Difference between revisions of "Holotopia"

Revision as of 12:36, 1 September 2020

Imagine...

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

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

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

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

Modernity ideogram

Our proposal

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

What is our relationship with information presently like?

Here is how Neil Postman described it:

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

Neil Postman

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

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

The substance of our proposal is a complete prototype of knowledge federation, where initial answers to relevant questions are proposed, and in part implemented in practice.

Our call to action is to institutionalize and develop knowledge federation as an academic field, and a real-life praxis (informed practice).

Our purpose is to restore agency to information, and power to knowledge.

A proof of concept application

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

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

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

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

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

Aurelio Peccei

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

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

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

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

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

A vision

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

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

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

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

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

A principle

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

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

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

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

A method

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

To make things whole—we must be able to see them whole!

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

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

Holoscope ideogram

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

A discovery of a new way of looking—which reveals a structural problem, and helps us reach a correct general assessment of an object of study or a situation as a whole (see if 'the cup is broken or whole') is a new kind of result that is made possible by the general-purpose science that is modeled by the holoscope

To see more, we take recourse to the vision of others. The holoscope combines scientific and other insights to enable us to see what we ignored, to 'see the other side'. This allows us to detect structural defects ('cracks') in core elements of everyday reality—which appear to us as just normal, when we look at them in our habitual way ('in the light of a candle').

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

Scope

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

Five Insights ideogram

We use the holoscope to illuminate five pivotal themes, which determine the "course":

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

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

The holotopia vision results.

The key to comprehensive change turns out to be the same as it was in Galilei's time—a new approach to knowledge, which allows for creation of general principles and insights. As the case was then, the development of this new approach to knowledge is shown to follow from the state of the art of knowledge of knowledge—and hence as an academic task.

A case for our proposal is thereby also made.

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

Power structure

Scope

What might constitute "a way to change course"?

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

The power structure insight allows us to see why no dictator is needed.

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

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

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

Diagnosis

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

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

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

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

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

The systems provide an ecology, which in the long run shapes our values and "human quality". They have the power to socialize us in ways that suit their needs. "The business of business is business"—and if our business is to succeed in competition, we must act in ways that lead to that effect. We either bend and comply—or get replaced. The effect on the system of both options will be the same.

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

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

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

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

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

Remedy

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Collective mind

Scope

We have just seen that our evolutionary challenge and opportunity is to develop the capability to update our institutions or systems, to learn how to make them whole.

Where—with what system—shall we begin?

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

One of them is obvious: If we should use information as guiding light and not competition, our information will need to be different.

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

Diagnosis

That is presently not the case with our core systems; and with our civilization as a whole.

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

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

To make that point, Wiener cited an earlier work, Vannevar Bush's 1945 article "As We May Think", where Bush urged the scientists to make the task of revising their communication their next highest priority—the World War Two having just been won.

These calls to action remained, however, without effect.

"As long as a paradox is treated as a problem, it can never be dissolved," observed David Bohm. Wiener too entrusted his insight to the communication whose tie with action had been severed.

We have assembled a formidable collection of academic results that shared the same fate—to illustrate a general phenomenon we are calling Wiener's paradox. The link between communication and action having been broken—the academic results will tend to be ignored whenever they challenge the present "course" and point to a new one!

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

This sentiment is transformed into holotopian optimism when we look at 'the other side of the coin'—the creative frontier that is opening up. We are invited to, we are indeed obliged to reinvent the systems in which we live and work, by recreating the very communication that holds them together. Including, of course, our own, academic system, and the way in which it interoperates with other systems—or fails to interoperate.

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

The information technology we now use to communicate with the world was created to enable a paradigm change on that very frontier.

'Electricity', and the 'lightbulb', have already been created—for the purpose of giving our society the 'headlights' it needs.

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

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

All earlier innovations in this area—the clay tablets and the printing press—required that a physical object with a message be physically transported.

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

We can now develop insights and solutions together.

Engelbart conceived this new technology as a necessary step toward becoming able to tackle the "complexity times urgency" of our problems, which he saw as growing at an accelerated rate.

This three minute video clip, which we called "Doug Engelbart's Last Wish", will give us an opportunity for a pause and an illuminating reflection. Think about the prospects of improving the planetary collective mind. Imagine "the effects of getting 5% better", Engelbart commented with a smile. Then our old man put his fingers on his forehead, and raised his eyes up: "I've always imagined that the potential was... large..." The potential is not only large; it is staggering. The improvement that is both necessary and possible is qualitative—from a system that doesn't really work, to one that does.

To Engelbart's dismay, our new "collective nervous system" ended up being used to only make the old processes and systems more efficient. The ones that evolved through the centuries of use of the printing press. The ones that broadcast information.

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

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

But that is exactly what binds us to power structure!

Remedy

What is to be done, to restore the severed link between communication and action?

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

Engelbart left us a clear and concise answer; he called it bootstrapping.

His point was that only writing about what needs to be done would not have an effect (the tie between information and action having been broken). Bootstrapping means that we consider ourselves as parts in a collective mind; and that we self-organize, and act, as it may best serve its restoration to wholeness.

The key to solution is to either create new systems with the material of our own minds and bodies—or to help others do that.

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

What we are calling knowledge federation is an umbrella term for a variety of activities and social processes that together comprise the functions of a collective mind. Obviously, the development of the collective mind paradigm will requires a system, a new kind of institution, which will assemble and mobilize the required knowledge and human and other resources toward that end. Presently, Knowledge Federation is a complete prototype of the transdiscipline for knowledge federation, ready for inspection, co-creative updates and deployment.

But may will have the requisit knowledge, and who may be given the power—to update our collective mind?

The praxis of knowledge federation itself must, of course, also be federated.

In 2008, when Knowledge Federation had its inaugural meeting, two closely related initiatives were formed: Program for the Future (a Silicon Valley-based initiative to continue and complete "Doug Engelbart's unfinished revolution") and Global Sensemaking (an international community of researchers and developers, working on technology and processes for collective sense making).

Patty Coulter, Mei Lin Fung and David Price speaking at the 2011 An Innovation Ecosystem for Good Journalism workshop in Barcelona

We use the above triplet of photos ideographically, to highlight that Knowledge Federation is a true federation—where state of the art knowledge is combined in state of the art systems. The featured participants of our 2011 workshop in Barcelona, where our public informing prototype was created, are Patty Coulter (the Director of Oxford Global Media and Fellow of Green College Oxford, formerly the Director of Oxford University's Reuter Program in Journalism) Mei Lin Fung (the founder of Program for the Future) and David Price (who co-founded both the Global Sensemaking R & D community, and Debategraph—which is now the leading global platform for collective thinking).

Other prototypes contributed other design patterns for restoring the severed link between information and action. The Tesla and the Nature of Creativity TNC2015 prototype showed what may constitute the federation of a research result—which is written in an esoteric academic vernacular, and has large potential general interest and impact. The first phase of this prototype, completed through collaboration between the author and our communication design team, turned the academic article into a multimedia object, with intuitive, metaphorical diagrams, and explanatory interviews with the author. The second phase was a high-profile, televised and live streamed event, where the result was made public. The third phase, implemented on Debategraph, modeled proper online collective thinking about the result—including pros and cons, connections with other related results, applications etc.

The Lighthouse 2016 prototype is a conceived as a direct remedy for the Wiener's paradox, created for and with the International Society for the Systems Sciences. This prototype models a system by which an academic community can federate a single core message into the public sphere. The message in this case was also relevant—it was whether or not we can rely on "free competition" to guide the evolution and the functioning of our systems; or whether we must use its alternative—the knowledge developed in the systems sciences.

Socialized reality

Scope

"Act like as if you loved your children above all else",

Greta Thunberg, representing her generation, told the political leaders at Davos. Of course political leaders love their children—don't we all? But what Greta was asking them to do was to 'hit the brakes'; and when the 'bus' they are believed to be 'driving' is inspected, it becomes clear that the 'brakes' too are missing. The job of a politician is to keep 'the bus on course' (the economy growing) for yet another four years. Changing the 'course' or the system is well beyond what they are able to do, or even imagine doing.

The COVID-19 pandemic may require systemic changes now.

Who—what institution or system—will take the leadership role, and guide us through our unprecedentedly immense creative and evolutionary challenges?

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

Why?

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

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

We readily find them in the way in which the university institution originated.

The academic tradition did not originate as a way to practical knowledge, but to freely pursue knowledge for its own sake; in a manner disciplined only by knowledge of knowledge—which philosophers have been developing since antiquity. Wherever this free-yet-disciplined pursuit of knowledge took us, we followed.

And as we pointed out in the opening paragraphs of this website, by highlighting the iconic image of Galilei in house arrest,

it was this free pursuit of knowledge that led to the last "great cultural revival".

We asked:

Could a similar advent be in store for us today?

The key to the positive answer to this question—which is obviously central to holotopia—is in the historicity of "the relationship we have with knowledge"—which Stephen Toulmin explicated so clearly in his last book, "Reurn to Reason", from which the above quotation was taken. So that is what we here focus on.

As Toulmin pointed out, at the time when the contemporary academic ethos was taking shape, it was the Church and the tradition that had the prerogative of telling the people how to conduct their daily affairs and what to believe in. And as the image of Galilei in house arrest may suggest—they held onto that prerogative most firmly! But the censorship and the prison could not stop an idea whose time had come. They were unable to prevent a completely new way of exploring the world to transpire from astrophysics, where it originated, and transform first our pursuit of knowledge in general—and then our society and culture at large.

It is therefore natural that at the universities we consider the curation of this approach to knowledge to be our core role in our society. Being the heirs and the custodians of a tradition that has historically led to some of the most spectacular evolutionary leaps in human history, we remain faithful to that tradition. We do that by meticulously conforming to the methods and the themes of interests of mathematics, physics, philosophy, biology, sociology, philosophy and other traditional academic disciplines, which, we believe, embody the highest standards of that tradition. People can learn practical skills elsewhere. It is only at the university that they can acquire the highest standards of knowledge of knowledge—and the ability to pursue knowledge effectively in any domain.

We must ask:

Could the academic tradition evolve further?

Could this tradition once again give us a completely new way to explore the world?

Can the free pursuit of knowledge, curated by the knowledge of knowledge, once again lead to "a great cultural revival" ?

Can "a great cultural revival" begin at the university?

Diagnosis

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

From the traditional culture we adopted a myth far more disruptive of modernization than the creation myth—that "truth" means "correspondence with reality"; and that the purpose of information, and of our pursuit of knowledge, is to "know the reality" objectively, as it truly is. It may take a moment of reflection to see how much this myth permeates our popular culture, our society and institutions; how much it marks "the relationship we have with information"—in all its various manifestations.

This fundamental error has subsequently been detected and reported, but not corrected. (We again witness that the link between information and action has been severed.)

It is simply impossible to open up the 'mechanism of nature', and verify that our ideas and models correspond to the real thing!

The "reality", the 20th century's scientists and philosophers found out, is not something we discover; it is something we construct.

This "social construction of reality" is a result of complex interaction between our cognitive organs and our culture. From the cradle to the grave, through innumerably many 'carrots and sticks', we are socialized to organize and communicate our experience in a certain specific way.

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

Information, in other words, has traditionally served as 'headlights'; the purpose of the traditional myths was not to tell the people how the world really originated—but to serve as foundation for principles and norms, which oriented their behavior; and the development of "human quality".

Information, however, and socialization, have always served also a different purpose—as instruments of power; as media which the power relationships were maintained. And hence as core elements of the power structure.

In "Social Construction of Reality", Berger and Luckmann left us an analysis of the social process by which the reality is constructed—and pointed to the role that "universal theories" (which determine the relationship we have with information) play in maintaining a given social and political status quo. An example, but not the only one, is the Biblical worldview of Galilei's persecutors.

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

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

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

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

The third story, featuring Antonio Damasio in the role of a leading cognitive neuroscientist, completes this thread by explaining that we, humans, are not the rational decision makers, as the founding fathers of the Enlightenment made us believe. Each of us has an embodied cognitive filter, which determines what options we are able to rationally consider. This cognitive filter is programmed through socialization. Damasio's insight allows us to understand why we civilized humans don't rationally consider taking off our clothes and walking into the street naked; and that for cognitively similar reasons we don't consider changing the systems in which we live and work.

Socialized reality constitutes a pseudo-epistemology.

Hence the socialized reality insight, which we have so far only touched upon, delineates and opens up a truly wonderful creative frontier—where three realms that are usually considered as independent are inextricably intertwined: culture, power and epistemology (or "the relationship we have with information").

As an understandable consequence of historical circumstances, as Toulmin showed, our hitherto modernization has ignored these subtleties—and we've assumed that (1) the purpose of information is to mirror reality and (2) the traditions got it all wrong. The consequences are far reaching and central to holotopia.

Severed link between information and action. The (perceived) purpose of information being to complete the 'reality puzzle'—every new piece appears to be as relevant as others, and necessary for completing the 'puzzle'. In the sciences and in the media, enormous quantities of information are produced "disconnected from usefulness"—as Neil Postman diagnosed.
Stringent limits to creativity. A vast global army of selected, trained and publicly sponsored creative people are obliged to confine their repertoire of creative action to producing research articles in traditional academic fields.
Loss of cultural heritage. A trivial observation will suffice to make a point: With the threat of eternal fire on the one side, and the promise of heavenly pleasures on the other, a 'field' was created that oriented people's ethical sense and behavior. To see that the ancient myths were, however, only a tip of an iceberg (a small part of a complex ecosystem whose purpose was to develop "human quality") this one-minute thought experiment—an imaginary visit to a cathedral—might be helpful: There is awe-inspiring architecture; Michelangelo's Pietà meets the eye, and his frescos are near by. Allegri's Miserere reaches us from above. And there's of course also the ritual. All this comprises an ecosystem—in which the emotions of awe and respect make one open to practicing and learning. By its complex dynamics, it resembles our biophysical environment—but there is a notable difference: There we have nothing equivalent to the temperature and CO2 measurements, to be able to diagnose problems and propose remedies.
"Human quality" abandoned to power structure. Advertising is everywhere. And explicit advertising too is only a tip of an iceberg, the bulk of which consists of a variety of ways in which "symbolic power" is used to socialize us in ways that suit the power structure interests. Scientific techniques are used; the story of Edward Bernays, Freud's American nephew who became "the pioneer of modern public relations and propaganda", is iconic.
Reification of institutions. Even when they cause us problems, and make us incapable of solving them.

This conclusion suggests itself.

The Enlightenment did not liberate us from power-related reality construction, as it is believed.

Our socialization only changed hands—from the kings and the clergy, to the corporations and the media.

Ironically, our carefully cultivated academic self-identity—as "objective observers of reality"—keeps us on the 'back seat'; we diagnose problems—but we cannot federate solutions.

Remedy

We have already seen the remedy.

The remedy is to change the relationship we have with information.

To consider information as the core element of our systems; and to adapt it to the functions that need to be served.

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

We, however, also federate those calls.

In the spirit of the holoscope, we condensed the fundamental part of this argument by a metaphorical image, the Mirror ideogram. This ideogram renders the essence of the academic situation we are in.

The Mirror ideogram invites us to interrupt what we are doing and self-reflect—as Socrates used to invite his contemporaries, at the Academia's point of inception.

This self-reflection leads us to two insights.

We are compelled to abolish reification.

When we look at a mirror, we see ourselves in the world. We are not above the world, observing it "objectively". The disciplinary interests, methods and institutions are not something that objectively existed, which our predecessors only discovered. They created them—in certain historical circumstances. Hence it is academically legitimate to create new ones.

We are compelled to embrace accountability.

The world we see ourselves in, when we look at the mirror, is a world in dire need—for new ideas, new ways of thinking and being. We see that, by virtue of the role we have in that world, we hold the very key to its transformation.

Mirror ideogram

We are then also compelled to ask:

How can we be accountable in our new social role, without sacrificing the academic rigor—which has been the distinguishing trait of our tradition?

The answer offers itself as an unexpected result of our metaphorical self-reflection:

We can walk right through the mirror!

This takes only two steps.

The first is to use what philosopher Villard Van Orman Quine called "truth by convention"—which we adapted as one of our keywords.

Quine opened "Truth by Convention" by observing:

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

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

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

The second step is to use truth by convention to define an epistemology.

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

Notice that nothing has been changed in the traditional-academic scheme of things. The academia has only been extended; a new way of thinking and working has been added to it, for those who might want to engage in that new way. On the 'other side of the mirror', we see ourselves and what we do as (part of) the 'headlights' and the 'light'; and we self-organize, and act, and use our creativity freely-yet-responsibly, and create a variety of new methods and results—just as the founding father of science did, at the point of its inception.

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

As the artists did—we can become creative in the very way in which we practice our profession.

To complete this proposal and make it concrete, we developed two prototypes: the holoscope models the academic reality on the other side; the holotopia models the corresponding social reality.

Let us illustrate these abstract ideas by brief and self-contained module, comprising an academically stated challenge, and two examples of its resolution—by using the techniques just described. Each of the examples includes both a concept definition by convention, and a prototype (of disciplinary or institutional re-definition) that was embedded and tested in academic practice, with encouraging results.

This challenge is reaching us from sociology.

Beck continued the above observation:

"Max Weber's 'iron cage' – in which he thought humanity was condemned to live for the foreseeable future – is for me the prison of categories and basic assumptions of classical social, cultural and political sciences."

Our 'candle headlights' (the practice of inheriting the way we look at the world, try to comprehend it and handle it) are keeping us in 'iron cage'!

The definition of design allowed us to capture the essence of our post-traditional cultural condition, and suggest how to adapt to it.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Narrow frame

Scope

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

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

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

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

Diagnosis

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

Nobody knows!

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

The way we the people look at the world, try to comprehend and handle it, shaped itself spontaneously—from scraps of science that were most visible around the middle of the 19th century, when Darwin and Newton as cultural heroes replaced Adam and Moses. What is today popularly considered as the "scientific worldview" took shape then—and remained largely unchanged.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Remedy

Truth by convention allows us to explicitly define and academically develop a way to look at the world, in order to comprehend and handle it.

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

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

That constitutes a way in which the severed link between the scientific insights and the popular worldview can be restored.

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

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

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

Polyscopy did not talk about knowledge. We may now improvise this new axiom:

Knowledge must be federated.

This only states the intuitive or common-sense idea of "knowledge": If we should be able to say that we "know" something, we must federate not only supporting evidence, but also potential counter-evidence—and hence information in general. Academic peer reviews implement that principle in science; but this federation tends to be restricted to a discipline. An analogy with constitutional democracy also comes to mind—where even a hated criminal has the right for a fair trial. Like a dutiful attorney, knowledge federation does its best to gather suitable evidence, and back each federated insight with a convincing case.

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

Can we be uninformed—in spite of all the information we have?

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

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

Patterns have a closely similar function as mathematics does in traditional sciences—and at the same time completely generalize the implementation of this function
Ideograms allow us to include the expressive power and the insights and techniques from art, advertising and information design
Vignettes implement the basic technique from media informing, where an insight or issue is made accessible by telling illustrative and engaging or "sticky" real-life people and situation stories
Threads implement Vannevar Bush's technical idea of "trails" as a way to combine specific ideas into higher-level units of meaning

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

A situation with overtones of a crisis, closely similar to the one we now have in our handling of information at large, arose in the early days of computer programming. The buddying industry undertook ambitious software projects—which resulted in thousands of lines of "spaghetti code", which nobody was able to 'detangle' (understand and correct). The solution was conceived as "computer programming methodology"; the longer story is interesting, but we only highlight a couple of lessons learned from the "object oriented methodology", developed in the 1960s by Ole-Johan Dahl and Krysten Nygaard.

The designers of a computer programming language made themselves accountable for the "usability" of the results, and developed a methodology.

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

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

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

We have seen, in socialized reality, that the academia too needs to consider itself accountable for the tools and processes by which information and knowledge are handled—both for the ones used by academic researchers, and for the ones used by people at large. To see what those two lessons learned may mean practically, Imagine a highly talented young person, let's call him Pierre Bourdieu to be concrete, about to become a researcher. The academia will give Bourdieu a certain way to render his results, which he'll be using throughout his career. The "usability", comprehensibility and in a word—the usefulness of Bourdieu's life work will largely depend on the format in which he'll render his results. This format, however, will not be in his power to change, and it is unlikely that even Bourdieu would even think about doing that.

Bourdieu is, of course, only a drop in an ocean.

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

When the circle is a general insight or a gestalt, it allows that insight to be integrated or "exported" as a "fact" into higher-level insights (while the contributing insights and data remain "hidden" in the square). When the circle is a prototype, the multiplicity of insights that comprise the square are given direct systemic impact, and hence agency.

Information ideogram

The holotopia may now be understood as the circle by which our knowledge federation proposal is federated; a vision is not only provided and published—but already turned into a collaborative strategy game whose goal is to "change course".

A prototype polyscopic book manuscript titled "Information Must Be Designed" is structured as an information holon. Here the claim made in the title (which is the same we made in the opening of this presentation by talking about the bus with candle headlights) is justified in four chapters of the book—each of which presents a specific angle of looking at it. The book's four chapters present four aspects of our handling of information; they identify anomalies and propose remedies—which are the design patterns of the proposed methodology.

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

The book's introduction is available online. What we then branded information design is today completed and called knowledge federation.

Convenience paradox

Scope

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

Why is "a great cultural revival" realistically possible?

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

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

Suppose we used real information to guide our choices, instead of advertising. What changes would develop? What difference would they make?

During the Renaissance, preoccupations with original sin and eternal reward gradually gave way to a pursuit of happiness and beauty here and now; and the arts prospered.

What might the next "great cultural revival" be like?

Diagnosis

There is a popular myth which precludes information and knowledge to make a difference in this realm too—analogous and related to the myth of free competition that breeds the power structure.

It is the belief that we don't really need information, or culture, because we can experience what makes us happy directly—and reach out toward it with the help of science and technology.

Our "pursuit of happiness" 'in the light of a candle' made two values prominent, at the detriment of others: convenience (favoring what appears to be pleasant and easy) and egotism (favoring narrowly conceived "personal interests"). Both appear as scientific: convenience because it resembles the experiment; egotism because it is the way in which nature herself pursues wholeness. Both values are, of course, endlessly supported by advertising.

