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>Our needs have changed.</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><p>It is time now to put on our map another category of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] – the ones from the humanities. Let them here, for now, be represented by [[Anthony Giddens]], and more specifically by his keyword "reflexive modernity". The point will be that our society is changing and has already changed. And that in this new situation solid, explicit knowledge on which we could rely to understand situations and issues, has now a key role that was not there previously. Here are some comments of Giddens' work we found on the Web: "It is important for understanding Giddens to note his interest in the increasingly post-traditional nature of society. When tradition dominates, individual actions do not have to be analysed and thought about so much, because choices are already prescribed by the traditions and customs. [...]. In post-traditional times, however, [...] all questions of how to behave in society [...] become matters which we have to consider and make decisions about. Society becomes much more reflexive and aware of its own precariously constructed state. Giddens is fascinated by the growing amounts of reflexivity in all aspects of society, from formal government at one end of the scale to intimate sexual relationships at the other."</p></div>
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  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Giddens.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Anthony Giddens]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>How to help knowledge grow up.</h4></div>
 +
<div class="col-md-9"><p>A short answer is this whole website. <em>Polyscopy</em> shows how "the scientific method" may be suitably turned into something that preserves its advantages, while enabling the creation of <em>high-level</em> insights and results in any area of interest. Similarly the <em>knowledge federation</em> prototypes "the whole thing", including the social processes and technology. The <em>Knowledge Federation</em> transdiscipline prototype models the academic institution capable of federating knowledge according to contemporary interests and epistemological state of the art.</p>
 +
 +
<p>But this whole page is largely a hint, which attempts to be sufficiently detailed to at least give an idea of the interesting substance. So let us do that here with <em>polyscopy</em>. There are several points – and we leave it as a challenge to the reader to see how all this fits into a coherent whole (a methodology, and a paradigm). (1) The stated and anyhow reasonable goal (as we shall see in more detail below) is to provide knowledge according to contemporary needs of people and society. This in itself is a reversal: Instead of believing that our highest goal, our "very best" knowledge, are facts that are "absolutely true" (which, we believe, we can achieve by adhering to the traditional-scientific procedures), we accept (make it a convention) that we the people simply need answers to certain questions. We then take it as our aim to answer those questions <em>as well as we can</em>  – while making provisions for improving both those answers and the procedures which we use to create the answers. (2) Polyscopy enables the creation of high-level information by treating all knowledge the same: Our models are man-made "ways of looking"; and there's experience (which here is the common denominator for experience of all kinds, not only the experience that comes from a laboratory). Our aim then is to make models that in most useful ways represent what is relevant in experience. (3) Knowledge federation as a process is the social process that negotiates the meaning between different models, finds the ones that are most credible, makes sure that the insights are reaching the "cells and organs" in the "social organism" where they are needed, and that the insights are acted upon. (4) Knowledge Federation is the new institution (transdiscipline) whose job is to make sure that all this is done in a way that reflects the relevant knowledge in various fields. </p>
 +
 +
<p>Polyscopy provides a methodology, which includes suitable criteria and keywords. The notion of [[gestalt|<em>gestalt</em>]] has here a central role. The <em>gestalt</em> is our interpretation of a situation (and importantly of the situation we are in), which points to a correct course of action. "Our house is on fire" is a textbook example. By definition (i.e. by convention), having a correct <em>gestalt</em> is what "being informed" is about. <em>Knowledge federation</em> provides suitable methods and social processes by which this goal can be achieved – examples of which are presented on this website. A more comprehensive account of the methods and further examples can be found in the linked documents. </p> </div>
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</div>
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-----
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<div class="row">
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<div class="col-md-3"><h4>We can value creative work differently; we can give it a whole new purpose.</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-5"><p>The third and last reversal is of the purpose of creative work, and of the underlying valuation or [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]].</p>
 +
 +