Those two values now guide even our choice and creation of information!

Remedy

We point to the remedy by the Convenience Paradox ideogram. Like all of us, the person in the picture wants his life to be convenient. But he made a wise choice: Instead of simply following the direction downwards, which feels easier, he paused to reflect whether this direction also leads to a more convenient condition.

It doesn't.

The convenience paradox is a pattern, where the pursuit of a more convenient direction leads to a less convenient situation. The iconic image of a "couch potato" in front of a TV is an obvious instance.

The convenience paradox is a result of us simplifying "pursuit of happiness" by ignoring its two most interesting dimensions—time; and our own condition, which makes us inclined or able to feel</em> in any specific way.

By depicting the way to wholeness as "yang" in the traditional yin-yang ideogram, it is suggested that its nature os paradoxical and obscure—and that the way needs to be illuminated by suitable information. This way is what the Buddhists call "Dhamma" and the Taoists "Tao".

However paradoxical, the way follows a certain pattern that can be understood; not in a mechanistic-causal way, not by studying what various cultures believe in—but by focusing on and federating the phenomenology repeated in the world traditions.

Convenience Paradox ideogram

Wholeness is such a beautifully inclusive value, with so many sides! We may have everything else in the world—and the lack of vitamin C will make it all futile.

We showed that the convenience paradox is a pattern repeated or subtly reflected in all major aspects of our civilized human condition.

To illustrate it, however, we here focus on what might be its least known and most interesting side—our capacity to feel. We'll elaborate it in terms of three specific insights.

1. Human wholeness feels better than most of us can imagine.

We called this insight "the best kept secret of human culture" , and made it a theme of one of our chosen ten conversations.

It was a glimpse or an experience or side of human wholeness that attracted our ancestors to the Buddha, the Christ, Mohammed and other adepts and teachers of the way, or "sages" or "prophets". C.F. Andrews described this in "Sermon on the Mount":

"(Through their practice, the early disciples of Jesus found out) that the Way of Life, which Jesus had marked out for them in His teaching, was revolutionary in its moral principles. It turned the world upside down (Acts 17. 6). (...) They found in this new 'Way of Life' such a superabundance of joy, even in the midst of suffering, that they could hardly contain it. Their radiance was unmistakable. When the Jewish rulers saw their boldness, they 'marvelled and took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus' (Acts 4. 13). (...) It was this exuberance of joy and love which was so novel and arresting. It was a 'Way of Life' about which men had no previous experience. Indeed, at first those who saw it could not in the least understand it; and some mocking said, 'These men are full of new wine' (Acts 2. 13)."

The existence and character of this experience can, however, readily be verified by simply observing or asking the people who have followed the way, and tasted some of its fruits.

2. The way to wholeness is counter-intuitive or paradoxical.

To get a glimpse of it, compare the above utterances by Lao Tzu, with what Christ taught in his Sermon on the Mount. Why was Teacher Lao claiming that "the weak can defeat the strong"? Why did the Christ asked his disciples to "turn the other cheek"?

Aldous Huxley's book "Perennial Philosophy" is alone sufficient to make this point. Coming from a family that gave some of Britain's leading scientists, Huxley undertook to not only federate some of the core insights about the way (by demonstrating the consistency of both the relevant practices and their results across historical periods and cultures), but to also make a case for the method he used, as an extension of science needed to support core elements of our cultural heritage.

3. The key to unraveling the paradox is to reverse the values.

Convenience needs to be replaced by (to use Peccei's keyword) "human development".

Egotism needs to be overcome through "selfless service".

Lao Tzu, an iconic representative of the way, is often portrayed as reading a bull—which signifies that he's harnessed his egotism.

While this insight can easily be federated in the manner just described, we here point to it by a curiosity.

In "The Art of Seeing", Huxley observed that overcoming egotism is a necessary element of even physical wholeness!

We may now perceive significant parts of our cultural history as struggle between cultivation of wholeness guided by insights into the nature of the way—and the power structure–related socialization, aided by the attraction of convenience and egotism. It is on the outcome of this struggle, Peccei observed, that our future will depend.

What hope do we have of reversing its outcome?

The answer is, of course, that we now have a whole new dimension to work with.

We can design communication.

We can create media content that will communicate the convenience paradox in clear and convincing ways; we can guide people to an informed use of information; and we can create various elements of culture to socialize us or cultivate us accordingly. Including, of course, the systems in which we live and work.

A vast creative frontier opens up.

We illustrate it here by a handful of examples.

In a fractal-like manner, our definition of culture reflects the entire situation around holoscope and holotopia. So let us summarize it here in that way, however briefly. We motivated this definition by discussing Zygmunt Bauman's book "Culture as Praxis"—where Bauman surveyed a large number of historical definitions of culture, and reached the conclusion that they are so diverse that they cannot be reconciled with one another. How can we develop culture as praxis—if we don't know what "culture" means? We defined culture as "cultivation of wholeness", where the keyword cultivation is defined by analogy with planting and watering a seed (which suits also the etymology of "culture") . Thereby (and in accordance with the general holotopia approach we discussed above), we pointed to a specific aspect of culture. No amount of dissecting and studying a seed would suggest that it needs to be planted and watered. Hence when we reduced "reality" to what we can explain in that way, the culture as cultivation is all gone! When, however, we consider and treat information as human experience, and look for what may help us redeem and further develop culture—then a remedial trend, modeled by holotopia, is already under way.

We defined addiction as a pattern; and motivated this definition by observing that evolution equipped us, humans with emotions of comfort and discomfort to guide our choices toward wholeness. We, however, found ways to deceive nature—by creating pleasurable things called "addictions", which lead us away from wholeness. Since selling addictions is lucrative business, the traditions identified certain activities or things (such as opiates and gambling) as addictions and developed suitable legislation and ethical norms. But with the help of technology, contemporary industries can develop hundreds of new addictions—without us having a way to even recognize them as that. By defining addiction as a pattern, we can perceive it (as we did with the power structure) as an aspect of otherwise good and useful things. From a large number of obvious or subtle candidates or examples, we here mention only pseudoconsciousness defined as "addiction to information". Consciousness of one's situation and surroundings is, of course, an evolutionary need. In civilization we can, however, drown this need in massive facts and data—which give us the sensation of knowing, without telling us what we above all need to know.

We adapted the definition that Martin Lings contributed, and defined religion as "reconnection with the archetype" (this again harmonizes with the etymological meaning of this word). The archetypes here include "justice", "beauty", "truth", "love" and anything else that may make a person overcome egotism and convenience and serve a "higher" ideal.

The NaCuHeal-Information Design was our project developed in collaboration with the European Public Health Association, through Prof. Gunnar Tellnes who was then its president. In Norway Tellnes developed an authentic approach to health, which was based on nature and culture-related activities. This collaboration resulted in several prototypes, of which we mention two.

We contributed "Healthcare as a Power Structure" to the European Association for the History of Medicine and Health. Historiographically, we based this research on the results of Weston Price and Werner Kollath—two pioneers of the scientific "hygiene", understood as a scientific study of the ways in which civilized lifestyle influences people's health. But we also added a methodological contribution—a way to 'connect the dots' and supplement historiographic research by a general "law of change" result. By seeing that also our approach to health and medicine can develop pathological tendencies, we can explain the fact that the results of those pioneers are still virtually unknown even to medical professionals; and why, in spite of them, our "caring for health" so consistently ignores the lifestyle factors, and relies on far more costly interventions.

Kommunewiki—a dialog-based communication project for Norwegian municipalities (as basic units of Norwegian democracy)—was conceived to empower their members to counter power structure lifestyle tendencies, and develop salutogenic new ones.

We developed the "Movement and Qi" educational prototype as a way to add to the conventional academic portfolio a collection of ways to use human body as medium—and work with "human quality" directly. And as a way to include the insights and techniques of the "human quality" traditions such as yoga and qigong into the academic repertoire.

"Liberation", subtitled "Religion beyond Belief", is a book manuscript and a communication design project. The book federates the message of Ven. Ajahn Buddhadasa, a 20th century's Buddhism reformer in Thailand, who—having through experimentation and practice understood and 'repeated the Buddha's experiment', found in it also a natural antidote to rampant materialism. The first four chapters present four aspects of human wholeness, including physical effortlessness, creativity, emotions and vitality. Buddhadasa's insights are shown to be a necessary piece in this large puzzle. The closing four chapters explain how societal wholeness may result.

The core Buddhadasa's message, which is also the message of this book, is to portray religion as "liberation"—not only from rigidly held beliefs that form our self-identity, but from rigidly held anything, as well as from self-identity as such.

We chose this book as part of our strategy for launching the holotopia. Many people have strong opinions about religion—be they "religious" and pro, or "scientific" and against. This book is likely to surprise both sides and challenge both positions—while at the same time reconciling their differences.

Isn't the prospect of evolving religion further a promising strategy for remedying religion-inspired violence?</p>
And of course, a way to evolve further culturally and ethically—as Peccei requested; and holotopia promised to deliver.

</div> </div>

A great cultural revival

The five insights together compose a vision of "a great cultural revival". They complete the analogy between our time and the situation at the twilight of the Middle Ages and the dawn of the Renaissance, which we've been pointing to by using the iconic image of Galilei in house arrest.

A revolution in innovation

By bringing a radical improvement of the efficiency and effectiveness of human work, through innovation, the Industrial Revolution promised to liberate our ancestors from hardship and toil, so that they may focus on developing culture and "human quality". The power structure, however, thwarted our aspirations. This issue can be resolved, and progress can be resumed, by learning to "make things whole" on the level of the systems in which we live and work.

A revolution in communication

The printing press enabled the Enlightenment by enabling a revolution in literacy and communication. The collective mind insight shows that the new information technology can power a similar revolution—whose effect will be a revolution of meaning. The kind of revolution that can make the differences that needs to make, in a post-industrial society.

A revolution in the relationship we have with information

By reviving the academic tradition (which had remained dormant for almost two thousand years), the Enlightenment empowered our ancestors to use reason to comprehend the world, and to evolve faster. The socialized reality insight shows that the evolution of the academic tradition has brought us to a new turning point—which will liberate us from reifying our inherited systems and worldviews; and enable us to evolve culturally, a similar rate as we've evolved technologically.

A revolution in method

Galilei in house arrest was really science in house arrest. It was this new way to understand the natural phenomena that liberated our ancestors from superstition, and empowered them to understand and change their world by developing technology. The narrow frame insight shows that the "project science" can and needs to be extended into all walks of life—to illuminate all those core issues that traditional sciences left in the dark.

A revolution in culture

The Renaissance was a "great cultural revival"—a liberation and celebration of life, love, and beauty, by changing the values and the lifestyle, manifested by the arts. The convenience paradox insight shows that our culture has once again become a victim of power structure; and that a final liberation is both possible and necessary.

The sixth insight

Combined together, the five insights readily lead to a more general sixth insight.

We must be able to create insights.

We have all the knowledge we need to begin "a great cultural revival". What we are lacking is a way to put it together, and make sense of it.

A case for our proposal is hereby also completed.

The Holotopia project completes the federation of Peccei's vision, by making it actionable.

It also completes the knowledge federation prototype, by serving as 'the dot on the i'.

This Holotopia project description will be completed by elaborating:

A strategy

The Holotopia project is conceived as a space, where we make co-creative strategic moves toward "changing course".

We implement Margaret Mead's recommendations for responding to the situation we are in:

"(W)e are living in a period of extraordinary danger, as we are faced with the possibility that our whole species will be eliminated from the evolutionary scene. One necessary condition of successfully continuing our existence is the creation of an atmosphere of hope that the huge problems now confronting us can, in fact, be solved—and can be solved in time."

Margaret Mead

Tactical assets

To the above co-creative space we bring a portfolio of assorted tactical assets.

A pilot project

To bring all this down to earth, we describe the pilot project we've developed in art gallery Kunsthall 3.14 in Bergen.

@@ Line 13: / Line 13: @@
 <small>Modernity <em>ideogram</em></small>
 </div> </div>
-<!-- ;)
 <div class="row">
@@ Line 42: / Line 40: @@
 <p>By what methods, what social processes, and by whom would information be created? What new information formats would emerge, and supplement or replace the traditional books and articles? How would information technology be adapted and applied? What would public informing be like? And <em>academic communication, and education</em>? </p>
-<blockquote>The substance of our proposal is a <em>complete</em> [[Holotopia:Prototype|<em>prototype</em>]] of [[Holotopia:Knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]], where initial answers to relevant questions are presented, and in part implemented in practice. </blockquote>
+<blockquote>The substance of our proposal is a <em>complete</em> [[Holotopia:Prototype|<em>prototype</em>]] of [[Holotopia:Knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]], where initial answers to relevant questions are proposed, and in part implemented in practice. </blockquote>
 <blockquote>Our call to action is to institutionalize and develop <em>knowledge federation</em> as an academic field, and a real-life <em>praxis</em> (informed practice).</blockquote>
@@ Line 61: / Line 59: @@
-<p>Peccei also specified <em>what</em> needed to be done to change course:</p>
+<p>Peccei also specified <em>what</em> needed to be done to "change course":</p>
 <blockquote>
 "The future will either be an inspired product of a great cultural revival, or there will be no future."
@@ Line 73: / Line 71: @@
 <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 <div class="col-md-7">
-<p>This conclusion, that we are in a state of crisis that has cultural roots and must be handled accordingly, Peccei shared with a number of twentieth century's thinkers. Arne Næss, Norway's esteemed philosopher, reached it on different grounds, and called it "deep ecology". </p>
+<p>This conclusion, that we are in a state of crisis that has cultural roots and must be handled accordingly, Peccei shared with a number of twentieth century's thinkers. Arne Næss, Norway's esteemed philosopher, reached it on different grounds, and called it "deep ecology". In what follows we shall assume that this conclusion has been <em>federated</em>—and focus on the more interesting questions, such as <em>how</em> to "change course"; and in what ways may the new course be different.</p>
 <p>In "Human Quality", Peccei explained his call to action:</p>
 <blockquote>
@@ Line 89: / Line 87: @@
 <div class="col-md-3"><h2>A vision</h2></div>
 <div class="col-md-7">
-<blockquote><em>Holotopia</em> is a vision of a possible future that emerges when proper light has been turned on.</blockquote>
+<blockquote><em>Holotopia</em> is a vision of a possible future that emerges when proper 'light' has been 'turned on'.</blockquote>
 <p>Since Thomas More coined this term and described the first utopia, a number of visions of an ideal but non-existing social and cultural order of things have been proposed. But in view of adverse and contrasting realities, the word "utopia" acquired the negative meaning of an unrealizable fancy.</p>
 <p>As the optimism regarding our future waned, apocalyptic or "dystopian" visions became common. The "protopias" emerged as a compromise, where the focus is on smaller but practically realizable improvements.</p>
-<p>The <em>holotopia</em> is different in spirit from them all. It is a <em>more</em> attractive vision of the future than what the common utopias offered—whose authors either lacked the information to see what was possible, or lived in the times when the resources we have did not yet exist. And yet the <em>holotopia</em> is readily realizable—because we already have the information and other resources that are needed for its fulfillment.</p>
+<p>The <em>holotopia</em> is different in spirit from them all. It is a <em>more</em> attractive vision of the future than what the common utopias offered—whose authors either lacked the information to see what was possible, or lived in the times when the resources we have did not yet exist. And yet the <em>holotopia</em> is readily actionable—because we already have the information and other resources that are needed for its fulfillment.</p>
 <blockquote>The <em>holotopia</em> vision is made concrete in terms of <em>five insights</em>, as explained below.</blockquote>
@@ Line 103: / Line 101: @@
 <div class="col-md-7">
-<p><em>What do we need to do</em> to change course toward the <em>holotopia</em>?</p>
+<p><em>What do we need to do</em> to "change course" toward <em>holotopia</em>?</p>
 <blockquote>The <em>five insights</em> point to a simple principle or rule of thumb—making things  [[Wholeness|<em>whole</em>]].</blockquote>
 <p>This principle is suggested by the <em>holotopia</em>'s very name. And also by the Modernity <em>ideogram</em>. Instead of <em>reifying</em> our institutions and professions, and merely acting in them competitively to improve "our own" situation or condition, we consider ourselves and what we do as functional elements in a larger system of systems; and we self-organize, and act, as it may best suit the [[Wholeness|<em>wholeness</em>]] of it all. </p>
@@ Line 130: / Line 128: @@
 <blockquote>To see things whole, we must look at all sides.</blockquote>
-<p>The <em>holoscope</em> distinguishes itself by allowing for <em>multiple</em> ways of looking at a theme or issue, which are called <em>scopes</em>. The <em>scopes</em> and the resulting <em>views</em> have similar meaning and role as projections do in technical drawing.</p>
+<p>The <em>holoscope</em> distinguishes itself by allowing for <em>multiple</em> ways of looking at a theme or issue, which are called <em>scopes</em>. The <em>scopes</em> and the resulting <em>views</em> have similar meaning and role as projections do in technical drawing. The <em>views</em> that show the <em>whole</em> from a certain angle are called <em>aspects</em>.</p>
-<p>This <em>modernization</em> of our handling of information—distinguished by purposeful, free and informed <em>creation</em> of the ways in which we look at the world—has become <em>necessary</em> in our situation, suggests the bus with candle headlights metaphor. But it also presents a challenge to the reader—to bear in mind that the resulting views are not offered as "reality pictures", contending for that status with one another.</p>
+<p>This <em>modernization</em> of our handling of information—distinguished by purposeful, free and informed <em>creation</em> of the ways in which we look at any theme or issue—has become <em>necessary</em> in our situation, suggests the bus with candle headlights. But it also presents a challenge to the reader—to bear in mind that the resulting views are not "reality pictures", contending for that status with our conventional ones.</p>
-<blockquote>In the <em>holoscope</em>, the legitimacy and peaceful coexistence of multiple ways to look at a theme is axiomatic.</blockquote>
+<blockquote>In the <em>holoscope</em>, the legitimacy and the peaceful coexistence of multiple ways to look at a theme is axiomatic.</blockquote>
-<p>We shall continue to use the conventional language and say that <em>X</em>  <em>is</em> <em>Y</em>—although it would be more correct to say that <em>X</em> can or must (also) be seen as <em>Y</em>. The views we offer are accompanied by an invitation to genuinely try to look at the theme at hand in a certain specific way; and to do that collaboratively, in a [[dialog|<em>dialog</em>]].</p>
+<p>We will continue to use the conventional way of speaking and say that something <em>is</em> as stated, that <em>X</em> <em>is</em> <em>Y</em>—although it would be more accurate to say that <em>X</em> can or need to (also) be perceived as <em>Y</em>. The views we offer are accompanied by an invitation to genuinely try to look at the theme at hand in a certain specific way (to use the offered <em>scopes</em>); and to do that collaboratively, in a [[dialog|<em>dialog</em>]].</p>
 <p>To liberate our worldview from the inherited concepts and methods and allow for deliberate choice of <em>scopes</em>, we used the scientific method as venture point—and modified it by taking recourse to insights reached in 20th century science and philosophy. </p>
@@ Line 143: / Line 141: @@
 </blockquote>
-<p>A discovery of a new way of looking—which reveals a structural problem, and helps us reach a correct general assessment of an object of study or a situation (whether the 'cup' is 'whole' or 'broken') is a new <em>kind of result</em> that is made possible by the general-purpose science, which is modeled by the <em>holoscope</em></p>
+<p>A discovery of a new way of looking—which reveals a structural problem, and helps us reach a correct general assessment of an object of study or a situation as a whole (see if 'the cup is broken or whole') is a new <em>kind of result</em> that is made possible by the general-purpose science that is modeled by the <em>holoscope</em></p>
-<p>To see more, we take recourse to the vision of others. The <em>holoscope</em> combines scientific and other insights to enable us to see what we ignored, to 'see the other side'. This allows us to detect structural defects ('cracks') in core elements of everyday reality—which when we see them in our habitual way ('in the light of a candle'), appear to us as just normal. </p>
+<p>To see more, we take recourse to the vision of others. The <em>holoscope</em> combines scientific and other insights to enable us to see what we ignored, to 'see the other side'. This allows us to detect structural defects ('cracks') in core elements of everyday reality—which appear to us as just normal, when we look at them in our habitual way ('in the light of a candle'). </p>
-<p>All elements in our proposal are deliberately left unfinished, rendered as a collection of <em>prototypes</em>. Think of them as composing a cardboard map of a city, and a construction site.  By sharing them, we are not making a case for building a specific 'city'—but for 'architecture' as an academic field, and a real-life <em>praxis</em>. </p>
+<p>All elements in our proposal are deliberately left unfinished, rendered as a collection of <em>prototypes</em>. Think of them as composing a 'cardboard model of a city', and a 'construction site'.  By sharing them we are not making a case for a specific 'city'—but for 'architecture' as an academic field, and a real-life <em>praxis</em>. </p>
 </div> </div>
@@ Line 172: / Line 170: @@
 <li><b>Innovation</b>—the way we use our ability to create, and induce change</li>
 <li><b>Communication</b>—the social process, enabled by technology, by which information is handled</li>
-<li><b>Epistemology</b>—the fundamental assumptions we use to create truth and meaning, or "the relationship we have with information"</li>
+<li><b>Epistemology</b>—the fundamental assumptions we use to create truth and meaning; or "the relationship we have with information"</li>
 <li><b>Method</b>—the way in which truth and meaning are constructed in everyday life, or "the way we look at the world, try to comprehend and handle it"</li>
 <li><b>Values</b>—the way we "pursue happiness", which in the modern society <em>directly</em> determines the course</li>
 </ul>
-<p>In each case, we see a structural defect, which led to perceived problems; a structural defect that <em>can</em> be remedied. And whose removal naturally leads to improvements that are well beyond the removal of symptoms.</p>
+<p>In each case, we see a structural defect, which led to perceived problems. We demonstrate practical ways, partly implemented as <em>prototypes</em>, in which those structural defects can be remedied. We see that their removal naturally leads to improvements that are well beyond the removal of symptoms.</p>
 <blockquote>The <em>holotopia</em> vision results.</blockquote>
-<p>From the <em>five insights</em> a <em>sixth insight</em> follows—that the more <em>basic</em> problem that underlies our problems is that "the tie between information and action has been severed". And that the key to solution, the "systemic leverage point" for "changing course" and continuing to evolve culturally and socially, in a new way, is the same as it was in Galilei's time: We must once again "change the relationship we have with information".</p>
+<p>The key to comprehensive change turns out to be the same as it was in Galilei's time—a new approach to knowledge, which allows for creation of general principles and insights. As the case was then, the development of this new approach to knowledge is shown to follow from the state of the art of <em>knowledge of knowledge</em>—and hence as an <em>academic</em> task.</p>
 <blockquote>A case for our proposal is thereby also made.</blockquote>
-<p>In the spirit of the <em>holoscope</em>, we here only summarize each of the <em>five insights</em>—and provide evidence and details separately.</p>
+<p>In the spirit of the <em>holoscope</em>, we here only summarize the <em>five insights</em>—and provide evidence and details separately.</p>
 </div> </div>
@@ Line 195: / Line 193: @@
 <h3><em>Scope</em></h3>
-<blockquote><em><b>What</b> do we need to do</em>, to become capable of "changing course"?</blockquote>
+<blockquote><b>What</b> might constitute "a way to change course"?</blockquote>
 <p>"Man has acquired such decisive power that his future depends essentially on how he will use it", observed Peccei. Imagine if some malevolent entity, perhaps an insane dictator, took control over that power. </p>
-<blockquote>The [[power structures|<em>power structure</em>]] insight shows that no dictator is needed.</blockquote>
+<blockquote>The [[Power structure|<em>power structure</em>]] insight allows us to see why no dictator is needed.</blockquote>
-<p>Albeit in democracy, we are in that situation <em>already</em>.</p>
 <p>While the nature of the <em>power structure</em> will become clear as we go along, imagine it, to begin with, as our institutions; or more accurately, as <em>the systems in which we live and work</em> (which we simply call <em>systems</em>).</p>
-<p>Notice that <em>systems</em> have an <em>immense</em> power—<em>over us</em>, because <em>we have to adapt to them</em> to be able to live and work; and <em>over our environment</em>, because by organizing us and using us in a certain specific way, <em>they decide what the effects of our work will be</em>. </p>
+<p>Notice that <em>systems</em> have an <em>immense</em> power—<em>over us</em>, because <em>we have to adapt to them</em> to be able to live and work; and <em>over our environment</em>, because by organizing us and using us in certain specific ways, <em>they decide what the effects of our work will be</em>. </p>
 <blockquote>The <em>power structure</em> determines whether the effects of our efforts will be problems, or solutions. </blockquote>
@@ Line 213: / Line 209: @@
 <p>How suitable are <em>the systems in which we live and work</em> for their all-important role?</p>
-<blockquote>Evidence shows that they waste a lion's share of our resources. And that they either <em>cause</em> problems, or make us incapable of solving them.</blockquote>
+<blockquote>Evidence shows that the <em>power structure</em> wastes a lion's share of our resources. And that it either <em>causes</em> problems, or make us incapable of solving them.</blockquote>
-<p>The reason for this malady is readily found in the way in which <em>systems</em> evolve. </p>
+<p>The root cause of this malady is in the way <em>systems</em> evolve. </p>
-<blockquote>"Survival of the fittest" favors the <em>systems</em> that are predatory, not the ones that are useful. </blockquote>
+<blockquote>Survival of the fittest favors the <em>systems</em> that are predatory, not those that are useful. </blockquote>
-<p>[https://youtu.be/zpQYsk-8dWg?t=920 This excerpt]  from Joel Bakan's documentary "The Corporation" (which Bakan as a law professor created to <em>federate</em> an insight he considered essential) explains how the most powerful institution on our planet evolved to be a perfect "externalizing machine" ("Externalizing" means maximizing profits by letting someone else bear the costs, notably the people and the environment), just as the shark evolved to be a perfect "killing machine".  [https://youtu.be/qsKQiVJkEvI?t=2780 This scene] from Sidney Pollack's 1969 film "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?" will illustrate how the <em>power structure</em> affects <em>our own</em> condition.</p>
+<p>[https://youtu.be/zpQYsk-8dWg?t=920 This excerpt]  from Joel Bakan's documentary "The Corporation" (which Bakan as a law professor created to <em>federate</em> an insight he considered essential) explains how the most powerful institution on our planet evolved to be a perfect "externalizing machine" ("Externalizing" means maximizing profits by letting someone else bear the costs, notably the people and the environment), just as the shark evolved to be a perfect predator.  [https://youtu.be/qsKQiVJkEvI?t=2780 This scene] from Sidney Pollack's 1969 film "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?" will illustrate how the <em>power structure</em> affects <em>our own</em> condition.</p>
-<p>The  <em>systems</em> provide a certain ecology, which in the long run shapes our values, and our "human quality". They have the power to <em>socialize</em> us in certain specific ways. "The business of business is business"—and if our business is to succeed in competition, <em>we</em> must act in a certain way. We can bend and comply—or get replaced. The effect on the <em>system</em> will be the same.</p>
+<p>The  <em>systems</em> provide an ecology, which in the long run shapes our values and "human quality". They have the power to <em>socialize</em> us in ways that suit <em>their</em> needs. "The business of business is business"—and if our business is to succeed in competition, we <em>must</em> act in ways that lead to that effect. We either bend and comply—or get replaced. The effect on the <em>system</em> of both options will be the same.</p>
 <p>
 [[File:Bauman-PS.jpeg]]
 </p>
-<p>An overall result, Zygmunt Bauman diagnosed it, is that bad intentions are no longer needed for cruelty and evil to result. Through <em>socialization</em>, the <em>power structure</em> can co-opt our duty and commitment; and even our heroism and honor.</p>
+<p>A consequence, Zygmunt Bauman diagnosed, is that bad intentions are no longer needed for bad things to happen. Through <em>socialization</em>, the <em>power structure</em> can co-opt our duty and commitment, and even heroism and honor.</p>
-<p>Bauman's insight that the concentration camp was only a special case, however extreme, of (what we are calling) the <em>power structure</em>, calls for careful contemplation: Even the concentration camp  employees were only "doing their job"—in a <em>system</em> whose nature and purpose was beyond their ethical sense, and power to change. </p>
+<p>Bauman's insight that even the holocaust was a consequence and a special case, however extreme, of  the <em>power structure</em>, calls for careful contemplation: Even the concentration camp  employees, Bauman argued, were only "doing their job"—in a <em>system</em> whose character and purpose was beyond their field of vision, and power to change. </p>
-<p>While our ethical sensitivity is tuned to the <em>power structures</em> of the past, we are committing, in all innocence, the greatest  [https://youtu.be/d1x7lDxHd-o massive crime] in human history.</p>
+<p>While our ethical sense is tuned to the <em>power structures</em> of the past, we are committing (in all innocence, by acting only through <em>power structures</em> that bind us together) the greatest  [https://youtu.be/d1x7lDxHd-o massive crime] in history.</p>
+<blockquote>Our children may not have a livable planet to live on.</blockquote>
+<p>Not because someone broke the rules—<em>but because we follow them</em>.</p>
 <h3>Remedy</h3>
-<p>The fact that we cannot "solve our problems", that our civilization will not become "sustainable", unless we took the evolution of <em>systems</em> into our own hands, has not remained unnoticed. </p>
+<p>The fact that we will not solve our problems unless we develop the capability to update our <em>systems</em> has not remained unnoticed. </p>
 <p>
@@ Line 238: / Line 238: @@
 </p>
-<p>The very first step the founders of The Club of Rome did after its inception in 1968 was to convene a team of experts, in Bellagio, Italy, and develop a suitable methodology. They gave "making things whole" on the scale of socio-technical systems the name "systemic innovation"—and we adapted that as one of our <em>keywords</em>. </p>
+<p>The very first step that the The Club of Rome's founders did after its inception, in 1968, was to convene a team of experts, in Bellagio, Italy, to develop a suitable methodology. They gave making things whole on the scale of socio-technical systems the name "systemic innovation"—and we adapted that as one of our <em>keywords</em>. </p>
-<p>The work and the conclusion of this team was based on results in systems science—a transdisciplinary scientific effort, where natural and human systems are studied, in order to understand how the structure of a system, <em>any</em> system, drives the system's behavior.</p>
+<p>The work and the conclusions of this team were based on results in the systems sciences. In the year 2000, in "Guided Evolution of society", systems scientist Béla H. Bánáthy surveyed relevant research, and concluded in a true <em>holotopian</em> tone:</p>
-<p>In the year 2000, in "Guided Evolution of society" and in a distinctly <em>holotopian</em> tone,  Béla H. Bánáthy summarized our generation's general challenge and opportunity, which the study of <em>systems</em> has revealed:</p>
 <blockquote>We are the <em>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 now have the knowledge available to us and we have the power of human and social potential that is required to initiate a new and historical social function: conscious evolution. But we can fulfill this function only if we develop evolutionary competence by evolutionary learning and acquire the will and determination to engage in conscious evolution. These two are core requirements, because <em>what evolution did for us up to now we have to learn to do for ourselves by guiding our own evolution.</em></blockquote>
-<p>We have adopted from Bánáthy his elegant keyword <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>. </p>
+<p>In 2010 Knowledge Federation began to self-organize to make further headway on this creative frontier. The procedure we developed is simple: We create a [[prototype|<em>prototype</em>]] of a system, and a <em>transdisciplinary</em> community and project around it to update it continuously. The insights in participating disciplines can in this way have real or <em>systemic</em> effects.</p>
-<p>In 2010,  Knowledge Federation began to self-organize to become able to make make further progress on that creative frontier. The procedure we developed is simple: We create a [[prototype|<em>prototype</em>]] of a system, and organize a <em>transdisciplinary</em> community and project around it, to update it continuously. This enables the insights reached in the participating disciplines to have real or <em>systemic</em> impact <em>directly</em>.</p>
+<p>Our very first <em>prototype</em>, the Barcelona Innovation Ecosystem for Good Journalism in 2011, was of a public informing that identifies systemic causes and proposes corresponding solutions (by involving academic and other experts) of perceived problems (reported by people directly, through citizen journalism). </p>
-<p>Our very first project of this kind, the Barcelona Innovation Ecosystem for Good Journalism in 2011, developed a [[prototype|<em>prototype</em>]] of a public informing that turns perceived problems (that people report directly, through citizen journalism) into <em>systemic</em> understanding of causes and recommendations for action (developed by involving academic and other domain experts, and having their insights made accessible by a communication design team). </p>
+<p>A year later we created The Game-Changing Game as a generic way to change <em>systems</em>—and hence as a "practical way to craft the future"; and based on it The Club of Zagreb, as an update to The Club of Rome.</p>
-<p>The experience with this <em>prototype</em> revealed a pervasive issue we were not aware of: The senior domain experts we brought together to represent (in this case) journalism <em>cannot change their own system</em>. What they, however, can and need to do is empower their students (or junior colleagues, or entrepreneurs) to do that. A year later we created The Game-Changing Game as a generic way to do that—and as a "practical way to craft the future". We subsequently created The Club of Zagreb, as a <em>necessary</em> (according to this insight) update to The Club of Rome, in its all-important mission. The Holotopia project builds further on that work.</p>
+<p>Each of about forty [[prototype|<em>prototypes</em>]] in our portfolio illustrates [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] in a specific domain.  Each of them is composed in terms of [[design pattern|<em>design patterns</em>]]—problem-solution pairs, ready to be adapted for other applications and domains.</p>
-<p>Our portfolio contains about forty[[prototype|<em>prototypes</em>]], each of which illustrates [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] in a specific domain.  Each <em>prototype</em> is composed by weaving together [[design pattern|<em>design patterns</em>]]—problem-solution pairs, which are ready to be adapted to other design challenges and domains.</p>
+<p>The Collaborology <em>prototype</em>, in education, will highlight some of the advantages of this approach.</p>
-<p>The Collaborology <em>prototype</em>, in education, will highlight this approach's advantages.</p>
+<p> An education that prepares us for yesterday's professions, and only in a certain stage of life, is obviously an obstacle to <em>systemic</em> change. Collaborology implements an education that is in every sense flexible (self-guided, life-long...), and in an <em>emerging</em> area of interest (collaborative knowledge work, as enabled by new technology). By being collaboratively created itself (Collaborology is created and taught by a network of international experts, and offered to learners world-wide), the economies of scale result that <em>dramatically</em> reduce effort. This in addition provides a sustainable business model for developing and disseminating up-to-date knowledge in <em>any</em> domain of interest. By conceiving the course as a design project, where everyone collaborates on co-creating the learning resources, the students get a chance to exercise their "human quality". This in addition gives the students an essential role in the resulting 'knowledge-work ecosystem' (as 'bacteria', extracting 'nutrients') .</p>
-<p> An education that prepares people for yesterday's professions, and only in a certain stage of life, is obviously an obstacle to <em>systemic</em> change. Collaborology implements an education that is in every sense flexible (self-guided, life-long...), and in an <em>emerging</em> area of interest (collaborative knowledge work, as enabled by new technology). By being collaboratively created itself (Collaborology is created and taught by a network of international experts, and offered to learners world-wide), the economies of scale result that <em>dramatically</em> reduce effort. This in addition provides a sustainable business model for developing and disseminating up-to-date knowledge in <em>any</em> domain of interest. By conceiving the course as a design project, where everyone collaborates on co-creating the learning resources, the students get a chance to exercise their "human quality". This in addition gives the students an essential role in the resulting 'knowledge-work ecosystem' (as 'bacteria', extracting 'nutrients') .</p>
 </div> </div>
@@ Line 275: / Line 269: @@
 <p>The handling of information, or metaphorically our society's 'headlights', suggests itself as the answer for several reasons. </p>