<p>To see what we are talking about, consider once again the present state of affairs: That the most valued academic work consists in looking at the world "in the light of the candles" (traditional disciplines; which, as Whorf suggested, might be seen as "plagiarizing the past" of science. ... </p>
 +
 +
<p>But there's a positive, and hugely valuable message of this ideogram – that there is a RADICALLY better way to direct creative work!</p>
 +
 +
  <p>The Modernity ideogram represents the turning point – the point of departure of the emerging paradigm. It is both an ideographic representation of a <em>gestalt</em> – and hence of a result; and also a definition of a new direction, a specification of an epistemology.</p>
 +
<p>The "conventional wisdom" that the people loath change, that they'll always what they do, is an oxymoron that keeps us from improving our condition. Why not <em>use</em> information, instead of habit, to make choices and choose directions? And why not <em>choose</em> and <em>create</em> information that is suitable or tailored to that purpose? It is that very choice, that direction, which is the mother of all good directions, that the bus ideogram is pointing toward. And it's that very direction that we want to bring to prominence. It is that humbly natural and yet spectacularly gratifying opportunity – of a far larger and more central role of knowledge in our lives and society –  than the Modernity ideogram is informing us about.</p></div>
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  <div class="col-md-4"> [[File:bus-ideogram.jpg]] <br><small><center>Modernity ideogram</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>The way we direct our creative skills is not sustainable.</h4></div>
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<div class="col-md-9"><p>First of all the characterization of the the situation we are in, the [[gestalt|<em>gestalt</em>]]. Here we are <em>establishing</em> a high-level result, a gestalt. So imagine us riding at an accelerating speed through uncharted and un-illuminated terrain in that vehicle... Obviously, our situation is worse than risky... it is flagrantly un-sustainable! Sooner or later this thing is bound to crash. It's non-sustainable "by design" (that is, by its structure – and by virtue of the fact that its structure has never really been [[design|<em>designed</em>]!  But there's a remedy! Yes, of course, it's to re-create those headlights, what we do with information and knowledge. By [[design|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. Isn't that what we've been talking all along? But there's a still deeper and subtler, more fundamental and more sweeping point. The point is... that by changing the headlights we make THE WHOLE BIG THING radically more valuable (turning it from risky, potentially a mass suicide machine, to a vehicle that can take us to places where we may reasonably want to be). Notice that when we consider the information as a commodity (as the media informing does), or when we create it within the limits of a discipline (as it is common in academic research), we are not likely to do the kind of big structural change that is suggested by the transition from the candle to the light bulb.</p></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>The way se are creative can be much more meaningfully directed.</h4></div>
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<div class="col-md-9"><p>This is a large and centrally important theme... So here's a brief clue: Consider what the bus represents; it's ALL all our creative efforts, through the ages, put together; it's our civilization; it's what will take us into the future... Consider the headlights: They are a tiny piece in the context of it all. And yet the value of it all – whether it will be a mass suicide device or a vehicle taking us where we may reasonably want to be – will be determined by that one tiny piece! THE POINT: As long as we just use our creativity in an undirected and uninformed way (by following the disciplinary habits, or THE MARKET), we are not at all likely to replace those candles. And that's why we <em>didn't</em> replace them! So the Modernity ideogram is pointing to a task at hand, a piece of modernization we have somehow incredibly forgotten (in the Age of Information!)- to modernize our information. And on a much larger scale – to modernize creative work (make it conscious and purposeful and informed and rationally or reasonably directed)...</p>
 +
 +
<p>Production <em>and</em> consumption become informed (or guided). This opens up most wonderful new ways for creating both things <em>and</em> information!</p>
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<p>And then there's the epistemology, the [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]] as we call it. Notice the good situation we are in: We have liberated ourselves from the old epistemology (where we are obliged to learn 'the technique of Old Masters' and use it to depict the world as it 'truly is' – to use a metaphor from the world of the arts, which marks the transition to "modern art"). We are in a convention-making space – we can make any convention we like about what information and knowledge are all about, and what values we want to use to esteem and prioritize knowledge work. And so what the Modernity ideogram is saying is – yes, we need to recreate those 'headlights'. That task must be given highest priority. We cannot just continue using our inherited ways... But there's a subtler and deeper message here as well – and that's the key to the new epistemology: It is that (1) information, and knowledge, have a key role to perform in our society... So we have a whole new 'puzzle' – not the traditional 'reality puzzle' of traditional disciplines, but a much more timely 'puzzle' – how to make a knowledge work that turns us into an informed society? So that the democracy may function (lead to choices and direction that are wise and beneficial). So that we may truly benefit from innovation or creative work. </p>