-<p>One of the reasons is obvious: If we should use information as guiding light and not competition, our information will need to be different.</p>
+<p>One of them is obvious: If we should use information as guiding light and not competition, our information will need to be different.</p>
-<p>In his 1948 seminal "Cybernetics", Norbert Wiener pointed to another reason: In <em>social</em> systems, communication is what  <em>turns</em> a collection of independent individuals into a system. Wiener made that point by talking about ants and bees. It is the nature of the communication that determines a social system's properties, and behavior.  Cybernetics has shown—as its main point, and title theme—that "the tie between information and action" has an all-important role, which determines (Wiener used the technical keyword "homeostasis, but let us here use this more contemporary one) the <em>sustainability</em> of a system. The full title of Wiener's book was  "Cybernetics or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine". To be able to correct their behavior and maintain inner and outer balance, to be able to "change course" when the circumstances demand that (Wiener used the technical term "homeostasis")—the system must have <em>suitable</em> communication and control.</p>
+<p>In his 1948 seminal "Cybernetics", Norbert Wiener pointed to another reason: In <em>social</em> systems, communication is what  <em>turns</em> a collection of independent individuals into a system. Wiener made that point by talking about ants and bees. It is the nature of the communication that determines a social system's properties, and behavior.  Cybernetics has shown—as its main point, and title theme—that "the tie between information and action" has an all-important role, which determines (Wiener used the technical keyword "homeostasis", but let us here use this more contemporary one) the <em>sustainability</em> of a system. The full title of Wiener's book was  "Cybernetics or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine". To be able to correct their behavior and maintain inner and outer balance, to be able to "change course" when the circumstances demand that, to be able to continue living and adapting and evolving—a system must have <em>suitable</em> communication and control.</p>
-<p>A system whose "tie between information and action has been severed" is 'brain-dead', and scheduled for extinction.</p>
+<h3>Diagnosis</h3>
-<h3>Diagnosis</h3>
+<p>That is presently <em>not</em> the case with our core systems; and with our civilization as a whole.</p>
 <blockquote>The tie between information and action has been severed, Wiener too observed. </blockquote>
-<p>Our society's communication-and-control is broken, and it needs to be restored.</p>
+<p>Our society's communication-and-control is broken; it needs to be restored.</p>
 <p>
 [[File:Bush-Vision.jpg]]
@@ Line 296: / Line 290: @@
 <p>We have assembled a formidable collection of academic results that shared the same fate—to illustrate a general phenomenon we are calling [[Wiener's paradox|<em>Wiener's paradox</em>]]. The link between communication and action having been broken—the academic results will tend to be ignored <em>whenever they challenge the present "course"</em> and point to a new one!</p>
-<p>To an academic researcher, it may feel disheartening to see so many best ideas of our best minds ignored. Why publish more—if even the most <em>elementary</em> insight that our field has produced, the one that <em>motivated</em> our field and our work, has not yet been communicated to the public?</p>
+<p>To an academic researcher, it may feel disheartening to see that so many best ideas of our best minds remained ignored.</p>
 <p>This sentiment is transformed into <em>holotopian</em> optimism when we look at 'the other side of the coin'—the creative frontier that is opening up. We are invited to, we are indeed <em>obliged</em> to reinvent <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>, by recreating the very communication that holds them together. Including, of course, our own, academic system, and the way in which it interoperates with other systems—<em>or fails</em> to interoperate. </p>
-<p>Optimism will turn into enthusiasm, when we consider also <em>this</em> commonly ignored fact:</p>
+<p>Optimism will turn into enthusiasm, when we consider also <em>this</em> widely ignored fact:</p>
-<blockquote>The information technology we now commonly use to communicate with the world was <em>created</em> to enable a paradigm change on that very frontier.</blockquote>
+<blockquote>The information technology we now use to communicate with the world was <em>created</em> to enable a paradigm change on that very frontier.</blockquote>
-<p>'Electricity', and the 'lightbulb', have just been created—in order to <em>enable</em> the development of the new kinds of 'socio-technical machinery' that our society now urgently needs.</p>
+<p>'Electricity', and the 'lightbulb', have already been created—<em>for the purpose of</em> giving our society the 'headlights' it needs.</p>
-<p>Vannevar Bush pointed to the need for this new paradigm already in his title, "As We May Think". His point was that "thinking" really means making associations or "connecting the dots". And that—given the vast volumes of our information—our knowledge work must be organized <em>in a way that enables us to benefit from each other's thinking</em>. That technology and processes must be devised to enable us to in effect "connect the dots" or think <em>together</em>, as a single mind does. Bush described a <em>prototype</em> system called "memex", which was based on microfilm as technology.</p>
+<p>Vannevar Bush pointed to the need for this new paradigm already in his title, "As We May Think". His point was that "thinking" really means making associations or "connecting the dots". And that—given the vast volumes of our information—our knowledge work must be organized <em>in a way that enables us to benefit from each other's thinking</em>. Bush's point was that technology and processes must be devised to enable us to in effect "connect the dots" or think <em>together</em>, as a single mind does. He described a <em>prototype</em> system called "memex", which was based on microfilm as technology.</p>
-<p>Douglas Engelbart, however, took Bush's idea in a whole new direction—by observing (in 1951!) that when each of us humans are connected to a personal digital device through an interactive interface, and when those devices are connected together into a network—then the overall result is that we are connected together as the cells in a human organism are connected by the nervous system. </p>
+<p>Douglas Engelbart, however, took Bush's idea significantly further than Bush himself envisioned, and indeed in a whole new direction—by observing (in 1951!) that when each of us humans are connected to a personal digital device through an interactive interface, and when those devices are connected together into a network—then the overall result is that we are connected together as the cells in a human organism are connected by the nervous system. </p>
-<p>Notice that the earlier innovations in this area—including both the clay tablets and the printing press—required that a physical object be <em>transported</em>; this new technology allows us to "create, integrate and apply knowledge" <em>concurrently</em>, as cells in a human nervous system do.</p>
+<p>All earlier innovations in this area—the clay tablets <em>and</em> the printing press—required that a physical object with a message be <em>physically transported</em>.</p>
-<blockquote> We can now develop insights and solutions  <em>together</em>! We can have results <em>instantly</em>!</blockquote>
+<blockquote>This new technology allows us to "create, integrate and apply knowledge" <em>concurrently</em>, as cells in a human nervous system do.</blockquote>
-<p>Engelbart saw in this new technology exactly what we need to become able to handle the "complexity times urgency" of our problems, which grows at an accelerated rate. </p>
+<p>We can now develop insights and solutions  <em>together</em>.</p>
-<p>[https://youtu.be/cRdRSWDefgw This three minute video clip], which we called "Doug Engelbart's Last Wish", offers an opportunity for a pause. Imagine the effects of improving the planetary <em>systems</em>, and our "development, integration and application of knowledge" to begin with. Imagine "the effects of getting 5% better", Engelbart commented with a smile. Then our old man put his fingers on his forehead, and looked up: "I've always imagined that the potential was... large..." The potential is not only large, it is <em>staggering</em>. The improvement that is both necessary and possible is <em>qualitative</em>—from a system that doesn't work, to one that does.</p>
+<p>Engelbart conceived this new technology as a necessary step toward becoming able to tackle the "complexity times urgency" of our problems, which he saw as growing at an accelerated rate. </p>
-<p>To Engelbart's dismay, this new "collective nervous system" ended up being use to only make the <em>old</em> processes and systems more efficient. The ones that evolved through the centuries of use of the printing press. The ones that <em>broadcast</em> information. </p>
+<p>[https://youtu.be/cRdRSWDefgw This three minute video clip], which we called "Doug Engelbart's Last Wish", will give us an opportunity for a pause and an illuminating reflection. Think about the prospects of improving the planetary <em>collective mind</em>. Imagine "the effects of getting 5% better", Engelbart commented with a smile. Then our old man put his fingers on his forehead, and raised his eyes up: "I've always imagined that the potential was... large..." The potential is not only large; it is <em>staggering</em>. The improvement that is both necessary and possible is <em>qualitative</em>—from a system that doesn't really work, to one that does.</p>
+<p>To Engelbart's dismay, our new "collective nervous system" ended up being used to only make the <em>old</em> processes and systems more efficient. The ones that evolved through the centuries of use of the printing press. The ones that <em>broadcast</em> information. </p>
 <p>
@@ Line 324: / Line 320: @@
 </p>
-<blockquote>The above observation by Anthony Giddens points to the impact this has had on our culture; and on "human quality".</blockquote>
+<p>The above observation by Anthony Giddens points to the effects that our dazzled and confused <em>collective mind</em> had on our culture; and on "human quality".</p>
-<p>Dazzled by an overload of data, in a reality whose complexity is well beyond our comprehension—we have no other recourse but "ontological security". We find meaning in learning a profession, and performing in it a competitively.</p>
+<p>Our sense of meaning having been drowned in an overload of data, in a reality whose complexity is well beyond our comprehension—we have no other recourse but "ontological security". We find meaning in learning a profession, and performing in it a competitively.</p>
-<p>But that is exactly what <em>binds us</em> to <em>power structure</em>. </p>
+<blockquote>But that is exactly what <em>binds us</em> to <em>power structure</em>!</blockquote>
 <h3>Remedy</h3>
-<blockquote><em>What is to be done</em>, if we should become able to use the new technology as it's meant to be used—to change our <em>collective mind</em>?</blockquote>
+<p><em>What is to be done</em>, to restore the severed link between communication and action?</p>
+<blockquote><em>How can we begin to change our collective mind</em>—as our technology enables, and our situation demands?</blockquote>
-<p>Engelbart left us a clear answer in the opening slides of his "A Call to Action" presentation, which were prepared for a 2007 panel that Google organized to share his vision to the world (but not shown!).</p>
+<p>Engelbart left us a clear and concise answer; he called it <em>bootstrapping</em>.</p>
-<p>
+<p>His point was that only <em>writing</em> about what needs to be done would not have an effect (the tie between information and action having been broken). <em>Bootstrapping</em> means that we consider ourselves as <em>parts</em> in a <em>collective mind</em>; and that we self-organize, and <em>act</em>, as it may best serve its restoration to <em>wholeness</em>.</p>
-[[File:DE-one.jpeg]]
-</p>
-<p>In the first slide, Engelbart emphasized that  "new thinking" or a "new paradigm" is needed. In the second, he pointed out what this "new thinking" was. </p>
-<blockquote>
-<p>We ride a common economic-political vehicle traveling at an ever-accelerating pace through increasingly complex terrain.</p>
-<p>Our headlights are much too dim and blurry. We have totally inadequate steering and braking controls. </p>
-</blockquote>
-<p>Yes, it was the <em>systemic innovation</em>, or "making things whole", he was pointing to. Engelbart even published an original <em>systemic innovation</em> methodology <em>already in 1962</em>—six years before Jantsch and others created theirs.</p>
+<blockquote>The key to solution is to either <em>create</em> new systems with the material of our own minds and bodies—or to <em>help others</em> do that.</blockquote>
-<p>Engelbart also made it clear what our next step needed to be—by which the spell of the <em>Wiener's paradox</em> is to be broken. He called it "bootstrapping"—and we adapted that as one of our <em>keywords</em>. His point was that only <em>writing</em> about what needs to be done (the tie between information and action having been broken) would not have an effect. <em>Bootstrapping</em> means that we <em>act</em>—and either <em>create</em> a new system with the material of our own minds and bodies, or help others do that.</p>
+<p>The Knowledge Federation <em>transdiscipline</em> was conceived by an act of <em>bootstrapping</em>, to enable <em>bootstrapping</em>. </p>
-<p>What we are calling <em>knowledge federation</em> is a collection of social processes—which constitute the operation of a <em>collective mind</em> that our technology enables, and our society requires.</p>
+<p>What we are calling <em>knowledge federation</em> is an umbrella term for a variety of activities and social processes that together comprise the functions of a <em>collective mind</em>. Obviously, the development of the <em>collective mind</em> [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] will requires a <em>system</em>, a new kind of institution, which will assemble and mobilize the required knowledge and human and other resources toward that end. Presently, Knowledge Federation is a complete <em>prototype</em> of the <em>transdiscipline</em> for <em>knowledge federation</em>, ready for inspection, co-creative updates and deployment.</p>
-<p>The Knowledge Federation <em>transdiscipline</em> was created by an act of <em>bootstrapping</em>, to enable <em>bootstrapping</em>. Originally, we were a community of knowledge media researchers and developers, developing the <em>collective mind</em> solutions that the new technology enables. Already at our first meeting, in 2008, we realized that the technology that we and our colleagues were developing has the potential to change our <em>collective mind</em>; but that to realize that potential, we need to self-organize differently.</p>
+<p>But may will have the requisit knowledge, and who may be given the power—to update our <em>collective mind</em>?</p>
-<!-- XXX
+<blockquote>The <em>praxis</em> of  <em>knowledge federation</em> itself must, of course, also be <em>federated</em>.</blockquote>
-<p>Ever since then have been <em>bootstrapping</em>, by developing <em>prototypes</em> with and for various communities and situations.</p>
+<p>In 2008, when Knowledge Federation had its inaugural meeting, two closely related initiatives were formed: Program for the Future (a Silicon Valley-based initiative to continue and complete "Doug Engelbart's unfinished revolution") and Global Sensemaking (an international community of researchers and developers, working on technology and processes for collective sense making). </p>
+<p>
+[[File:BCN2011.jpg]]<br>
+<small>Patty Coulter, Mei Lin Fung and David Price speaking at the 2011 An Innovation Ecosystem for Good Journalism workshop in Barcelona</small>
+</p>
+<p>We use the above triplet of photos ideographically, to highlight that Knowledge Federation is a true federation—where state of the art knowledge is combined in state of the art <em>systems</em>. The featured participants of our 2011 workshop in Barcelona, where our public informing <em>prototype</em> was created, are Patty Coulter (the Director of Oxford Global Media and Fellow of Green College Oxford, formerly the Director of Oxford University's Reuter Program in Journalism) Mei Lin Fung (the founder of Program for the Future) and David Price (who co-founded both the Global Sensemaking R & D community, and Debategraph—which is now the leading global platform for collective thinking).
+</p>
-<p>Among them, we highlight
+<p>Other <em>prototypes</em> contributed other <em>design patterns</em> for restoring the severed link between information and action. The Tesla and the Nature of Creativity TNC2015 <em>prototype</em> showed what may constitute the <em>federation</em> of a research result—which is written in an esoteric academic vernacular, and has large potential general interest and impact. The first phase of this <em>prototype</em>, completed through collaboration between the author and our communication design team, turned the academic article into a multimedia object, with intuitive, metaphorical diagrams, and explanatory interviews with the author. The second phase was a high-profile, televised and live streamed event, where the result was made public. The third phase, implemented on Debategraph, modeled proper online collective thinking about the result—including pros and cons, connections with other related results, applications etc. </p>
-<ul>
-<li>Barcelona Innovation Ecosystem for Good Journalism, IEJ2011</li>
-<li>Tesla and the Nature of Creativity, TNC2015</li>
-<li>The LIghthouse 2016</li>
-</ul> </p>
-<p>The first, IEJ2011m, shows how researchers, journalists, citizens and creative media workers can collaborate to give the people exactly the kind of information they need—to be able to orient themselves in contemporary world, and handle its challenges correctly.</p>
-<p>The second, TNC2015, shows how to <em>federate</em> a result of a single scientist—which is written in an inaccessible language, and has high potential relevance to other fields and to the society at large.</p>
-<p>The third, The Lighthouse 2016, empowers a community of researchers (the concrete <em>prototype</em> was made for and with the International Society for the Systems Sciences) to <em>federate</em> a single core insight that the society needs from their field. (Here the concrete insight was that "the free competition" cannot replace "communication and control" and provide "homeostasis"—as Wiener already argued in Cybernetics, in 1948.)</p>
-<p>Together, those three <em>prototypes</em> constitute a <em>prototype</em> solution to the <em>Wiener's paradox</em>.</p>
+<p>The Lighthouse 2016 <em>prototype</em> is a conceived as a <em>direct</em> remedy for the <em>Wiener's paradox</em>, created for and with the International Society for the Systems Sciences. This <em>prototype</em> models a system by which <em>an academic community</em> can federate a single core message into the public sphere. The message in this case was also relevant—it was whether or not we can rely on "free competition" to guide the evolution and the functioning of our <em>systems</em>; or whether we must use its alternative—the knowledge developed in the systems sciences. </p>
 </div> </div>
-<!-- XXX
 <div class="row">
@@ Line 383: / Line 365: @@
 <p>
 <blockquote>"Act like as if you loved your children above all else",</blockquote>
-Greta Thunberg, representing her generation, told the political leaders at Davos. <em>Of course</em> the political leaders love their children—don't we all? But what Greta was asking for was to 'hit the brakes'; and when our 'bus' is inspected, it becomes clear that its 'brakes' too are dysfunctional.</p>
+Greta Thunberg, representing her generation, told the political leaders at Davos. <em>Of course</em> political leaders love their children—don't we all? But what Greta was asking them to do was to 'hit the brakes'; and when the 'bus' they are believed to be 'driving' is inspected, it becomes clear that the 'brakes' too are missing. The job of a politician is to keep 'the bus on course' (the economy growing) for yet another four years. <em>Changing</em> the 'course' or the <em>system</em> is well beyond what they are able to do, or even imagine doing.</p>
-<p>So <b>who</b> will lead us through the next and vitally important step on our evolutionary agenda—where we shall learn how to update <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>?</p>
+<p>The COVID-19 pandemic may require systemic changes <em>now</em>.</p>
-<p>Both Jantsch and Engelbart believed that "the university" would have to be the answer; and they made their appeals accordingly. But they were ignored—and so were Vannevar Bush and Norbert Wiener before them, and the others who followed. </p>
+<blockquote><b>Who</b>—what institution or <em>system</em>—will take the leadership role, and guide us through our unprecedentedly immense creative and evolutionary challenges?</blockquote>
+<p>Both Erich Jantsch and Doug Engelbart believed that "the university" would have to be the answer; and they made their appeals accordingly. But the universities ignored them—just as they ignored Vannevar Bush and Norbert Wiener before them, and so many others who followed. </p>
 <p>Why?</p>
-<p>It is tempting to conclude that the <em>academia</em> too followed the general trend, and evolved as a <em>power structure</em>. But to see solutions, we need to look at deeper causes.</p>
+<p>Isn't the prospect of restoring agency to information and power to knowledge deserving of academic attention?</p>
-<p>As we pointed out in the opening paragraph of this website, the academic tradition did not develop as a way to pursue practical knowledge, but (let's call it that) "right" knowledge.
+<p>It is tempting to conclude that the university institution followed the general trend, and evolved as a <em>power structure</em>. But to see solutions, we need to look at deeper causes.</p>
-Our tradition developed from classical philosophy, where the "philosophical" questions such as "How do we know that something is <em>true</em>?" and even "<em>What does it mean</em> to say that something is true?" led to rigorous or "academic" standards for pursuing knowledge. The university's core social role, as we, academic people tend to perceive it, is to uphold those standards. By studying at a university, one becomes capable of pursuing knowledge in an academic way in <em>any</em> domain of interest.</p>
+<p>
+[[File:Toulmin-Vision2.jpeg]]
+</p>
-<p>And as we also pointed out, by bringing up the image of Galilei in house arrest, this seemingly esoteric or "philosophical" pursuit was what largely <em>enabled</em> the last "great cultural revival", and led to all those various good things that we now enjoy. The Inquisition, censorship and prison were unable to keep in check an idea whose time had come—and the new way to pursue knowledge soon migrated from astrophysics, where it originated, and transformed all walks of life. </p>
+<p>We readily find them in the way in which the university institution <em>originated</em>.</p>
-<p>We began our presentation of <em>knowledge federation</em> by asking "Could a similar advent be in store for us today?" </p>
+<p>The academic tradition did not originate as a way to practical knowledge, but to <em>freely</em> pursue knowledge for its own sake; in a manner disciplined only by [[knowledge of knowledge|<em>knowledge of knowledge</em>]]—which philosophers have been developing since antiquity. Wherever this free-yet-disciplined pursuit of knowledge took us, we followed.</p>
-<h3>Diagnosis</h3>
+<p>And as we pointed out in the opening paragraphs of this website, by highlighting the iconic image of Galilei in house arrest,
+<blockquote>it was this <em>free</em> pursuit of knowledge that led to the <em>last</em> "great cultural revival".</blockquote>
+</p>
+<p>We asked:
+<blockquote>Could a similar advent be in store for us today?</blockquote></p>
+<p>The key to the positive answer to this question—which is obviously central to <em>holotopia</em>—is in the <em>historicity</em> of "the relationship we have with knowledge"—which Stephen Toulmin explicated so clearly in his last book, "Reurn to Reason", from which the above quotation was taken. So that is what we here focus on.</p>
+<p>As Toulmin pointed out, at the time when the <em>contemporary</em> academic ethos was taking shape, it was the Church and the tradition that had the prerogative of telling the people how to conduct their daily affairs and what to believe in. And as the image of Galilei in house arrest may suggest—they held onto that prerogative most firmly! But the censorship and the prison could not stop an idea whose time had come. They were unable to prevent a completely <em>new</em> way of exploring the world to transpire from astrophysics, where it originated, and transform first our pursuit of knowledge in general—and then our society and culture at large.</p>
+<p>It is therefore natural that at the universities we consider the curation of this <em>approach</em> to knowledge to be our core role in our society. Being the heirs and the custodians of a tradition that has historically led to some of <em>the</em> most spectacular evolutionary leaps in human history, we remain faithful to that tradition. We do that by meticulously conforming to the methods and the themes of interests of mathematics, physics, philosophy, biology, sociology, philosophy and other traditional academic disciplines, which, we believe, <em>embody</em> the highest standards of that tradition. People can learn practical skills elsewhere. It is only at the <em>university</em> that they can acquire the highest standards of <em>knowledge of knowledge</em>—and the ability to pursue knowledge effectively in <em>any</em> domain.</p>
+<p>We must ask:</p>
-<p>Here is why we felt confident in drafting an affirmative answer to this rhetorical question.</p>
+<blockquote>Could the academic tradition evolve further? </blockquote>
-<p>Early in the course of our modernization, we made a fundamental error whose consequences cannot be overrated.  This error was subsequently uncovered and reported, but it has not yet been corrected.</p>
+<p>Could this tradition <em>once again</em> give us a completely <em>new</em> way to explore the world?</p>
-<p>Without thinking, from the traditional culture we've adopted a <em>myth</em> incomparably more disruptive of modernization that the creation myth—that "truth" means "correspondence with reality". And that the role of information is to provide us an "objectively true reality picture", so that we may distinguish truth from falsehood by simply checking whether an idea fits in. </p>
+<p>Can the free pursuit of knowledge, curated by the <em>knowledge of knowledge</em>, once again lead to "a great cultural revival" ?</p>
-<blockquote>The 20th century science and philosophy disproved and abandoned this naive view.</blockquote>
+<blockquote>Can "a great cultural revival" <em>begin</em> at the university?</blockquote>
-<p>
-[[File:Einstein-Watch.jpeg]]
-</p>
-<p>It has turned out that <em>there is simply no way</em> to open the 'mechanism of nature' and verify that our models <em>correspond</em> to the real thing!</p>
-<p>How, then, did our "reality picture" come about?</p>
-<p>Reality, reported scientists and philosophers, is not something we discover; it is something we <em>construct</em>. </p>
+<h3>Diagnosis</h3>