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 +
<p>There's a whole new notion of 'basic research' that follows from the new epistemology! It's to CREATE knowledge work. This means being creative on a whole new level. This also means that writing academic articles will not necessarily be THE medium... So we challenge you to stretch your categories and look at what's being presented here as <em>basic research</em> – the key question is what comes next in the stream of actions that leads to those 'headlights' being physically in place... We are invited to be creative in entirely new ways! MUCH freer than what's been the case on the old side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]].... And yet far more responsible...</p>
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<p>We should say that the [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]] is what defines our two main keywords, [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] and [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]]. </p></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– It is absolutely necessary to find a way to change course. </h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><p>And now our selected <em>giants</em>, who will help us 'see the light' (the bus with candle headlights). Icons only. Peccei is here  the icon of (federation for) sustainability alias "world problematique".</p>
 +
 +
<p>But what could be a more natural way to "change course" than to change 'the headlights'?</p></div>
 +
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  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Peccei.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Aurelio Peccei]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– The task is nothing less than to build a new society and new institutions for it. </h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><p>Erich Jantsch – the icon of [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>.  We are organizing the <em>academic</em> space on the other side of the [[mirror|<em>mirror</em>]]... So let's be careful, or academic. This matter is of no small importance... So let's envision a science – which will instruct us how to create the 'headlights'... Well the science already exists! It's cybernetics, or more generally the systems sciences... We could have brought in Norbert Wiener instead. But Jantsch must be credited for bringing the cybernetic approach in line with "sustainability" or "world problematique" – and for taking the NECESSARY STEPS to put the key systems in line. To CREATE the headlights... More about this will be said in [[STORIES|Federation through Stories]]. Briefly now – the point is to add to democracy the capability to "recreate the systems in which they live and work" - as [[Bela Banathy]] phrase it. </p></div>
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  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Jantsch.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Erich Jantsch]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– We are riding a common economic-political vehicle.... </h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><p>Engelbart is our icon of [[knowledge federation|<em>Knowledge federation</em>]]. The point here is that the contemporary technology has been CREATED to enable us to replace 'candles' by 'light bulbs'. More about this in [[STORIES|Federation through Stories]]. </p></div>
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  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Doug.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Douglas Engelbart]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>– 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. </h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-6"><p>"We are <em>the first generation of our species</em> that has the privilege, the opportunity, and the burden of responsibility to engage in the process of our own evolution. We are indeed <em>chosen people</em>. We let this insight of systems scientist [[Bela H. Banathy]], from his book "Guided Evolution of Society" (published in the yr. 2000), and already the title of that book, summarize the insights of the cited and other relevant giants. Indeed this book <em>is</em> a result of a thorough federation! Banathy's conclusion is that we stand before a gigantic evolutionary leap, similar in size and import to the advent of the agriculture. Then we learned to cultivate our outer environment, we assumed a proactive stance toward the nature. Now we are about to learn to similarly cultivate (direct the evolution of) our cultural and social environments. "But we can fulfil 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(...)."</p>
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The Modernity ideogram may just as well be interpreted as an ideogram pointing to the need to "the guided evolution of society"; the [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]] may be understood as a way to secure the mentioned two "core requirements". </div>
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  <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Banathy.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Bela Banathy]]</center></small></div>
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</div>
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-----
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>We can invent the light bulb.</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-5"><p>We can once again invent the light bulb. This time of course in the creative zone where creativity is about to expand – on the level of socio-technical systems, and specifically institutions. But isn't that what we've been talking about all along?</p>
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<p>The “i” in the above metaphorical image, composed of a circle on top of a square, renders the information that Knowledge Federation 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.</p></div>
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<div class="col-md-4"> [[File:i-ideogram.jpg]] <br><small><center>Information ideogram</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>So let's create information – what information may need to be like...</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-9"><p>So let's create information – what it may need to be like, to <em>inform</em> us properly!</p>
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<p>There's the square – it represents a careful choice of multiple ways of looking. We must carefully look on all sides, from all meaningful angles...</p>
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<p>But this is not enough, not at all – it's all POINTLESS unless we condense it to a point, to a general direction-showing insight... That's the circle.</p>
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<p>The triangle symbolizes the mountain. So there are these three kinds of abstraction, which are suitably used...</p></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>We can rebuild our knowledge.</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-9"><p>It's an information holon. Such holons inform all important matters. We create information AS WELL AS WE CAN! It's too important to be just ignored (if we cannot do it by using "the scientific method").</p>
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<p>Holons put together produce a HOLARCHY. The task of [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] is to maintain it.</p></div>
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</div>
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-----
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>We can apply the above techniques to redirect the pursuit of happiness.</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-9"><p>Aside from directing our creative efforts, as we have just seen, a fertile area for applying these techniques – and for changing the course of the metaphorical bus – is informing what's been called "the pursuit of happiness". Presently this most pivotal of our pursuits is a prime exemplar of what Einstein branded "a plebeian illusion (that the world "really is" as perceived by us through our senses). We may caricature it by the image of someone who discovered he liked chocolate cake, and then "pursued happiness" by eating chocolate cake to the point where his tummy began to hurt; and where <em>nothing</em> tastes any more, including the chocolate cake.</p>
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<p>Add to this the half-a-trillion-dollars-a-year global advertising industry – which uses state-of-the-art science and communication design to manipulate our choices, so that we'll want even <em>more</em> 'chocolate cake' (because the very existence of businesses in the overgrown 'chocolate cake industry' depends on such a state of affairs). Add also us, academic scientists, looking the other way – because this is none of our business, and because we have more important matters to occupy ourselves with – and you'll have a complete picture of our present way of handling this all-important issue.</p></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>Pursuit of happiness can become evidence based.</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-5"><p>Suitable information can be developed by federating knowledge. The Convenience Paradox ideogram shows a possible result. This was the very first exemplar of a result in [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]], presented at the Einstein Meets Magritte transdisciplinary conference in 1995 (the article appeared in 1999). The ideogram depicts a situation where the pursuit of a more convenient direction (down) leads to an increasingly less convenient condition. By representing the way that in the long run leads us to either happiness or misery as the yin (which stands for dark, or obscure) in the traditional yin-yang ideogram, it is suggested that the way to convenience or happiness needs to be illuminated by suitable information.</p></div>
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<div class="col-md-4"> [[File:CP-ideogram.jpg]] <br><small><center>Information ideogram</center></small></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>Suitable information can be created by federating knowledge.</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-9"><p>The [[justification|<em>justification</em>]] of this [[patterns|<em>pattern</em>]] is composed of a variety of specific anecdotes and insights, spanning a wide range of sources of insights, examples of which the therapeutic techniques of F.M. Alexander and Moshe Feldenkrais, Buddhism and psychoanalysis.  The rationale is that although some of them are "scientific" and others are not, each of them in its own way  represent the experiences reached through working with large numbers of people.</p></div>