-<p>Part of this construction is a function of our cognitive system, which turns "the chaotic diversity of our sense-experience" into something that makes sense, and helps us function. The other part is performed by our society. Long before we are able to reflect on these matters "philosophically", we are given certain concepts through which to look at the world and organize it and make sense of it. Through innumerable 'carrots and sticks', throughout our lives, we are induced to "see the reality" in a certain specific way—as our culture defines it. As everyone knows, every "normal human being" sees the reality as it truly is. Wasn't that the reason why our ancestors often considered the members of a neighboring tribes, who saw the reality differently, as not completely normal; and why they treated them as not completely human?</p>
-<p>Of various consequences that have resulted from this historical error, we shall here mention two. The first will explain what really happened with our culture, and our "human quality"; why the way we handle them urgently needs to change. The second will explain what holds us back—why we've been so incapable of treating our <em>systems</em> as we treat other human-made things, by adapting them to the purposes that need to be served.  </p>
+<blockquote>In the course of our modernization, we made a <em>fundamental</em> error.</blockquote>
-<p>To see our first point, we invite you to follow us in a one-minute thought experiment. To join us on an imaginary visit to a cathedral. No, this is not about religion; we shall use the cathedral as one of our <em>ideograms</em>, to put things in proportion and make a point.</p>
+<p>From the traditional culture we adopted a <em>myth</em> far more disruptive of modernization than the creation myth—that "truth" means "correspondence with reality"; and that the purpose of information, and of our pursuit of knowledge, is to "know the reality" objectively, as it truly is. It may take a moment of reflection to see how much this <em>myth</em> permeates our popular culture, our society and institutions; how much it marks "the relationship we have with information"—in all its various manifestations.</p>
-<p>What strikes us instantly, as we enter, is awe-inspiring architecture. Then we hear the music play: Is it Bach's cantatas? Or Allegri's Miserere? We see sculptures, and frescos by masters of old on the walls. And then, of course, there's the ritual...</p>
+<p>This fundamental error has subsequently been detected and reported, but not corrected. (We again witness that the link between information and action has been severed.)</p>
-<p>We also notice a little book on each bench. When we open it, we see that its first paragraphs explain how the world was created.</p>
-<p>Let this difference in size—between the beginning of Genesis and all the rest we find in a cathedral—point to the fact that, owing to our error, our pursuit of knowledge has been focused on a relatively minor part, on <em>explaining</em> how the things we perceive originated, and how they work. And that what we've ignored is our culture as a complex ecosystem, which evolved through thousands of years, whose function is to <em>socialize</em> people in a certain specific way. To <em>create</em> certain "human quality". Notice that we are not making a value judgment, only pointing to a function.</p>
-<p>The way we presently treat this ecosystem reminds of the way in which we treated the natural ones, at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. We have nothing equivalent to CO2 measurements and quotas, to even <em>try</em> to make this a scientific and political issue.</p>
+<p>
+[[File:Einstein-Watch.jpeg]]
+</p>
+<p><em>It is simply impossible</em> to open up the 'mechanism of nature', and verify that our ideas and models <em>correspond</em> to the real thing!</p>
-<p>So how <em>are</em> our culture, and our "human quality" evolving? To see the answer, it is enough to just look around. To an excessive degree, the <em>symbolic environment</em>  we are immersed in is a product of advertising. And explicit advertising is only a tip of an iceberg, comprising various ways in which we are <em>socialized</em> to be egotistical consumers; to believe in "free competition"—not in "making things <em>whole</em>".</p>
+<blockquote>The "reality", the 20th century's scientists and philosophers found out, is not something we discover; it is something we <em>construct</em>. </blockquote>
-<p>By believing that the role of information is to give us an "objective" and factual view of "reality", we have ignored and abandoned to decay core parts of our cultural heritage. <em>And</em> we have abandoned the creation of culture, and of "human quality", to <em>power structure</em>. </p>
+<p>This "social construction of reality" is a result of complex interaction between our cognitive organs and our culture. From the cradle to the grave, through innumerably many 'carrots and sticks', we are <em>socialized</em> to organize and communicate our experience <em>in a certain specific way</em>. </p>
-<p>To see our second point, that reality construction is a key instrument of the <em>power structure</em>, and hence of power, it may be sufficient to point to "Social Construction of Reality", where Berger and Luckmann explained how throughout history, the "universal theories" about the nature of reality have been used  to <em>legitimize</em> a given social order. But this theme is central to <em>holotopia</em>, and here too we can only get a glimpse of a solution by looking at deeper dynamics and causes.</p>
+<blockquote>The <em>socialized reality</em> construction has has served as the 'DNA', which enabled the traditional cultures to reproduce themselves and evolve.</blockquote>
-<p>To be able to do that we devised a <em>thread</em>—in which three short stories or <em>vignettes</em> are strung together to compose a larger insight.</p>
+<p>Information, in other words, <em>has</em> traditionally served as 'headlights'; the purpose of the traditional myths was not to tell the people how the world really originated—but to serve as foundation for principles and norms, which oriented their behavior; and the development of "human quality".</p>
-<p>The first <em>vignette</em> describes a real-life event, where two Icelandic horses living outdoors—aging Odin the Horse, and New Horse who is just being introduced to the herd where Odin is the stallion and the leader—are engaged in turf strife. It will be suffice to just imagine these two horses running side by side, with their long hairs waving in the wind, Odin pushing New Horse toward the river, and away from his pack of mares.</p>
+<p>Information, however, and <em>socialization</em>, have always served also a different purpose—as instruments of power; as media which the power relationships were maintained. And hence as core elements of the <em>power structure</em>.</p>
-<p>
+<p>In "Social Construction of Reality", Berger and Luckmann left us an analysis of the social process by which the reality is constructed—and pointed to the role that "universal theories" (which determine the relationship we have with information) play in maintaining a given social and political status quo. An example, but not the only one, is the Biblical worldview of Galilei's persecutors.</p>
-[[File:Bourdieu-insight.jpeg]]
-</p>
-<p>The second story is about sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, and his "theory of practice"—where Bourdieu provided a conceptual framework to help us understand how <em>socialization</em> works; and in particular its relationship with what he called "symbolic power". Our reason for combining these two stories together is to suggest that we humans exhibit a similar turf behavior as Odin—but that this tends to remain largely unrecognized. Part of the reason is that, as Bourdieu explained, the ways in which this atavistic disposition of ours manifests itself are incomparably more diverse and subtle than the ones of horses—indeed as more diverse so as our culture is more complex than theirs. </p>
+<p>To organize and sum up what we above all need to know about the <em>nature</em> of <em>socialization</em>, and about the relationship between power and culture, we created the Odin–Bourdieu–Damasio [[thread|<em>thread</em>]], consisting of three short real-life stories or [[vignette|<em>vignettes</em>]]. (The <em>thread</em> is an adaptation of Vannevar Bush's technical idea for organizing collective mind work, which he called "trail".) </p>
-<p>Bourdieu devised two keywords for the symbolic cultural 'turf'" "field" and "game", and used them interchangeably. He called it a "field", to suggest (1) a field of activity or profession, and the <em>system</em> where it is practiced; and (2)  something akin to a magnetic field, in which we people are immersed as small magnets, and which subtly, without us noticing, orients our seemingly random or "free" movement.  He referred to it as "game", to suggests that there are certain semi-permanent roles in it, with allowable 'moves', by which our 'turf strife' is structured in a specific way.</p>
+<p>The first, Odin the Horse [[vignette|<em>vignette</em>]], points to the nature of turf struggle, by portraying the turf behavior of horses. </p>
-<p>To explain the dynamics of the game or the field, Bourdieu adapted two additional keywords, each of which has a long academic history: "habitus" and "doxa". A habitus is composed of embodied behavioral predispositions, and may be thought of as distinct 'roles' or 'avatars' in the 'game'. A king has a certain distinct habitus; and so do his pages. The habitus is routinely maintained through direct, body-to-body action (everyone bows to the king, and you do too), without conscious intention or awareness. Doxa is the belief, or embodied experience, that the given social order is <em>the</em> reality. "Orthodoxy" acknowledges that multiple "realities" coexist, of which only a single one is "right"; doxa ignores even the <em>possibility</em> of alternatives.</p>
+<p>The second <em>vignette</em>, featuring Pierre Bourdieu as leading sociologist, shows that we humans exhibit a similar behavior—and that our culture may be perceived as a complex 'turf'.</p>
+<p>
+[[File:Bourdieu-insight.jpeg]]
+</p>
+<p>Bourdieu used interchangeably two keywords—"field" and "game"—to refer to this 'turf'. By calling it a field, he portrayed it as something akin to  a magnetic field, which orients our seemingly random or "free" behavior, without us noticing. By calling it a game, he portrayed it as something that structures or "gamifies" our social existence, by giving each of us certain "action capabilities" (which Bourdieu called "habitus"), pertaining to a role, which tends to be transmitted from body to body <em>directly</em>. Everyone bows to the king, and we do that too. With time, we become <em>socialized</em> to accept those roles and behaviors as <em>the</em> "reality". Bourdieu called this experience (that our social reality is as immutable and real as the physical reality) <em>doxa</em>. </p>
-<p>Hence we may understand <em>socialized reality</em> as something that 'gamifies' our social behavior, by giving everyone an 'avatar' or a role, and a set of capabilities.  Doxa is the 'cement' that makes such <em>socialized reality</em> relatively permanent.</p>
+<p>The third story, featuring Antonio Damasio in the role of a leading cognitive neuroscientist, completes this <em>thread</em> by explaining that we, humans, are <em>not</em> the rational decision makers, as the founding fathers of the Enlightenment made us believe. Each of us has an <em>embodied</em> cognitive filter, which <em>determines what options</em> we are able to rationally consider. This cognitive filter is <em>programmed</em> through <em>socialization</em>. Damasio's insight allows us to understand why we civilized humans don't rationally <em>consider</em> taking off our clothes and walking into the street naked; and that for <em>cognitively similar reasons</em> we don't consider changing <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>.</p>
-<p>A [[vignette|<em>vignette</em>]] involving Antonio Damasio as cognitive neuroscientist completes this <em>thread</em>, by helping us see that the "embodied predispositions" that are maintained in this way have a <em>decisive role</em>, contrary to what the 19th century science and indeed the core of our philosophical tradition made us believe. Damasio showed that our socialized <em>embodied</em> predispositions act as a cognitive filter—<em>determining</em> not only our priorities, but also the <em>options</em> we may be able to rationally consider. Our embodied, socialized predispositions are a reason, for instance, why we don't consider showing up in public naked (which in another culture might be normal). </p>
+<blockquote><em>Socialized reality</em> constitutes a <em>pseudo-epistemology</em>.</blockquote>
-<p>This conclusion suggests itself: Changing <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>—however rational, and necessary, that may be—is for <em>similar</em> reasons inconceivable. </p>
+<p>Hence the <em>socialized reality</em> insight, which we have so far only touched upon, delineates and opens up a truly <em>wonderful</em> creative frontier—where three realms that are usually considered as independent are inextricably intertwined: culture, power and <em>epistemology</em> (or "the relationship we have with information").  </p>
-<blockquote>We are incapable of changing our <em>systems</em>, because we have been <em>socialized</em> to accept them as reality.</blockquote>
+<p>As an <em>understandable</em> consequence of historical circumstances, as Toulmin showed, our hitherto modernization has ignored these subtleties—and we've assumed that (1) the purpose of information is to mirror reality and (2) the traditions got it all wrong.  The consequences are far reaching and central to <em>holotopia</em>. </p>
-<p>We may now condense this diagnosis to a single keyword: <em>reification</em>. We are incapable of replacing 'candle headlights' because we have <em>reified</em> them as 'headlights'! "Science" has no systemic purpose. Science <em>is</em> what the scientists are doing. Just as "journalism" is the profession we've inherited from the tradition. </p>
+<ul>
-<p>
+<li><b>Severed link between information and action</b>. The (perceived) purpose of information being to complete the 'reality puzzle'—every new piece appears to be as relevant as others, and <em>necessary</em> for completing the 'puzzle'. In the sciences <em>and</em> in the media, enormous quantities of information are produced "disconnected from usefulness"—as Neil Postman diagnosed. </li>
-[[File:Beck-frame.jpeg]]
+<li><b>Stringent limits to creativity</b>. A vast global army of selected, trained and publicly sponsored creative people are obliged to confine their repertoire of creative action to producing research articles in traditional academic fields. </li>
-</p>
+<li><b>Loss of cultural heritage</b>. A trivial observation will suffice to make a point: With the threat of eternal fire on the one side, and the promise of heavenly pleasures on the other, a 'field' was created that oriented people's ethical sense and behavior. To see that the ancient myths were, however, only a tip of an iceberg (a small part of a complex ecosystem whose purpose was to develop "human quality") this one-minute thought experiment—an imaginary visit to a cathedral—might be helpful: There is awe-inspiring architecture; Michelangelo's Pietà meets the eye, and his frescos are near by. Allegri's Miserere reaches us from above. And there's of course also the ritual. All this comprises an ecosystem—in which the emotions of awe and respect make one open to practicing and learning. By its complex dynamics, it resembles our biophysical environment—but there is a notable difference: There we have nothing equivalent to the temperature and CO2 measurements, to be able to diagnose problems and propose remedies. </li>
-<p>But <em>reification</em> reaches still deeper—to include the very <em>language</em> we use to organize our world. It includes the very concepts by which we frame our "issues". Ulrich Beck continued the above observation:</p>
+<li><b>"Human quality" abandoned to <em>power structure</em></b>. Advertising is everywhere. And <em>explicit</em> advertising too is only a tip of an iceberg, the bulk of which consists of a variety of ways in which "symbolic power" is used to <em>socialize</em> us in ways that suit the <em>power structure</em> interests. Scientific techniques are used; [https://youtu.be/lOUcXK_7d_c the story of Edward Bernays], Freud's American nephew who became "the pioneer of modern public relations and propaganda", is iconic.</li>
-<blockquote>
+<li><b><em>Reification</em> of institutions</b>. Even when they cause us problems, and make us incapable of solving them.</li>
-"Max Weber's 'iron cage' – in which he thought humanity was condemned to live for the foreseeable future – is for me the prison of <em>categories and basic assumptions</em> of classical social, cultural and political sciences."
+</ul>
-</blockquote>
-<p>We may now see not only our inherited physical institutions or <em>systems</em> as 'candles'—but also our inherited or socialized concepts, which determine the very <em>way</em> in which we look at the world.</p>
+<p>This conclusion suggests itself.</p>
-<p><em>Reification</em> underlies <em>both</em> problems. It is what <em>keeps us</em> in 'iron cage'.</p>
+<blockquote>The Enlightenment did not liberate us from power-related reality construction, as it is believed.</blockquote>
+<blockquote>Our <em>socialization</em> only changed hands—from the kings and the clergy, to the corporations and the media.</blockquote>
+<p>Ironically, our carefully cultivated academic self-identity—as "objective observers of reality"—keeps us on the 'back seat'; we diagnose problems—but we cannot <em>federate</em> solutions.</p>
 <h3>Remedy</h3>
-<p>Notice the depth and the beauty of our challenge.</p>
+<p>We have already seen the remedy.</p>
-<p>When we write "worldviews", our word processor underlines the word in red. <em>Even grammatically</em>, there can be only one worldview—the one that <em>corresponds</em> with the world!  <em>Whatever we say</em>, even when that is "we are constructing reality", <em>by default</em> we are making a statement <em>about</em> reality, we are saying how the things "really are" out there. But in this latter case, of course, the result is a paradox. </p>
+<blockquote>The remedy is to change the relationship we have with information.</blockquote>
-<p>We <em>are</em> in a paradox; how can we ever come out?</p>
+<p>To consider information as <em>the</em> core element of our <em>systems</em>; and to adapt it to the functions that need to be served.</p>
+<p>When making this proposal, we are not saying anything new; we are indeed only echoing the calls to action that <em>many</em> have made before us.</p>
+<p>
+[[File:Jantsch-university.jpeg]]
+</p>
+<p>We, however, also <em>federate</em> those calls.</p>
-<p>The answer we proposed is in two steps.</p>
+<p>In the spirit of the <em>holoscope</em>, we condensed the <em>fundamental</em> part of this argument by a metaphorical image, the Mirror <em>ideogram</em>. This <em>ideogram</em> renders the essence of the <em>academic</em> situation we are in.</p>
+<p>The Mirror [[ideogram|<em>ideogram</em>]] invites us to interrupt what we are doing and self-reflect—as Socrates used to invite his contemporaries, at the Academia's point of inception.</p>
@@ Line 490: / Line 495: @@
 <div class="col-md-6">
+<p>This self-reflection leads us to two insights.</p>
-<p>The first – pointed to by the metaphor of the mirror, and the Mirror <em>ideogram</em> – is to self-reflect. We are proposing the kind of self-reflection that Socrates championed, which was the academic tradition's very source, and point of inception. We believed that something was the case, and it turned out that it was not. Meanwhile, we built on that assumption our institutional organization, our ethos and our self-image. We built on it even a formal logic, which excludes the middle.</p>
+<blockquote>We are compelled to abolish <em>reification</em>.</blockquote>
-<p>The <em>mirror</em> reflects the fact that we are not <em>above</em> the world, looking at it objectively. However it might have seemed otherwise, the procedures we use were not objectively existing ways to objectively see the world, which were only <em>discovered</em> by our predecessors. We cannot forever continue being busy doing the work that is <em>defined</em> by those procedures. The evolution of <em>our</em> system must be allowed to continue.  </p>
-<p>The <em>mirror</em> warns us that <em>we</em> are now 'keeping Galilei in house arrest'—by using only "symbolic power", of course, and without being aware of that.</p>
-<p>Our self-reflection in front of the <em>mirror</em> is not from a power position, but in the manner of the [[dialog|<em>dialog</em>]]. Which means—in a completely different tone of voice, which reflects <em>genuine</em> intention to see what goes on, correct errors, and make improvements.</p>
-<p>The Mirror <em>ideogram</em> points to the nature of our contemporary academic situation, in a similar way as the Modernity <em>ideogram</em> points to our general one. The spontaneous evolution of <em>knowledge of knowledge</em> has brought us here, in front of the <em>mirror</em>. Seeing ourselves in the <em>mirror</em> means seeing ourselves in the world. It means the end of <em>reification</em>—and the beginning of <em>accountability</em>. The world we see in the <em>mirror</em> is a world in dire need—for <em>new</em> ways to be creative. The role in which we see ourselves, in that world, by looking at the <em>mirror</em> is all-important.</p>
-<p>Imagine what it will mean to liberate the vast academic 'army', all of us who have been selected, trained and publicly sponsored to produce new ideas—from disciplinary constraints, to empower us to see ourselves as the core part of our society's 'headlights', and to self-organize and be creative accordingly!</p>
+<p>When we look at a mirror, we see ourselves <em>in the world</em>. We are not <em>above</em> the world, observing it "objectively". The disciplinary interests, methods and institutions are not something that objectively existed, which our predecessors only discovered. They <em>created</em> them—in certain historical circumstances. Hence it is academically legitimate to create new ones.</p>
-<p>But how shall we do that, how shall we step into that so much larger and freer yet more responsible role—without sacrificing the core element of our tradition; which is logical and methodological <em>rigor</em>?</p>
+<blockquote>We are compelled to embrace <em>accountability</em>.</blockquote>
+<p>The world we see ourselves in, when we look at the <em>mirror</em>, is a world in dire need—for <em>new</em> ideas, new ways of thinking and being. We see that, by virtue of the role we have in that world, we hold the very key to its transformation.</p>
 </div>
 <div class="col-md-3">
@@ Line 513: / Line 511: @@
 </p>
 </div> </div>
 <div class="row">
 <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 <div class="col-md-7">
-<p>The answer, and the second step we are proposing, is unexpected; even seemingly impossible, or magical.</p>
+<p>We are then also compelled to ask:</p>
-<blockquote>We can go <em>through</em> the <em>mirror</em>—into a completely <em>new</em> academic and social reality.</blockquote>
+<blockquote>How can we be accountable in our new social role, without sacrificing the academic rigor—which has been <em>the</em> distinguishing trait of our tradition?</blockquote>
-<p>Symbolically, that means liberating ourselves from the entrapment of <em>reification</em>—and liberating the people, the oppressed. We all must be liberated from reifying the way we see our world, from reifying our <em>systems</em> or institutions, and the very concepts we use to make sense of our world. We must all move to a world where what constitutes our society, and our culture, is given the kind of status that the technology has—of humanly created things; which must continue to evolve, by being adapted to their purposes. </p>
+<p>The answer offers itself as an unexpected result of our metaphorical <em>self-reflection</em>:</p>
-<p>Academically or philosophically, this crucial step, through the <em>mirror</em>, is made possible by what philosopher Villard Van Orman Quine called "truth by convention"—which we adapted as one of our <em>keywords</em>.</p>
+<blockquote>We can walk right <em>through</em> the <em>mirror</em>!</blockquote>
+<p>This takes only two steps.</p>
+<p>The first is to use what philosopher Villard Van Orman Quine called "truth by convention"—which we adapted as one of our <em>keywords</em>.</p>
 <p>
 [[File:Quine–TbC.jpeg]]
@@ Line 535: / Line 535: @@
 </blockquote>
-<p>But if the switch to <em>truth by convention</em> is the way in which the sciences repair their logical foundations—then why not use it to update the logical foundations of our <em>knowledge work</em> at large?</p>
+<p>But if  <em>truth by convention</em> has been the way in which <em>the sciences</em> augment the rigor of their logical foundations—why not use it to update the logical foundations of <em>knowledge work</em> at large?</p>
+<p>As we are using this [[keyword|<em>keyword</em>]], the [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]] is the kind of truth that is common in mathematics: "Let <em>X</em> be <em>Y</em>. Then..." and the argument follows. Insisting that <em>X</em> "really is" <em>Y</em> is obviously meaningless. A  convention is valid only <em>within a given context</em>—which may be an article, or a theory, or a methodology.</p>
+<p>The second step is to use <em>truth by convention</em> to <em>define</em> an <em>epistemology</em>.</p>
+<p>We defined [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]] by rendering the core of our proposal (to change the relationship we have with information—by considering it a human-made thing, and adapting information and the way we handle it to the functions that need to be served) as a convention.</p>
+<p>Notice that nothing has been changed in the traditional-academic scheme of things. The <em>academia</em> has only been <em>extended</em>; a new way of thinking and working has been added to it, for those who might want to engage in that new way. On the 'other side of the <em>mirror</em>', we see ourselves and what we do as (part of) the 'headlights' and the 'light'; and we self-organize, and act, and use our creativity freely-yet-responsibly, and create a variety of new methods and results—just as the founding father of science did, at the point of its inception. </p>
+<p>In the "Design Epistemology" research article (published in the special issue of the Information Journal titled "Information: Its Different Modes and Its Relation to Meaning", edited by Robert K. Logan) where we articulated this proposal, we made it clear that the <em>design epistemology</em> is only one of the many ways to manifest this approach. We drafted a parallel between the <em>modernization</em> of science that can result in this way and the emergence of modern art:  By defining an <em>epistemology</em> and a <em>methodology</em> by convention, we can do in the sciences as the artists did—when they liberated themselves from the demand to mirror reality, by using the techniques of Old Masters. </p>
-<p><em>Truth by convention</em>, as we use this [[keyword|<em>keyword</em>]], is the kind of truth that is common in mathematics: "Let <em>x</em> be <em>y</em>. Then..." and the argument follows. Obviously, the claim that <em>x</em> "really is" <em>y</em> is unintended, and meaningless. Only a  convention has been made—which is valid <em>within the given context</em>, of an article, or a theory, or a methodology.</p>
+<blockquote>As the artists did—we can become creative <em>in the very way in which we practice our profession.</em></blockquote>
-<p>In our <em>prototype</em> we used [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]] to define an <em>epistemology</em>; and a <em>methodology</em>. </p>
+<p>To complete this proposal and make it concrete, we developed two <em>prototypes</em>: the <em>holoscope</em> models the <em>academic</em> reality on the other side; the <em>holotopia</em> models the corresponding <em>social</em> reality.</p>
-<p>The <em>epistemology</em>, called <em>design epistemology</em>, turns the core of our proposal (to change the relationship we have with information, as we described above) into a convention.</p>
+<p>Let us illustrate these abstract ideas by brief and self-contained module, comprising an academically stated challenge, and two examples of its resolution—by using the techniques just described. Each of the examples includes both a concept definition <em>by convention</em>, and a <em>prototype</em> (of disciplinary or institutional re-definition) that was embedded and tested in academic practice, with encouraging results.</p>
-<p>In the "Design Epistemology" research article, where we articulated this proposal, we drafted a parallel between the modernization of knowledge work we are proposing, and the emergence of modern art. By defining an <em>epistemology</em> and a <em>methodology</em> as conventions, we academic researchers can do as the artists did, when they liberated themselves from the demand to faithfully depict the reality, by using the techniques of Old Masters—we can be creative in the very way in which we practice our profession. We made it clear that the approach we proposed was a general one, and that our <em>design epistemology</em> was only an <em>example</em> showing what might be possible when the approach is developed.</p>
-<p>Notice that logically <em>anything</em> can be turned into a convention. The "proof of the pie" is that it works!  <em>truth by convention</em>. We, however, chose to use [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]] to codify the state-of-the-art <em>epistemological</em> insights; the ones that now serve as anomalies, challenging the epistemological and methodological status quo, and demanding change. In this way, by weaving those insights into a <em>prototype</em> <em>methodology</em>, and configuring a system that will continuously keep them up to date (we are doing that as we speak)—we use [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] to give information the agency to <em>modify</em> the <em>epistemology</em> and the <em>methods</em>; and to enable the latter to <em>evolve</em>.</p>
+<p>This challenge is reaching us from sociology.</p>
+<p>
+[[File:Beck-frame.jpeg]]
+</p>
+<p>Beck continued the above observation:</p>
+<blockquote>
+"Max Weber's 'iron cage' – in which he thought humanity was condemned to live for the foreseeable future – is for me the prison of <em>categories and basic assumptions</em> of classical social, cultural and political sciences."
+</blockquote>
+<p>Our 'candle headlights' (the practice of <em>inheriting</em> the way we look at the world, try to comprehend it and handle it) are keeping us in 'iron cage'!</p>
-<p>A <em>vast</em> creative frontier opens up before us on the other side of the <em>mirror</em>, both academic <em>and</em> cultural. We developed the <em>holoscope</em> and the <em>holotopia</em> as <em>prototypes</em>, to show what might be possible if we pursued this <em>new course</em>. </p>
+<p>The definition of <em>design</em> allowed us to capture the essence of our post-traditional cultural condition, and suggest how to adapt to it.</p>
-<p>By using [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]], language too can be liberated from <em>reification</em> and tradition; and so can our professional and specifically disciplinary-academic pursuits. We conclude here by only mentioning two examples, each of which illustrates <em>both</em> possibilities (both were proposed to corresponding communities of interest, where they proved welcome, and useful). </p>
+<p>We defined <em>design</em> as "alternative to <em>tradition</em>", where <em>design</em> and <em>tradition</em> are (by convention) two alternative ways to <em>wholeness</em>. <em>Tradition</em> relies on spontaneous, gradual, Darwinian-style evolution. Change is resisted, small changes are tried—and tested and assimilated through generations of use. We practice <em>design</em> when we consider ourselves <em>accountable</em> for <em>wholeness</em>. </p>
-<p>Our definition of <em>design</em>, as "the alternative to <em>tradition</em>", introduced <em>design</em> and <em>tradition</em> as two alternative ways to <em>wholeness</em>. Here <em>tradition</em> means relying on what we've inherited from the past, and relying on small changes and "the survival of the fittest"; <em>design</em> is the alternative, where we consciously and intentionally "make things <em>whole</em>". The point is that when <em>tradition</em> can no longer be relied on, <em>design</em> must be used. This pair of <em>keywords</em> allows us to understand the Modernity <em>ideogram</em>, and our situation or the "world problematique" in simple terms: We are no longer <em>traditional</em>; and yet we are not yet <em>designing</em>. We are caught up in an unstable way of evolving, where neither of the options work. Our <em>technology</em> is developed by <em>design</em>—and progressed at an accelerated rate; our culture (represented by the <em>headlights</em>) has remained <em>traditional</em>, and fallen behind.</p>
+<blockquote>When <em>tradition</em> cannot be relied on, <em>design</em> must be used.</blockquote>
-<p>Our definition of <em>implicit information</em> as <em>information</em> that is not making a factual statement, but is implicit in cultural artifacts, mores etc., and of <em>visual literacy</em> (a definition for the International Visual Literacy Association), as "literacy associated with <em>implicit information</em>", opens up a whole realm of possibilities to be developed. While our ethics, legislature and academic production have been focused on factual, <em>explicit information</em>, we have been culturally (and ethically and politically) dominated by the subtle <em>implicit information</em>, which we have not yet learned to decode, <em>or</em> control. The creation of <em>prototypes</em>—the core activity on the other side of the <em>mirror</em>, by which agency is restored to information—opens up a myriad possibilities for combining art and science. As we shall see, in the Holotopia project this will be our core approach.</p>
+<p>The situation we are in, which we rendered by the bus with candle headlights metaphor, can now be understood as a result of a transition: We are no longer <em>traditional</em> (our technology evolves by <em>design</em>); but we are not yet <em>designing</em> ("the relationship we have with information" is still <em>traditional</em>). Our call to action can be understood as a practical way to <em>complete</em> modernization. </p>
+<p><em>Reification</em> can now be understood as the foundation for truth and meaning that suits the <em>tradition</em>; <em>truth by convention</em> is what empowers us to <em>design</em>.</p>
+<p>We proposed this definition to the academic design community, as part of an answer to its quest for logical foundations. The fact that Danish Designers chose our presentation to be repeated as opening keynote at their tenth anniversary conference suggests that this praxis, of <em>assigning</em> a purpose to a discipline and a community by using <em>ruth by convention</em>, may be of <em>immediately</em> interest. </p>
+<p>The definition of <em>implicit information</em> and of <em>visual literacy</em> as "literacy associated with <em>implicit information</em> for the International Visual Literacy Association was in spirit similar—but its point was different.</p>
+<p>
+[[File:Whowins.jpg]]
+</p>
+<p>We showed the above <em>ideogram</em> as depicting a situation where two kinds of information—the <em>explicit information</em> with explicit, factual and verbal warning in a black-and-white rectangle, and the visual and "cool" rest—meet each other in a direct duel. The image shows that the <em>implicit information</em> wins "hands down" (or else this would not be a cigarette advertising). Our larger point was that while our legislation, ethical sensibilities and "official" culture at large are focused on <em>explicit information</em>, our culture is largely created through subtle <em>implicit information</em>. Hence we need a <em>literacy</em> to be able to decode those messages—and reverse the negative consequences of <em>reification</em>. </p>
+<p>Lida Cochran, the only surviving IVLA founder, found that this definition expressed and served the founders' original intention.</p>
 </div> </div>
@@ Line 564: / Line 593: @@
 <div class="col-md-7"><h3><em>Scope</em></h3>
-<p>The question we'll explore here is the one posed by the Modernity <em>ideogram</em>:  <b>How</b> do we need to "look at the world, try to comprehend and handle it". </p>
+<p>We have just seen that the academic tradition—instituted as the modern university—finds itself in a much larger and more central social role than it was originally conceived for. We look up to the <em>academia</em>, and not to the Church and the tradition, for an answer to <em>the</em> pivotal question:</p>
-<p>We build part of our case for the <em>holoscope</em> and the <em>holotopia</em> by developing an analogy between the <em>last</em> "great cultural revival", where a <em>fundamental</em> change of the way we look at the world (from traditional/Biblical, to rational/scientific) effortlessly caused nearly <em>everything</em> to change. Notice that to meet <em>that</em> sort of a change, we do not need to convince the political and business leaders, we do not need to occupy Wall Street. It is the prerogative of our, academic occupation to uphold and update and give to our society this most powertful agent of change—the standard of "right" knowledge.</p>
+<blockquote><b>How</b> should we look at the world, to be able to comprehend and handle it?</blockquote>
+<p>That role, and that question, carry an immense power!</p>
-<h3>Diagnosis</h3>
+<p>It was by providing a completely <em>new</em> answer to that question, that the last "great cultural revival" came about.</p>
-<blockquote>So how <em>should</em> we look at the world, try to comprehend it and handle it? <br>
-Nobody knows! </blockquote>
-<p>Of course, countess books and articles have been written that could inform an answer to this most timely question. But no consensus has emerged—or even a consensus about a <em>method</em> by which that could be achieved. </p>
+<h3>Diagnosis</h3>
-<p>That being the case, we'll begin this diagnostic process by simply sharing what <em>we</em>'ve been told while we were growing up. Which is roughly as follows.</p>
+<blockquote>So how <em>should</em> we look at the world, to be able to comprehend and handle it? </blockquote>
+<blockquote>Nobody knows! </blockquote>
-<p>As members of the <em>homo sapiens</em> species, we have the evolutionary privilege to be able to understand the world, and to make rational choices based on such understanding. Give us a correct model of the natural world, and we'll know exactly how to go about satisfying "our needs", which we of course know because we can experience them directly. But the traditions got it all wrong! Being unable to understand how the nature works, they put a "ghost in the machine", and made us pray to the ghost to give us what we needed. Science corrected this error. It <em>removed</em> the "ghost", and told us how 'the machine' <em>really</em> works. </p>
+<p>Of course, countess books and articles have been written about this theme since antiquity. But in spite of that—or should we say <em>because</em> of that—no consensus has emerged.</p>
-<p>"Truth", or "scientific" understanding of real-life matters, is what can be explained by using deductive reasoning from this new "reality picture", what follows logically from it, and only that. Isn't this how we, finally, understood that women can't fly on broomsticks—that this would violate some scientifically established natural laws?</p>
+<p>The way we the people look at the world, try to comprehend and handle it, shaped itself spontaneously—from scraps of science that were most visible around the middle of the 19th century, when Darwin and Newton as cultural heroes replaced Adam and Moses. What is today popularly considered as the "scientific worldview" took shape then—and remained largely unchanged.</p>
-<p>Perhaps no rational person would <em>write</em> this sort of "philosophy". But—and this is one of our key points in this diagnosis—this "philosophy" has <em>not</em> been written. It simply <em>emerged</em>—around the middle of the 19th century, when Adam and Moses as cultural heroes were replaced for so many of us by Darwin and Newton. Science originated, and shaped its disciplinary divisions and procedures <em>before</em> that time, while still the tradition and the Church had the prerogative of telling people how to see the world, and what values to uphold. When the latter lost popular trust, the people were left to their own devices—to develop a new,  "scientific" understanding of everyday matters; from whatever scraps of the 19th century science appeared to be suitable.</p>
+<p>As members of the <em>homo sapiens</em> species, this worldview would make us believe, we have the evolutionary privilege to be able to comprehend the world in causal terms, and to make rational choices accordingly. Give us a correct model of the world, and we'll know exactly how to satisfy our needs (which we can experience directly). But the traditional cultures got it all wrong: Not knowing how the nature works, they put a "ghost in the machine", and made us pray to him to give us what we needed. Science corrected this error—and now we can satisfy our needs by manipulating the mechanisms of nature directly, with the help of technology. </p>
-<blockquote>It is this ad-hoc scrapbook of 19th century ideas, frozen into a "reality picture", that most modern people, including surprisingly many scientists, still consider as "scientific worldview".</blockquote>
+<p>It is this causal or "scientific" understanding of the world that made us modern. Isn't that how we understood that women cannot fly on broomsticks?</p>
-<p>From a collection of reasons why this popular way to create truth and meaning needs to be updated, we here mention only two.</p>
+<p>From our collection of reasons why this way of looking at the world is neither scientific nor functional, we here mention only two.</p>
 <p>
 [[File:Heisenberg–frame.jpeg]]
 </p>
-<blockquote>The first reason is that the nature is <em>not</em> a mechanism.</blockquote>
+<blockquote>The first reason is that the nature is not a mechanism.</blockquote>
-<p>The mechanistic or "classical" worldview of 19th century's science was disproved and disowned by modern science. It has turned out that even the <em>physical</em> phenomena cannot be understood by reasoning as we do when we try to understand a machine.</p>
-<p>Werner Heisenberg, one of the progenitors of this research, expected that the largest impact of modern physics would be <em>on popular culture</em>—that it would lead to (what Peccei called) a "great cultural revival", by removing (what he called) "the narrow and rigid frame"—the way of looking at the world that our popular culture adopted from the 19th century's science—which damaged culture and <em>prevented</em> it from evolving. In "Physics and Philosophy" Heisenberg described how the destruction of religious and other traditions on which the continuation of culture and "human quality" depended, and the dominance of "instrumental" thinking and values (which Bauman called "adiaphorisation") followed from the assumptions that the modern physics <em>proved</em> were wrong. </p>
-<blockquote>True, Heisenberg might have responded to the argument (that what is popularly thought of as "scientific worldview" helped us see that women can't fly on broomsticks), the <em>narrow frame</em> enabled us to eliminate so many of the superstitions our ancestors were living with; but we also threw out the baby (culture) with the bath water!</blockquote>
-<p>Needless to say, also this <em>Heisenberg's</em> insight remained without due action—as just another casualty of the <em>Wiener's paradox</em>.</p>
+<p>The mechanistic way of looking at the world that Newton and his contemporaries developed in physics, which around the 19th century shaped the worldview of the masses, was later disproved and disowned by modern science. Research in physics showed that even the <em>physical</em> phenomena exhibit the <em>kinds of</em> interdependence that cannot be understood in "classical" or causal terms.</p>
-<p>In 2005, Hans-Peter Dürr, Heisenberg's intellectual "heir", co-authored the Potsdam Manifesto, whose title and message was "We have to learn to think in a new way". The new way of thinking, conspicuously impregnated by "seeing things whole" and seeing ourselves as part of a larger whole, was shown to follow from the worldview of new physics, and the environmental and larger social crisis.</p>
+<p>In "Physics and Philosophy", Werner Heisenberg, one of the progenitors of this research, described how "the narrow and rigid" way of looking at the world that our ancestors adapted from the 19th century science was damaging to culture—and in particular to its parts on on which the "human quality" depended, such as ethics and religion. And how as a result the "instrumental" thinking and values, which Bauman called "adiaphorized", became prominent. Heisenberg believed that the dissolution of that "rigid and narrow frame" would be <em>the</em> most valuable gift of his field to the humanity. </p>
-<blockquote>The second reason is that even mechanisms, or more precisely the "classical" systems, when they are "complex"—as social and natural systems undoubtedly are—cannot be understood in causal terms.</blockquote>
+<p>In 2005, Hans-Peter Dürr (considered as Heisenberg's scientific "heir") co-wrote the Potsdam Manifesto, whose title and message is "We need to learn to think in a new way". The proposed new thinking is similar to the one that leads to <em>holotopia</em>: "The materialistic-mechanistic worldview of classical physics, with its rigid ideas and reductive way of thinking, became the supposedly scientifically legitimated ideology for vast areas of scientific and political-strategic thinking. (...) We need to reach a fundamentally new way of thinking and a more comprehensive understanding of our <em>Wirklichkeit</em>, in which we, too, see ourselves as a thread in the fabric of life, without sacrificing anything of our special human qualities. This makes it possible to recognize humanity in fundamental commonality with the rest of nature (...)"</p>
-<p>We offer this as the second core insight that we the people need to acquire from the systems sciences, and from cybernetics in particular.</p>
+<blockquote>The second reason is that even complex mechanisms ("classical" nonlinear dynamic systems) cannot be understood in causal terms.</blockquote>
 <p>
 [[File:MC-Bateson-vision.jpeg]]
 </p>
+<p>It has been said that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Research in the systems sciences, one of which is cybernetics, explained this <em>scientifically</em>: The "hell" (which you may imagine as global issues, or the 'destination' toward which our 'bus' is believed to be headed) tends to be a "side effect" of our best efforts and "solutions", reaching us through "nonlinearities" and "feedback loops" in the natural and social systems we are trying to manipulate. </p>
-<p>It has been said that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. There is a <em>scientific</em> reason for that: The "hell" (which you may imagine as the global issues, or as the destination toward which our 'bus' is currently taking us) is largely composed of "side effects" of our best efforts and "solutions"—of relationships that are obscured from us by the system's nonlinearity; of boomerang effects of our best intentions reaching us  through the system's many 'feedback loops'. To see just how consistently simple causality is popularly considered as "modern" or even "scientific" thinking, what disastrous consequences this has had, and what wonderful possibilities have remained in its shadow—is to see the <em>holotopia</em>.
 <p>
-[https://youtu.be/nXQraugWbjQ?t=57 Hear Mary Catherine Bateson] (cultural anthropologist and cybernetician, and the daughter of Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson who pioneered both fields) say:
+[https://youtu.be/nXQraugWbjQ?t=57 Hear Mary Catherine Bateson] (cultural anthropologist and cybernetician, daughter of Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson who pioneered both fields) say:
 <blockquote>
 "The problem with Cybernetics is that it is not an academic discipline that belongs in a department. It is an attempt to correct an erroneous way of looking at the world, and at knowledge <em>in general</em>. (...) Universities do not have departments of epistemological therapy!"
@@ Line 618: / Line 641: @@
 </p>
+<h3>Remedy</h3>
-<h3>Remedy</h3>
+<blockquote><em>Truth by convention</em> allows us to explicitly <em>define</em> and academically <em>develop</em> a way to look at the world, in order to comprehend and handle it.</blockquote>
+<p>We called the result a <em>methodology</em>, and our <em>prototype</em> the Polyscopic Modeling <em>methodology</em> or [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]]. </p>
+<p>A <em>methodology</em> is in essence a toolkit; anything that does the job would do. We, however, defined <em>polyscopy</em> by turning state of the art <em>epistemological</em> insights into conventions.</p>
+<blockquote>That constitutes a way in which the severed link between the scientific insights and the popular worldview can be restored.</blockquote>
+<p>The <em>polyscopy</em> definition comprises eight aphorismic postulates; by using [[truth by convention|<em>truth by convention</em>]], each of them is given an exact interpretation.</p>
+<p>The first postulate defines <em>information</em> as "recorded experience". It is thereby made explicit that the substance communicated by information is not "reality", but human experience. Since human experience can be recorded in a variety of ways (a chair is a record of experience related to sitting and chair making), the notion of <em>information</em> is extended beyond written documents. The first postulate enables <em>knowledge federation</em> across cultural traditions and fields of interests; the barriers of language and method are bridged by reducing all that is of relevance to human experience, as a 'common denominator'. </p>
+<p>The second postulate is that the [[scope|<em>scope</em>]] (the way we look) determines the <em>view</em> (what is seen). In <em>polyscopy</em> the experience (or "reality" or whatever is "behind" experience) is not assumed to have an a priori structure. We <em>attribute</em> to it a structure with the help of the concepts and other elements of our <em>scope</em>. This postulate enables us to create new ways of looking, and to make the basic approach of science generally applicable—as prototyped by the <em>holoscope</em>. </p>
+<p><em>Polyscopy</em> did not talk about knowledge. We may now improvise this new axiom:</p>
-<p>The remedy we proposed is to spell out the rules, by defining a <em>general-purpose methodology</em> as a convention; and by turning it into a <em>prototype</em> and developing it continuously—to remain consistent with the state of the art of relevant knowledge, technology, and our society's needs.</p>
+<blockquote><em>Knowledge</em> must be <em>federated</em>.</blockquote>
-<p>Our <em>prototype</em> is called Polyscopic Modeling <em>methodology</em>, and nicknamed <em>polyscopy</em>. </p>
+<p>This only states the intuitive or common-sense idea of "knowledge": If we should be able to say that we "know" something, we must <em>federate</em> not only supporting evidence, but also potential counter-evidence—and hence <em>information</em> in general. Academic peer reviews implement that principle in science; but this <em>federation</em> tends to be restricted to a discipline. An analogy with constitutional democracy also comes to mind—where even a hated criminal has the right for a fair trial. Like a dutiful attorney, <em>knowledge federation</em> does its best to gather suitable evidence, and back each <em>federated</em> insight with a convincing case.</p>
-<blockquote>By defining a <em>methodology</em>, we can <em>define</em> an approach to knowledge.</blockquote>
+<p>A <em>methodology</em> allows us to state explicitly what information needs to be like; and what being "informed" means. We modeled this intuitive notion with the keyword [[gestalt|<em>gestalt</em>]]. To be "informed", one needs to have a <em>gestalt</em> that is appropriate to one's situation. "Our house is on fire" is a canonical example. The knowledge of <em>gestalt</em> is profoundly different from only knowing the data (such as the room temperatures and the CO2 levels.). To have an appropriate <em>gestalt</em> means to be moved to do the action that a situation is calling for.</p>
-<p><em>Polyscopy</em>, for instance, specifies that for "knowledge" to be real knowledge, <em>information</em> must be <em>federated</em>. This means that we must abolish the habit of throwing out whatever fails to fit our "scientific worldview", or <em>socialized reality</em> or <em>narrow frame</em>. "Knowledge" maintained by <em>ignoring</em> counter-evidence  does not merit that name. </p>
+<blockquote>Can we be uninformed—in spite of all the information we have?</blockquote>
-<p>This does not mean, of course, that anything goes. Rather, it demands a <em>praxis</em> that may be understood by analogy with constitutional democracy—in the realm of ideas. As even a hateful criminal has the right for a fair trial, so does an idea have the right to be considered. Based on this simple rule of thumb, we would, for instance, be advised to <em>not</em> ignore Buddhism because we don't find it appealing, or because we don't believe in reincarnation. The work of <em>knowledge federation</em> is here similar to the work of a dutiful attorney—it is to carefully sift through the heritage, find pieces that we <em>may</em> need to integrate; and support them with a convincing case.</p>
+<p>"One cannot not communicate", reads one of Paul Watzlawick's axioms of communication. Even when everything in a news report is <em>factually</em> correct, the <em>gestalt</em> it conveys <em>implicitly</em> can be profoundly deceptive—because we are told what Donald Trump has said, and not Aurelio Peccei.</p>
-<p><em>Knowledge federation</em> turns insights and data into principles and rules of thumb, which help us orient action. Especially valuable are the ones we call <em>gestalts</em>. A <em>gestalt</em> is an interpretation of a situation that suggests suitable action. "Our house is on fire" is a canonical example. This <em>keyword</em> allows us to <em>define</em> the intuitive notion "informed"—as having a <em>gestalt</em> that is appropriate to one's situation. You will easily recognize now that we'll be using this idea all along, by rendering our general situation as the Modernity <em>ideogram</em>, and our academic one as the Mirror <em>ideogram</em>. And that we are making headway toward a third—the <em>holotopia</em> vision. Suitable techniques for communicating and 'proving' or <em>justifying</em> such claims are offered, most of which are developed by generalizing the standard toolkit of science.</p>
+<p><em>Polyscopy</em> offers a collection of techniques for communicating and 'proving' or <em>justifying</em> general or <em>high-level</em> insights and claims. <em>Knowledge federation</em> is conceived as the social process by which such insights can be created and maintained. To create the <em>methodology</em>, we <em>federated</em> methodological insights from a variety of fields:</p>
+<ul>
+<li>[[pattern|<em>Patterns</em>]] have a closely similar function as mathematics does in traditional sciences—and at the same time completely generalize the implementation of this function</li>
+<li>[[ideogram|<em>Ideograms</em>]] allow us to include the expressive power and the insights and techniques from art, advertising and information design</li>