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</div>
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-----
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  [[File:Donella.jpeg]]
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-3"><h4>The mindset or paradigm out of which the system arises is the most impactful way to intervene.</h4></div>
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  <div class="col-md-9"><p>Let us summarize our main point by hearing a lady giant – Donella Meadows. </p>
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<p>"Folks who do systems analysis have a great belief in “leverage points.” These are places within a complex system (a corporation, an economy, a living body, a city, an ecosystem) where a small shift in one thing can produce big changes in everything." This is how the systems scientist Donella Meadows began her essay "Leverage Points: Places to Intervene in a System". Of course, as the above quotation we picked up on the Web might also suggest, the "feedback" or the information and information flow comes to mind first – and isn't that what we've been talking all along! But there's a finer and subtler point: In the list of systemic leverage points (which have often been quoted in the systems community), here is what she identifies as <em>the</em> most powerful: "The mindset or paradigm out of which the system — its goals, power structure, rules, its culture — arises." You will have no difficulty noticing that the specific approach to knowledge that has been outlined here has exactly that as its distinguishing characteristic. The now prevailing paradigm may well be now seen as a social creation of truth and meaning which relies on updating <em>a paradigm</em> – and largely ignoring or denying whatever fails to fit in. But fortunately we know – or should know – better... And so the the presented ideograms, and of course the ideas they represent, pave the way to an approach to knowledge where evolution of new ways of looking, and not fitting things into the existing way of looking and conceiving things (or paradigm) is its mode of operation. </p></div>
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</div>
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-----
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-2"><h2>See</h2></div>
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  <div class="col-md-1"><big>&diams;</big></div>
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<div class="col-md-9"><p><b>The first book of Knowledge Federation Trilogy</b> titled "Liberation" and subtitled "Religion for the Third Millennium". The relevance to our larger theme, the [[paradigm strategy]], can be understood by analogy with the Humanism and the Renaissance. Is a profound change of our worldview and values, of our very "cultural DNA" likely to result when we begin to federate rather than ignore the relevant insights? </p>
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<p>Science liberated us from an outdated religious view and made us free to pursue happiness here on Earth. But what if we (as Heisenberg suggested – because of our "rigid and narrfow worldview") misunderstood BOTH happiness AND religion? What if ... The Liberation is ... well, read the book.. But it includes also the liberation from the imposed narrow worldview – just as the case was the last time around...</p>
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<p>Religion has in all traditional society played the role of connecting us with each other into a community, and connecting us with our purpose. Religion has been the source of ethics... And then something happened. As Heisenberg wrote in Physics and Philosophy (about the "narrow and rigid frame of concepts" of 19th century science) "It was especially difficult to find in this framework room for those parts of reality that had been the object of the traditional reli- gion and seemed now more or less only imaginary. Therefore, in those European countries in which one was wont to follow the ideas up to their extreme consequences, an open hostility of sci- ence toward religion developed, and even in the other countries there was an increasing tendency toward indifference toward such questions." Is an entirely new approach to religion, and to ethics and values, ready to emerge when we begin to once again take knowledge seriously (but handle it and organize it in an entirely new way)? See the [http://knowledgefederation.net/Misc/Liberation.pdf introduction to Liberation], and the preliminary blog post sketches [https://polyscopy.wordpress.com/2013/04/24/science-and-religion/ Science and Religion], and [https://polyscopy.wordpress.com/2015/11/22/the-garden-of-liberation/ The Garden of Liberation].</p>
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<p>Strategically, this book is conceived to "put the ball in play" – to attract public attention to these themes, by problematizing some of the issues that are so much part of our cultural makeup, of our socialized identity, that the act of turning them upside-down just cannot be ignored. Strategically, this book is playing a kind of a Judo trick on the present distribution of attention in the public and the media.</p></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-2"><h2></h2></div>
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  <div class="col-md-1"><big>&diams;</big></div>