+<li>[[vignette|<em>Vignettes</em>]] implement the basic technique from media informing, where an insight or issue is made accessible by telling illustrative and engaging or "sticky"  real-life people and situation stories</li>
+<li>[[thread|<em>Threads</em>]] implement Vannevar Bush's technical idea of "trails" as a way to combine specific ideas into higher-level units of meaning</li>
+</ul>
-<p>A parabolic image will help us see some practical consequences of this approach. Imagine you are talking on the phone with your neighbor, that he's at work and you are at home, and that you see that his house is on fire. Yet you tell him about the sale in the neighborhood fishing gear store. While from a <em>factual</em> point of view nothing is wrong (your neighbor is an avid fisherman, and the sale you are telling him about will deeply interested him), in this new "reality" we are proposing you are being untruthful and dangerously deceptive, <em>because a wrong gestalt is implicit</em> in the "reality picture" you present. You will easily see how this reflects upon our conventional media informing, and the way in which it constructs the "reality" we are living in.</p>
-<p>The Polyscopic Modeling <em>methodology</em> is defined as a convention. We could turn <em>anything</em> into a convention—and it would be fine as long as it serves the purpose; as long as it "works". We, however, chose to <em>federate</em> this <em>methodology</em>, and turn it into a <em>prototype</em>. </p>
+<p>We conclude by telling a [[vignette|<em>vignette</em>]]—which will illustrate some of the further nuances of this <em>methodological</em> approach to information and knowledge.</p>
-<blockquote>This gives us a way to make the idea of "right" information this <em>methodology</em> represents a function of relevant insights reached in the sciences; and to allow it to evolve.</blockquote>
+<p>A situation with overtones of a crisis, closely similar to the one we now have in our handling of information at large, arose in the early days of computer programming. The buddying industry undertook ambitious software projects—which resulted in thousands of lines of "spaghetti code", which nobody was able to 'detangle' (understand and correct). The solution was conceived as "computer programming methodology"; [https://holoscope.info/2019/02/07/knowledge-federation-dot-org/#InformationHolon the longer story] is interesting, but we only highlight a couple of lessons learned from the "object oriented methodology", developed in the 1960s by Ole-Johan Dahl and Krysten Nygaard.</p>
-<p>To illustrate this approach, and to point at some further nuances that are worth highlighting, we now describe a single instance of a source that has been <em>federated</em> in this way—and to give due credit.</p>
-<p>A situation with overtones of a crisis, closely similar to the one we now have in our handling of information at large, arose in the early days of computer programming, when the buddying industry undertook ambitious software projects—which resulted in thousands of lines of "spaghetti code", which nobody was able to understand and correct.  [https://holoscope.info/2019/02/07/knowledge-federation-dot-org/#InformationHolon The story] is interesting, but here we only highlight the a couple of main points and lessons learned.</p>
+<blockquote>The designers of a computer programming language made themselves accountable for the "usability" of the results, and developed a methodology.</blockquote>
+<p>Any sufficiently complete programming language, even the "machine language" of the computer, will allow the programmers to create <em>any</em> application program. The creators of the object oriented methodology, however, took it upon themselves to provide the programmers the kind of programming tools that would enable them, or even <em>compel</em> them, to write comprehensible, reusable and well-structured code. </p>
 <p>
 [[File:Dahl-Vision.-R.jpeg]]
 </p>
-<p>They are drawn from the "object oriented methodology", developed in the 1960s by Old-Johan Dahl and Krysten Nygaard. The first one is that—to understand a complex system—<em>abstraction</em> must be used. We must be able to <em>create</em> concepts on distinct levels of generality, representing also distinct angles of looking (which, you'll recall, we called <em>aspects</em>). But that is exactly the core point of <em>polyscopy</em>, suggested by the methodology's very name.</p>
+<blockquote>To understand a complex system, <em>abstraction</em> must be used. We must be able to <em>create</em> views of the complex whole on distinct levels of generality.</blockquote>
+<p>The object oriented methodology provided a structuring template called "object"—which "hides implementation and exports function". What this means is that an object can be "plugged into" more general objects based on the functions it produces—without the burden of the details of its code. </p>
+<p>We have seen, in <em>socialized reality</em>, that the <em>academia</em> too needs to consider itself accountable for the tools and processes by which information and knowledge are handled—<em>both</em> for the ones used by academic researchers,  <em>and</em> for the ones used by people at large. To see what those two lessons learned may mean practically, Imagine a highly talented young person, let's call him Pierre Bourdieu to be concrete, about to become a researcher. The <em>academia</em> will give Bourdieu a certain way to render his results, which he'll be using throughout his career. The "usability", comprehensibility and in a word—the <em>usefulness</em> of Bourdieu's life work will largely depend on the format in which he'll render his results. This format, however, will not be in his power to change, and it is unlikely that even Bourdieu would even think about doing that.</p>
-<p>The second point we'd like to highlight is is the <em>accountability</em> for the method. Any sufficiently complete programming language including the native "machine language" of the computer will allow the programmers to create <em>any</em> sort of program. The creators of the "programming methodologies", however, took it upon themselves to provide the programmers the kind of programming tools that would not only enable them, but even <em>compel</em> them to write comprehensible, reusable, well-structured code. To see how this reflects upon our theme at hand, our proposal to add systemic self-organization to the <em>academia</em>'s repertoire of capabilities, imagine that an unusually gifted young man has entered the <em>academia</em>; to make the story concrete, let's call him Pierre Bourdieu. Young Bourdieu will spend a lifetime using the toolkit the <em>academia</em> has given him. Imagine if what he produces, along with countless other selected creative people, is equivalent to "spaghetti code" in computer programming! Imagine the level of improvement that this is pointing to!</p>
+<p>Bourdieu is, of course, only a drop in an ocean.</p>
 </div> </div>
@@ Line 657: / Line 706: @@
-<p>The object oriented methodology provided a template called "object"—which "hides implementation and exports function". What this means is that an object can be "plugged into" more general objects based on the functions it produces—without inspecting the details of its code! (But those details are made available for inspection; and of course also for continuous improvement.)</p>
+<p>The solution for structuring information we devised in <em>polyscopy</em> is called <em>information holon</em>. An <em>information holon</em> is closely similar to the "object" in object oriented methodology. Information, represented in the Information <em>ideogram</em> as an "i", is depicted as a circle on top of a square. The circle represents the point of it all (such as "the cup is whole"); the square represents the details, the side views. </p>
-<p>The solution for structuring information we provided in <em>polyscopy</em>, called <em>information holon</em>, is closely similar. Information, represented in the Information <em>ideogram</em> as an "i", is depicted as a circle on top of a square. The circle represents the point of it all (such as "the cup is whole"); the square represents the details, the side views. </p>
-<p>When the <em>circle</em>  is a <em>gestalt</em>, it allows this to be integrated or "exported" as a "fact" into <em>higher-level</em> insights; and it allows various and heterogeneous insights on which it is based to remain 'hidden', but available for inspection, in the <em>square</em>. When the <em>circle</em> is a <em>prototype</em> it allows the multiplicity of insights that comprise the <em>square</em> to have a direct <em>systemic</em> impact, or agency.</p>
-</div>
-<div class="col-md-3">
+<p>When the <em>circle</em>  is a general insight or a <em>gestalt</em>, it allows that insight to be integrated or "exported" as a "fact" into <em>higher-level</em> insights (while the contributing insights and data remain "hidden" in the <em>square</em>). When the <em>circle</em> is a <em>prototype</em>, the multiplicity of insights that comprise the <em>square</em> are given direct <em>systemic</em> impact, and hence agency.</p>
+</div> <div class="col-md-3">
 [[File:Information.jpg]]<br>
 <small>Information <em>ideogram</em></small>
 </div> </div>
 <div class="row">
 <div class="col-md-3"></div>
 <div class="col-md-7">
+<p>The <em>holotopia</em> may now be understood as the <em>circle</em> by which our <em>knowledge federation</em> proposal is <em>federated</em>; a vision is not only provided and published—but already turned into a collaborative strategy game whose goal is to "change course".</p>
-<p>The <em>prototype</em> <em>polyscopic</em> book manuscript titled "<em>Information</em> Must Be <em>Designed</em>" book manuscript is structured as an <em>information holon</em>. Here the claim made in the title (which is the same we made in the opening of this presentation by talking about the bus with candle headlights) is <em>justified</em> in four chapters of the book—each of which presents a specific angle of looking at it.</p>
+<p>A <em>prototype</em> <em>polyscopic</em> book manuscript titled "<em>Information</em> Must Be <em>Designed</em>" is structured as an <em>information holon</em>. Here the claim made in the title (which is the same we made in the opening of this presentation by talking about the bus with candle headlights) is <em>justified</em> in four chapters of the book—each of which presents a specific angle of looking at it. The book's four chapters present four <em>aspects</em> of our handling of information; they identify anomalies and propose remedies—which are the <em>design patterns</em> of the proposed <em>methodology</em>. </p>
-<p>It is customary in computer methodology design to propose a programming language that implements the methodology—and to <em>bootstrap</em> the approach by creating a compiler for that language in the language itself. In this book we did something similar. The book's four chapters present four angles of looking at the general issue of information, identify anomalies and propose remedies—which are the <em>design patterns</em> of the proposed <em>methodology</em>. The book then uses the <em>methodology</em> to justify the claim that motivates it—that makes a case for the proposed <em>paradigm</em>, by using the <em>paradigm</em>. </p>
+<p>It is customary in programming language design to showcase the language by creating its first compiler in the language itself. In this book we described the <em>paradigm</em> that is modeled by <em>polyscopy</em>,  and then used <em>polyscopy</em> to make a case for that <em>paradigm</em>.</p>
+<p>The book's [http://folk.uio.no/dino/IDBook/Introduction.pdf introduction] is available online. What we then branded <em>information design</em> is today completed and called <em>knowledge federation</em>. </p>
 </div> </div>
@@ Line 688: / Line 732: @@
 <div class="col-md-7"><h3><em>Scope</em></h3>
-<p>In this last of the <em>five insights</em> we take up perhaps the most interesting question that remained:</p>
+<p>We turn to culture and to "human quality", and ask: </p>
-<blockquote><b>Why</b> is "a great cultural revival" realistically possible?</blockquote>
-<p><em>Why</em> is the <em>holotopia</em> a better alternative? What is to be gained by "changing course"—and instead of reaching out for all the fun and pleasurable <em>things</em> that an advanced material civilization has to offer—engage in something as elusive and distant as "human development"?</p>
+<blockquote>
+<b>Why</b> is "a great cultural revival" realistically possible?</blockquote>
-<p>In Galilei's time, concern with the "original sin" and "eternal punishment" were soon to be replaced; happiness and beauty would be lived here and now, and elevated and celebrated by the arts. What might the <em>next</em> "great cultural revival" be like? </p>
+<p>What insight, and what strategy, may divert our "pursuit of happiness" from material consumption to human cultivation?</p>
+<p>We may approach the same theme from a different angle: Suppose we developed the <em>praxis</em> of <em>federating</em> information—and used it to combine <em>all</em> relevant heritage and insights—from the sciences, the world traditions, the therapy schools... </p>
+<blockquote>Suppose we used <em>real</em> information to guide our choices, instead of advertising. What changes would develop? What difference would they make?</blockquote>
+<p>During the Renaissance, preoccupations with original sin and eternal reward gradually gave way to a pursuit of happiness and beauty here and now; and the arts prospered.</p>
+<blockquote> What might the <em>next</em> "great cultural revival" be like? </blockquote>
 <h3>Diagnosis</h3>
-<blockquote>We (the <em>power structures</em> we compose) have done the same to <em>culture</em> and to ourselves, as we did to natural environment. </blockquote>
+<p>There is a popular <em>myth</em> which precludes information and knowledge to make a difference in this realm too—analogous and related to the <em>myth</em> of free competition that breeds the <em>power structure</em>. </p>
-<p>With one notable difference.</p>
+<blockquote>It is the belief that we don't really need information, or culture, because we can experience what makes us happy <em>directly</em>—and reach out toward it with the help of science and technology.</blockquote>
-<blockquote>We do not have 'a science of culture'—which would give us the equivalent of the temperature and the CO2 measurements, so that we may even <em>hope</em> to turn this into an issue!</blockquote>
+<p>Our "pursuit of happiness" 'in the light of a candle' made two values prominent, at the detriment of others:  <em>convenience</em> (favoring what <em>appears</em> to be pleasant and easy) and <em>egotism</em> (favoring narrowly conceived "personal interests"). Both appear as scientific: <em>convenience</em> because it resembles the experiment; <em>egotism</em> because it is the way in which nature herself pursues <em>wholeness</em>. Both values are, of course, endlessly supported by advertising.</p>
-<p>By looking at the world through the <em>narrow frame</em>, by seeing the world as a machine and focusing on immediate causality, we have made <em>convenience</em> (or "instant gratification") the value that orients our private pursuits; and <em>egotism</em> (or "egocenteredness") the value that orients our social ones.</p>
+<blockquote>Those two values now guide <em>even</em> our choice and creation of information!</blockquote>
-<p>Our point here will be that this is not only leading us into a trap through the social and natural "feedback loops", as we have already seen—but also <em>directly</em>, by separating us from the kind of happiness and fulfillment that only culture, and "human development" can lead to. </p>
+</div> </div>
+<div class="row">
+<div class="col-md-3"></div>
+<div class="col-md-6">
 <h3>Remedy</h3>
-<p>Here too there is an insight, a rule of thumb, that reverses our "pursuit of happiness" quite thoroughly; and leads us to a realm of fulfillment that most of us consider possible.</p>
+<p>We point to the remedy by the Convenience Paradox <em>ideogram</em>. Like all of us, the person in the picture wants his life to be convenient. But he made a wise choice: Instead of simply following the direction downwards, which <em>feels</em> easier, he paused to reflect whether this direction also leads to a more convenient <em>condition</em>. </p>
+<blockquote>It doesn't.</blockquote>
+<p>The <em>convenience paradox</em> is a <em>pattern</em>, where the pursuit of a more convenient direction leads to a less convenient situation. The iconic image of a "couch potato" in front of a TV is an obvious instance.</p>
+<p>The <em>convenience paradox</em> is a result of us simplifying "pursuit of happiness" by ignoring its two most interesting <em>dimensions</em>—time; and our own condition, which makes us inclined or <em>able to</em> feel</em> in any specific way.</p>
+<p>By depicting the <em>way</em> to <em>wholeness</em> as "yang" in the traditional yin-yang <em>ideogram</em>, it is suggested that its nature os paradoxical and obscure—and that the <em>way</em> needs to be illuminated by suitable <em>information</em>. This <em>way</em> is what the Buddhists call "Dhamma" and the Taoists "Tao". </p>
+<p>However paradoxical, the <em>way</em> follows a certain pattern that <em>can</em> be understood; not in a mechanistic-causal way, not by studying what various cultures <em>believe</em> in—but by focusing on and <em>federating</em> the <em>phenomenology</em> repeated in the world traditions.</p>
+</div>
+<div class="col-md-3">
+[[File:Convenience Paradox.jpg]]
+<small>Convenience Paradox <em>ideogram</em></small>
+</div> </div>
+<div class="row">
+<div class="col-md-3"></div>
+<div class="col-md-7">
+<p><em>Wholeness</em> is such a beautifully inclusive value, with so many sides! We may have everything else in the world—and the lack of vitamin C will make it all futile. </p>
+<blockquote>We showed that the <em>convenience paradox</em> is a <em>pattern</em> repeated or subtly reflected in all major aspects of our civilized human condition.</blockquote>
-<p>We've called it "the best kept secret of human culture", and offered it for dialog and elaboration as one of our selected <em>ten themes</em>. </p>
+<p>To illustrate it, however, we here focus on what might be its least known and most interesting side—<em>our capacity to feel</em>. We'll elaborate it in terms of three specific insights.</p>
-<p>Long story short—there is an incomparably better way to be human, than what we've known and experienced.</p>
+<blockquote>1. Human wholeness <em>feels</em> better than most of us can imagine.</blockquote>
-<p>This is what attracted our distant ancestors to persons like the Moses, the Buddha, the Christ or Mohammad. Yet always—the <em>power structure</em> managed to divert the <em>way</em> they were pointing to into something quite different, and at not rarely into <em>its very opposite</em>! </p>
+<p>We called this insight "the best kept secret of human culture" , and made it a theme of one of our chosen <em>ten conversations</em>. </p>
-<p>So what can <em>we</em> do that is different?</p>
+<p><em>It was a glimpse or an experience or side of human wholeness</em> that attracted our ancestors to the Buddha, the Christ, Mohammed and other adepts and teachers of the <em>way</em>, or "sages" or "prophets". C.F. Andrews described this in "Sermon on the Mount":</p>
+<blockquote>"(Through their practice, the early disciples of Jesus found out) that the Way of Life, which Jesus had marked out for them in His teaching, was revolutionary in its moral principles. It turned the world upside down (Acts 17. 6). (...) They found in this new 'Way of Life' such a superabundance of joy, even in the midst of suffering, that they could hardly contain it. Their radiance was unmistakable. When the Jewish rulers saw their boldness, they 'marvelled and took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus' (Acts 4. 13). (...) It was this exuberance of joy and love which was so novel and arresting. It was a 'Way of Life' about which men had no previous experience. Indeed, at first those who saw it could not in the least understand it; and some mocking said, 'These men are full of new wine' (Acts 2. 13)."</blockquote>
-<p>We can introduce <em>knowledge of knowledge</em>; offer, and teach <em>information about information</em>. We can <em>create</em> a communication channel, which is wide enough and clear enough for these things to be seen!</p>
+<p>The existence and character of this experience can, however, readily be verified by simply observing or asking the people who have followed the <em>way</em>, and tasted some of its fruits.</p>
-<p>As soon as we <em>begin</em> to do that, to <em>federate</em> suitable insights to illuminate that realm of possibilities, the <em>convenience paradox</em> is clearly seen.</p>
+<blockquote>2. The <em>way</em> to <em>wholeness</em> is counter-intuitive or paradoxical.</blockquote>
-<p>The <em>convenience paradox</em> insight is that <em>convenience</em> is a deceptive and useless value, behind which <em>enormous</em> cultural opportunities have remained hidden. The idea of a "couch potato" provides a common-sense illustration—but, we show, the depth and breadth of possibilities for improving our condition through long-term cultivation is beyond what most of us will dare to consider possible.</p>
 <p>
 [[File:LaoTzu-vision.jpeg]]
 </p>
+<p>To get a glimpse of it, compare the above utterances by Lao Tzu, with what Christ taught in his Sermon on the Mount. Why was Teacher Lao claiming that "the weak can defeat the strong"? Why did the Christ asked his disciples to "turn the other cheek"?</p>
+<p>Aldous Huxley's book "Perennial Philosophy" is <em>alone</em> sufficient to make this point.  Coming from a family that gave some of Britain's leading scientists, Huxley undertook to not only <em>federate</em> some of the core insights about the <em>way</em> (by demonstrating the consistency of both the relevant practices <em>and</em> their results across historical periods and cultures), but to also make a case for the method he used, as an extension of science needed to support core elements of our cultural heritage.</p>
+<blockquote>3. The key to unraveling the paradox is to <em>reverse</em> the values.</blockquote>
+<p><em>Convenience</em> needs to be replaced by (to use Peccei's keyword) "human development". </p>
+<p><em>Egotism</em> needs to be overcome through "selfless service".</p>
-<p>Human <em>wholeness</em> does exist; and it feels, and looks, incomparably better than most of us will dare to imagine. It is this that drove people to the Buddha, Christ, Mohammed and other founders of religion. We represent them all here by Lao Tzu, who is often considered the founder of "Taoism". "Tao" literally means "way". The point here is to develop one's way of live, and culture, based on on <em>where the way is leading to</em>—and not (only) based on how attractive a direction may feel at the moment.</p>
+<p>Lao Tzu, an iconic representative of the <em>way</em>, is often portrayed as reading a bull—which signifies that he's harnessed his <em>egotism</em>.</p>
+<p>While this insight can easily be <em>federated</em> in the manner just described, we here point to it by a curiosity.</p>
-<p>The most fascinating insight is reached as soon as we ignore the differences in worldview, what the adherents of different religion "believe in"—and pay attention to the <em>symbolic environment</em> they produce, and the kind of values and way of being they nourish. Compare, for instance, the above Lao Tzu's observations with what Christ told his disciples in the Sermon on the Mount. </p>
 <p>
 [[File:Huxley-vision.jpeg]]
 </p>
-<p>Most interestingly, even a superficial <em>federation</em> (when we no longer focus on what religious traditions "believe in", but on the <em>symbolic environments</em> they create and the values they promote) the <em>transcendence</em> of <em>egotism</em> is a key element of the "way". </p>
+<p>In "The Art of Seeing", Huxley observed that overcoming egotism is a necessary element of even <em>physical</em> wholeness!</p>
-<p>Lao Tzu is often pictured as riding a bull, which signifies that he conquered and tamed his ego. We here quote Aldous Huxley, to point out that transcending <em>egotism</em> is so much part of our <em>wholeness</em>, that even <em>physical</em> effort and effortlessness—which we now handle exclusively by developing the technology—is conditioned by it. </p>
-<p>Motivation: Bauman's "Cuture as praxis". Definition of <em>culture</em> as "<em>cultivation</em> of <em>wholeness</em>. </p>
+<p>We may now perceive significant parts of our cultural history as struggle between <em>cultivation</em> of <em>wholeness</em> guided by insights into the nature of the <em>way</em>—and the <em>power structure</em>–related <em>socialization</em>, aided by the attraction of <em>convenience</em> and <em>egotism</em>. It is on the outcome of this struggle, Peccei observed, that our future will depend. </p>
-<p>Definition of <em>religion</em> as "reconnection with archetypes". </p>
+<blockquote>What hope do we have of reversing its outcome?</blockquote>
-<p>The book "Liberation" subtitled "Religion beyond Belief" is an ice breaker. It <em>federates</em> "the best kept secret", and creates a <em>dialog</em>. </p>
+<p>The answer is, of course, that we now have a whole new <em>dimension</em> to work with.</p>
-<p>Movement and Qi is a template how to put the <em>language</em> of "movement" (doing something with the body) into the academic repertoire. And how to put the heritage of the world traditions such as yoga and qigong into academic repertoire.</p>
+<blockquote>We can <em>design</em> communication.</blockquote>
+<p>We can create media content that will communicate the <em>convenience paradox</em> in clear and convincing ways; we can guide people to an <em>informed</em> use of information; <em>and</em> we can create various elements of culture to <em>socialize</em> us or <em>cultivate</em> us accordingly. Including, of course, <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>. </p>
+<blockquote>A <em>vast</em> creative frontier opens up.</blockquote>
+<p>We illustrate it here by a handful of examples.</p>
+<p>In a fractal-like manner, our definition of <em>culture</em> reflects the entire situation around <em>holoscope</em> and <em>holotopia</em>. So let us summarize it here in that way, however briefly. We motivated this definition by discussing Zygmunt Bauman's book "Culture as Praxis"—where Bauman surveyed a large number of historical definitions of culture, and reached the conclusion that they are so diverse that they cannot be reconciled with one another. How can we develop culture as <em>praxis</em>—if we don't know what "culture" means? We defined  <em>culture</em> as "<em>cultivation</em> of <em>wholeness</em>", where the keyword <em>cultivation</em> is defined by analogy with planting and watering a seed (which suits also the etymology of "culture") . Thereby (and in accordance with the general <em>holotopia</em> approach we discussed above), we pointed to a specific <em>aspect</em> of culture. No amount of dissecting and studying a seed would suggest that it needs to be planted and watered. Hence when we reduced "reality" to what we can explain in that way, the <em>culture</em> as <em>cultivation</em> is all gone! When, however, we consider and treat <em>information</em> as human experience, and look for what may help us redeem and further develop <em>culture</em>—then a remedial trend, modeled by <em>holotopia</em>, is already under way. </p>