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<div class="col-md-9"><p><b>The details of the philosophical foundations of the emerging creative frontier</b>, as [[prototypes|<em>prototyped</em>]] by [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] and [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]].  The relevance to our larger theme, the [[paradigm strategy]], can be understood by analogy with the emergence of science. A good place to begin is the blog post [https://polyscopy.wordpress.com/2010/02/07/return-to-reason/ Return to Reason], which presents an explanation of the historicity of our prevailing academic standards and practices (shows that they are not eternal ways to objective truth, but a product of specific circumstances and historical incidents that gave them their present shape) – from the pen of an expert (Stephen Toulmin, whose book "Return to Reason" is surveyed and commented in the blog post, was a reputed philosopher of science). The book manuscript Informing Must be Designed (whose [https://folk.uio.no/dino/IDBook/Introduction.pdf introduction] is open but whose chapters need to be unlocked with the password "Dubrovnik") introduces the methods and techniques of polyscopy, and then applies them to justify the claim made in its title (which is the same as the main message of the Modernity ideogram).  Pay attention to Chapter 4, which introduces a novel way of understanding the power and politics – and shows why the new approach to knowledge is a <em>necessary</em> part of our "societal immune system". A more recent presentation of the foundations and method of [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] titled "What might play the role of Copernicus" (hear [https://soundcloud.com/dinokarabeg/polyscopy-v1-no2-copernicus this recording] while viewing [https://www.dropbox.com/s/yj34myh776opdxe/PolyScopy%20Philosophy.pdf?dl=0 these slides]) is a play on the theme of another metaphor, Archimedes claim that he could "move the world" if he'd be given a lever and "a firm place to stand". An approach to knowledge is described that is capable of 'moving' our social and cultural world (a task to which we must give priority, now that we've acquired to "move" our physical world, albeit not always in the best possible way...).</p>
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<p>All this – the brief sketch provided above, and the earlier sketches just mentioned, are expected to converge to a book with tentative title "Knowledge Federation" and tentative subtitle "Science for the Third Millennium". This is intended to be the third book in [[Knowledge Federation  Trilogy]], by which the [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] proposal will be placed into the public sphere. There's a strategy that accompanies this proposal – to create an event, and stir up the interest of the public for certain themes. And then follow up with a public dialog <em>through which the suitable public sphere that is capable of reflecting on those themes and bringing them to a conclusion</em> will be put in place. We cannot emphasize enough that <em>this process is our goal, and our value proposition</em>, not any specific idea or implementation of creative work for this new millennium. Here the medium truly is the message!</p></div>
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</div>
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<div class="row">
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  <div class="col-md-2"><h2></h2></div>
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  <div class="col-md-1"><big>&diams;</big></div>
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<div class="col-md-9"><p><b>The key insights of the historical pioneers of the emerging creative frontier</b>, and their histories. The relevance to our larger theme, the [[paradigm strategy]], can be understood by analogy with the Industrial Revolution. Could our work in general, and our creative work in particular, become dramatically more efficient and effective? We shall see in [[STORIES|Federation through Stories]] that [[Douglas Engelbart]] and [[Erich Jantsch]] – who are on these pages given the role of the icons of the two core ideas that mark the emerging frontier, respectively [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] and [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] – famously failed to find resonance for their ideas in the contemporary academia. We shall see also that their ideas tend to be ignored also by people whose profession has become to help us "resolve the global issues". Can our efforts to "change course" (as Peccei framed it) or to begin "guided evolution of society" (as Banathy framed it) really be done without the recourse of those scientific insights that can tell us what is possible and what is not? Can our overgrown muscles of technological and other innovation continue to be running rampant, uninformed by a suitably developed and informed "collective mind"? [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] has been conceived as a new academic space where the contemporary Douglas Engelbart and Erich Jantsch will find their institutional home. </p>
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<p>These insights and histories are sketches for the second book of [[Knowledge Federation Trilogy]] whose tentative title is "Systemic Innovation", and tentative subtitle "Democracy for the Third Millennium"</p></div>
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</div>
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<!-- OLDER
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<div class="page-header" > <h1>Federation through Images</h1> </div>
 
<div class="page-header" > <h1>Federation through Images</h1> </div>
  

Latest revision as of 12:46, 19 December 2018

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