+<p>We defined <em>addiction</em> as a <em>pattern</em>; and motivated this definition by observing that evolution equipped us, humans with emotions of comfort and discomfort to guide our choices toward <em>wholeness</em>. We, however, found ways to deceive nature—by creating pleasurable things called "addictions", which lead us <em>away</em> from <em>wholeness</em>. Since selling addictions is lucrative business, the <em>traditions</em> identified certain activities or <em>things</em> (such as opiates and gambling) as addictions and developed suitable legislation and ethical norms. But with the help of technology, contemporary industries can develop hundreds of <em>new</em> addictions—without us having a way to even recognize them as that. By defining <em>addiction</em> as a <em>pattern</em>, we can perceive it (as we did with the <em>power structure</em>) as an <em>aspect</em> of otherwise good and useful things. From a large number of obvious or subtle candidates or examples, we here mention only <em>pseudoconsciousness</em> defined as "<em>addiction</em> to information". Consciousness of one's situation and surroundings is, of course, an evolutionary need. In civilization we can, however, drown this need in massive facts and data—which give us the <em>sensation</em> of knowing, without telling us what we above all <em>need to</em> know.</p>
+<p>We adapted the definition that Martin Lings contributed, and defined <em>religion</em> as "reconnection with the <em>archetype</em>" (this again harmonizes with the etymological meaning of this word). The <em>archetypes</em> here include "justice", "beauty", "truth", "love" and anything else that may make a person overcome <em>egotism</em> and <em>convenience</em> and serve a "higher" ideal.</p>
+<p>The NaCuHeal-Information Design was our project developed in collaboration with the European Public Health Association, through Prof. Gunnar Tellnes who was then its president. In Norway Tellnes developed an authentic approach to health, which was based on nature and culture-related activities. This collaboration resulted in several <em>prototypes</em>, of which we mention two. </p>
+<p>We contributed "Healthcare as a Power Structure" to the European Association for the History of Medicine and Health. Historiographically, we based this research on the results  of Weston Price and Werner Kollath—two pioneers of the scientific "hygiene", understood as a scientific study of the ways in which civilized lifestyle influences people's health. But we also added a <em>methodological</em> contribution—a way to 'connect the dots' and supplement historiographic research by a general "law of change" result. By seeing that also our approach to health and medicine can develop pathological tendencies, we can explain the fact that the results of those pioneers are still virtually unknown even to medical professionals; and why, in spite of them, our "caring for health" so consistently ignores the lifestyle factors, and relies on far more costly interventions.</p>
+<p>Kommunewiki—a <em>dialog</em>-based communication project for Norwegian municipalities (as basic units of Norwegian democracy)—was conceived to empower their members to counter <em>power structure</em> lifestyle tendencies, and develop <em>salutogenic</em> new ones.</p>
+<p>We developed the "Movement and Qi" educational <em>prototype</em> as a way to add to the conventional academic portfolio a collection of ways to use human <em>body</em> as medium—and work with "human quality" directly. And as a way to include the insights and techniques of the "human quality" traditions such as yoga and qigong into the academic repertoire. </p>
+<p>"Liberation", subtitled "Religion beyond Belief", is a book manuscript and a communication design project. The book <em>federates</em> the message of Ven. Ajahn Buddhadasa, a 20th century's Buddhism reformer in Thailand, who—having through experimentation and practice understood and 'repeated the Buddha's experiment', found in it also a natural antidote to rampant materialism. The first four chapters present four <em>aspects</em> of human <em>wholeness</em>, including physical effortlessness, creativity, emotions and vitality. Buddhadasa's insights are shown to be a <em>necessary</em> piece in this large puzzle. The closing four chapters explain how <em>societal</em> <em>wholeness</em> may result.</p>
+<p>The core Buddhadasa's message, which is also the message of this book, is to  portray <em>religion</em> as "liberation"—not only from rigidly held beliefs that form our self-identity, but from rigidly held <em>anything</em>, as well as from <em>self-identity</em> as such.</p>
+<p>We chose this book as part of our strategy for launching the <em>holotopia</em>. Many people have strong opinions about religion—be they "religious" and pro, or "scientific" and against. This book is likely to surprise both sides and challenge <em>both</em> positions—while at the same time reconciling their differences. </p>
+<blockquote>Isn't the prospect of <em>evolving</em> religion further a promising strategy for remedying religion-inspired violence?</p>
+<p>And of course, a way to evolve further culturally and ethically—as Peccei requested; and <em>holotopia</em> promised to deliver.</p>
 </div> </div>
@@ Line 754: / Line 871: @@
 <div class="col-md-7">
-<p>The <em>five insights</em> have been chosen to reflect five <em>aspects</em> of the last "great cultural revival", to which we point by bringing up the image of Galilei in hose arrest. Our point is that when those five centrally important aspects of our society's 'drive into the future' are no longer looked at by using the <em>inherited</em> ways of looking at the world ('in the light of a pair of candles') but by a deliberately <em>designed</em> way (represented by the <em>holoscope</em>), or in other words when our minds and eyes are liberated from the habit and the tradition and we allow ourselves to <em>create</em> the way we look at the world—then once again the blind spots and the opportunities for creative action are seen that <em>naturally</em> lead to a deep and comprehensive change.</p>
+<p>The <em>five insights</em> together compose a vision of "a great cultural revival". They complete the analogy between our time and the situation at the twilight of the Middle Ages and the dawn of the Renaissance, which we've been pointing to by using the iconic image of Galilei in house arrest.</p>
-<p>Hence the <em>five insights</em> together reveal a vast creative frontier, where dramatic improvements can be reached. And which <em>together</em> constitute "a great cultural revival"—each of them being a piece in the large puzzle, a mechanism that unleashes our creative potential on such major scale.</p>
 <h3>A revolution in innovation</h3>
-<p>By bringing a radical improvement of the efficiency and effectiveness of human work, through innovation, the Industrial Revolution liberated our ancestors from the toil for survival, and empowered them to devote themselves to more humane pursuits such as developing their "human quality", by developing culture. Or so we were told. The real story may, however, be entirely different. Research has shown that the hunger-gatherers used only a small fraction of their time for hunting and gathering. The <em>power structure</em> insight shows that not only today—but throughout history the improvements in effectiveness and efficiency in human work have been largely wasted by the <em>systems in which we live and work</em></p>
+<p>By bringing a radical improvement of the efficiency and effectiveness of human work, through innovation, the Industrial Revolution promised to liberate our ancestors from hardship and toil, so that they may focus on developing culture and "human quality".  The <em>power structure</em>, however, thwarted our aspirations. This issue can be resolved, and progress can be resumed, by learning to "make things whole" on the level of <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>.</p>
-<p>We saw, by illuminating those systems and the way in which they evolve, that this age-old negative trend in our evolution can be countered by innovating differently—through [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]], or by "making things whole". And how this <em>socio-technical</em> innovation can, finally, liberate us from toil and empower us to engage in cultural revival.</p>
 <h3>A revolution in communication</h3>
-<p>The printing press enabled the Enlightenment by enabling a revolution in literacy, and in communication.  The <em>collective mind</em> insight shows that the new information technology enables a <em>similar</em> revolution—whose effects will not be only a mass production of volumes of information, but most importantly a revolution in the production of <em>meaning</em>. A revolution where information is considered and treated as the lifeblood of human society—and enabled to make all the differences it can and needs to make, in a post-industrial society.</p>
+<p>The printing press enabled the Enlightenment by enabling a revolution in literacy and communication.  The <em>collective mind</em> insight shows that the new information technology can power a <em>similar</em> revolution—whose effect will be a revolution of <em>meaning</em>. The kind of revolution that can make the differences that needs to make, in a post-industrial society.</p>
-<h3>A revolution in vision</h3>
+<h3>A revolution in the relationship we have with information</h3>
-<p>The Enlightenment was a combined revolution; our ancestors were first empowered to use their reason to <em>understand</em> the world; and then to see that the royalties were not divinely ordained, but indeed part of a human-made <em>power structure</em>. The whole revolution, however, began as a relatively minor epistemological innovation in astrophysics. By putting the Sun into the center of the Solar system, a scientific explanation of the movement of the planets became possible. We have seen that a <em>continuation</em> of that revolution is now due, by which all <em>reification</em> is seen as obsolete and a product of <em>power structure</em>; and in particular the <em>reification</em> of our worldview, and of our <em>systems</em>. By liberating the <em>academia</em> from the pitfall of <em>reification</em>, we can both empower ourselves to adapt our <em>systems</em> to the purposes they need to serve <em>and</em> liberate the vast global army of academic researchers from the disciplinary constraints on creativity—and empower them to be creative in ways and on the scale that a "great cultural revival" enables and requires.</p>
+<p>By reviving the academic tradition (which had remained dormant for almost two thousand years), the Enlightenment empowered our ancestors to use reason to comprehend the world, and to evolve faster. The <em>socialized reality</em> insight shows that the evolution of the academic tradition has brought us to a <em>new</em> turning point—which will liberate us from  <em>reifying</em> our inherited <em>systems</em> and worldviews; and enable us to evolve culturally, a similar rate as we've evolved technologically.</p>
 <h3>A revolution in method</h3>
-<p>Galilei in house arrest was really <em>science</em> in house arrest. It was this new way to understand the natural phenomena that liberated our ancestors from superstition, and empowered them to understand and change their world by developing technology. The <em>narrow frame</em> insight shows that the "project science" can and needs to be extended into all walks of life—to illuminate all those core issues that science left in the dark. </p>
+<p>Galilei in house arrest was really <em>science</em> in house arrest. It was this new way to understand the natural phenomena that liberated our ancestors from superstition, and empowered them to understand and change their world by developing technology. The <em>narrow frame</em> insight shows that the "project science" can and needs to be extended into all walks of life—to illuminate all those core issues that traditional sciences left in the dark. </p>
 <h3>A revolution in culture</h3>
-<p>The Renaissance <em>was</em> a "great cultural revival"—a liberation and celebration of life, love, and beauty, by changing the values and the lifestyle, and developing the arts. The <em>convenience paradox</em> insight illuminates two <em>dimensions</em> of this most fertile creative domain we've neglected—the time dimension, and the inner one. When this is done, a completely new <em>direction</em> of human pursuits readily emerge as natural—where our goal is the cultivation of inner <em>wholeness</em>, by developing culture.  </p>
+<p>The Renaissance <em>was</em> a "great cultural revival"—a liberation and celebration of life, love, and beauty, by changing the values and the lifestyle, manifested by the arts. The <em>convenience paradox</em> insight shows that our culture has once again become a victim of <em>power structure</em>; and that a <em>final</em> liberation is both possible and necessary.</p>
-<p>This new revolution perhaps finds its most vivid expression in re-evolution of religion—by which an age-old conflict between science and religion is seen as a conflict between two <em>power structures</em>, which hindered the evolution of <em>both</em> our understanding of the world and our understanding of our selves. And how a completely <em>new</em> phase in this relationship can now begin.</p>
 </div> </div>
@@ Line 789: / Line 900: @@
 <div class="col-md-7">
-<h3>The solution is a <em>paradigm</em></h3>
+<p>Combined together, the <em>five insights</em> readily lead to a more general <em>sixth insight</em>. </p>
-<p>Already this very brief sketch of the <em>five insights</em> gives us a glimpse of the anatomy and pathophysiology of the "problematique". And lets us anticipate why the "solutionatique" will not be a result of mere preoccupation with what we perceive as issues or "problems". And why its results will be a lot more than mere solutions to problems; why the solution will indeed be "a great cultural revival", or the <em>holotopia</em>.</p>
+<blockquote>We must be able to create insights.</blockquote>
-<p>The <em>power structure</em> insight showed that we cannot "solve our problems" without changing <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>—which organize us in ways that <em>create</em> problems; <em>or</em> make us collectively incapable of understanding them and taking care of them.</p>
+<p>We <em>have</em> all the knowledge we need to begin "a great cultural revival". What we are lacking is a way to put it together, and make sense of it.</p>
-<p>The <em>collective mind</em> insight gave us a natural place to begin. We need to first of all update communication—which is what <em>turns</em> us the people into a system. And which—the tie between communication and action having been severed—turns us into systems that make us collectively 'brain dead'—and hence scheduled for extinction.</p>
-<p>The <em>socialized reality</em> and the <em>narrow frame</em> insight together pointed to a place where the not is tied, and how to untie it (or technically, to the "systemic leverage point" and to the natural strategy for change). As long as we consider the purpose of information to be giving us "an objective reality picture", or in other words as long as we <em>reify</em> our present knowledge-work institutions and practices and the information they give us, there is no hope for change, and vice versa. The <em>reification</em> results in mass production of "pieces", in the sciences and the media, which not only are unsuitable for seeing what each of us personally has to do—but indeed (having evolved within the <em>power structure</em>) systemically serve for (as Herman and Chomsky put it) "manufacturing consent".</p>
+<blockquote>A case for our proposal is hereby also completed.</blockquote>
-<p>What we are lacking—and the key element of solution—is the ability to create high-level insights, principles, rules of thumb, which can orient our action. Ways to <em>federate</em> the massive data into the kind of "pieces" that have agency and purpose.  </p>
+<p>The Holotopia project completes the <em>federation</em> of Peccei's vision, by making it actionable.</p>
-<p>As soon as we do that, the <em>convenience paradox</em> insight showed, our very values and our "human quality" is bound to change radically—and lead to exactly the kind of values and behavior patterns on which the restructuring our <em>systems</em>, and resolving the <em>power structure</em> issue, now depends.</p>
+<p>It also completes the <em>knowledge federation</em> [[prototype|<em>prototype</em>]], by serving as 'the dot on the i'.</p>
-<h3>Large change can be easy</h3>
+</div> </div>
-<p>As we have just seen, the <em>five insights</em> and their solutions are so closely interdependent, that resolving one requires resolving all of them. This first part of a, larger <em>sixth insight</em> follows.</p>
+<b><BIG>This Holotopia project description will be completed by elaborating:</BIG></b>
-<blockquote>A large and comprehensive change can be easy—even when much smaller and obviously necessary changes may have proven impossible.</blockquote>
+<div class="page-header" ><h2>A strategy</h2></div>
-<p>Comprehensive change, as the change of the system as a whole, has its own <em>systemic</em> way in which it may most easily be done. </p>
+<div class="row">
+<div class="col-md-3"></div>
+<div class="col-md-6">
-<h3>Occupy the university</h3>
+<p>The Holotopia project is conceived as a space, where we make co-creative strategic moves toward "changing course".</p>
-<p>We have also seen that each of the <em>five insights</em> is really a result of <em>federating</em> published more specific insights. And that our collective capability to do that now requires that "the relationship we have with information" be changed. That <em>this</em> is the natural leverage point to the large and comprehensive change, just as the case was in Galilei's time. Hence the second part of the <em>sixth insight</em> results.</p>
+<p>We implement Margaret Mead's recommendations for responding to the situation we are in:
+<blockquote>
+"(W)e are living in a period of extraordinary danger, as we are faced with the possibility that our whole species will be eliminated from the evolutionary scene. One necessary condition of successfully continuing our existence is the creation of an atmosphere of hope that the huge problems now confronting us can, in fact, be solved—and can be solved in time."
+</blockquote> </p>
+</div>
-<blockquote>The systemic leverage point is the university</blockquote>
+ <div class="col-md-3">
+[[File:Mead.jpg]]<br>
+<small>Margaret Mead</small>
+</div> </div>
-<p>The relationship we have with information is no longer in the hands of the Church, but of the university as institution, as the contemporary representative of the academic tradition. </p>
+<div class="page-header" ><h2>Tactical assets</h2></div>
-<p>From the point of view of the <em>holotopia</em>, this is <em>extremely</em> good news. To make decisive headway toward "a great cultural revival", we do not need to convince the political and business leaders. We do not need to occupy Wall street. We, publicly sponsored public servants, have the key to solution in our hands. </p>
-<p>Since upholding the standard of "right" knowledge is the core task of <em>our</em> academic occupation, there is really nothing to occupy. We only need to do our job.</p>
+<div class="row">
+<div class="col-md-3"></div>
+<div class="col-md-7"><p>To the above co-creative space we bring a portfolio of assorted <em>tactical assets</em>. </p>
-<p>To make a completely clear argument, we defined <em>academia</em> as "institutionalized academic tradition". And we represented the academic tradition by Socrates as the progenitor of the original Academia, and Galilei as a progenitor of science and the academic tradition's revival, which led to the larger cultural revival. Both Socrates and Galilei stood up to the <em>power structure</em> of the day, by representing <em>new</em> ways to look at the world, based on <em>knowledge of knowledge</em>. The question, then, is <em>What does the contemporary university institutionalize</em>? Is it supporting <em>that</em> sort of work—or maintaining status quo, through <em>reification</em> of the existing habits and structures?</p>
+</div> </div>
-<p>When reiterating the call to action voiced by Vannevar Bush, Norbert Wiener, Erich Jantsch, Doug Engelbart, and so many others—we do that by submitting a complete <em>paradigm proposal</em>; by showing that their call to action can be responded to based on the time-honored academic standards. And indeed that the time-honored academic standards <em>demand</em> that we do that.</p>
+<div class="page-header" ><h2>A pilot project</h2></div>
-<h3>Human quality</h3>
-<p>The critical resource is—and has always been—people who love knowledge, or truth, or humanity, beyond the comfort of fitting into the <em>power structure</em> of the day. </p>
+<div class="row">
+<div class="col-md-3"></div>
+<div class="col-md-7"><p>To bring all this down to earth, we describe the pilot project we've developed in art gallery Kunsthall 3.14 in Bergen. </p>
-<p>We have seen that the social and cultural ecology of the day is vehemently opposing it—so much so that we may be lacking even the critical amount that we need—even all other things being in place—to begin "a new course".</p>
-<p>The Holotopia project may be understood as a strategic undertaking to create a space, and a <em>system</em> or social dynamic, in which a sufficiently strong remedial trend can emerge.</p>
+[[File:KunsthallDialog01.jpg]]
+<br>
-</div> </div>
+<!-- CCC
 <div class="page-header" ><h2>A strategy</h2></div>
@@ Line 1,347: / Line 1,468: @@
 <p>The most interesting reason—which we will revisit and understand more thoroughly below—is that the <em>power structures</em> have the power to <em>socialize</em> us in ways that suit <em>their</em> interests. This basic idea, of <em>socialization</em>, can however be understood if we think of our
+-------
+ in the opening slides of his "A Call to Action" presentation, which were prepared for a 2007 panel that Google organized to share his vision to the world (but not shown!).</p>
+<p>
+[[File:DE-one.jpeg]]
+</p>
+<p>In the first slide, Engelbart emphasized that  "new thinking" or a "new paradigm" is needed. In the second, he pointed out what this "new thinking" was. </p>
+<blockquote>
+<p>We ride a common economic-political vehicle traveling at an ever-accelerating pace through increasingly complex terrain.</p>
+<p>Our headlights are much too dim and blurry. We have totally inadequate steering and braking controls. </p>
+</blockquote>
+-------
+<p>Part of this construction is a function of our cognitive system, which turns "the chaotic diversity of our sense-experience" into something that makes sense, and helps us function. The other part is performed by our society. Long before we are able to reflect on these matters "philosophically", we are given certain concepts through which to look at the world and organize it and make sense of it. Through innumerable 'carrots and sticks', throughout our lives, we are induced to "see the reality" in a certain specific way—as our culture defines it. As everyone knows, every "normal human being" sees the reality as it truly is. Wasn't that the reason why our ancestors often considered the members of a neighboring tribes, who saw the reality differently, as not completely normal; and why they treated them as not completely human?</p>
+<p>Of various consequences that have resulted from this historical error, we shall here mention two. The first will explain what really happened with our culture, and our "human quality"; why the way we handle them urgently needs to change. The second will explain what holds us back—why we've been so incapable of treating our <em>systems</em> as we treat other human-made things, by adapting them to the purposes that need to be served.  </p>
+<p>To see our first point, we invite you to follow us in a one-minute thought experiment. To join us on an imaginary visit to a cathedral. No, this is not about religion; we shall use the cathedral as one of our <em>ideograms</em>, to put things in proportion and make a point.</p>
+<p>What strikes us instantly, as we enter, is awe-inspiring architecture. Then we hear the music play: Is it Bach's cantatas? Or Allegri's Miserere? We see sculptures, and frescos by masters of old on the walls. And then, of course, there's the ritual...</p>
+<p>We also notice a little book on each bench. When we open it, we see that its first paragraphs explain how the world was created.</p>
+<p>Let this difference in size—between the beginning of Genesis and all the rest we find in a cathedral—point to the fact that, owing to our error, our pursuit of knowledge has been focused on a relatively minor part, on <em>explaining</em> how the things we perceive originated, and how they work. And that what we've ignored is our culture as a complex ecosystem, which evolved through thousands of years, whose function is to <em>socialize</em> people in a certain specific way. To <em>create</em> certain "human quality". Notice that we are not making a value judgment, only pointing to a function.</p>
+<p>The way we presently treat this ecosystem reminds of the way in which we treated the natural ones, at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. We have nothing equivalent to CO2 measurements and quotas, to even <em>try</em> to make this a scientific and political issue.</p>
+<p>So how <em>are</em> our culture, and our "human quality" evolving? To see the answer, it is enough to just look around. To an excessive degree, the <em>symbolic environment</em>  we are immersed in is a product of advertising. And explicit advertising is only a tip of an iceberg, comprising various ways in which we are <em>socialized</em> to be egotistical consumers; to believe in "free competition"—not in "making things <em>whole</em>".</p>
+<p>By believing that the role of information is to give us an "objective" and factual view of "reality", we have ignored and abandoned to decay core parts of our cultural heritage. <em>And</em> we have abandoned the creation of culture, and of "human quality", to <em>power structure</em>. </p>
+<p>To see our second point, that reality construction is a key instrument of the <em>power structure</em>, and hence of power, it may be sufficient to point to "Social Construction of Reality", where Berger and Luckmann explained how throughout history, the "universal theories" about the nature of reality have been used  to <em>legitimize</em> a given social order. But this theme is central to <em>holotopia</em>, and here too we can only get a glimpse of a solution by looking at deeper dynamics and causes.</p>
+<p>To be able to do that we devised a <em>thread</em>—in which three short stories or <em>vignettes</em> are strung together to compose a larger insight.</p>
+<p>The first <em>vignette</em> describes a real-life event, where two Icelandic horses living outdoors—aging Odin the Horse, and New Horse who is just being introduced to the herd where Odin is the stallion and the leader—are engaged in turf strife. It will be suffice to just imagine these two horses running side by side, with their long hairs waving in the wind, Odin pushing New Horse toward the river, and away from his pack of mares.</p>
+-------
+<p>The second story is about sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, and his "theory of practice"—where Bourdieu provided a conceptual framework to help us understand how <em>socialization</em> works; and in particular its relationship with what he called "symbolic power". Our reason for combining these two stories together is to suggest that we humans exhibit a similar turf behavior as Odin—but that this tends to remain largely unrecognized. Part of the reason is that, as Bourdieu explained, the ways in which this atavistic disposition of ours manifests itself are incomparably more diverse and subtle than the ones of horses—indeed as more diverse so as our culture is more complex than theirs. </p>
+<p>Bourdieu devised two keywords for the symbolic cultural 'turf'" "field" and "game", and used them interchangeably. He called it a "field", to suggest (1) a field of activity or profession, and the <em>system</em> where it is practiced; and (2)  something akin to a magnetic field, in which we people are immersed as small magnets, and which subtly, without us noticing, orients our seemingly random or "free" movement.  He referred to it as "game", to suggests that there are certain semi-permanent roles in it, with allowable 'moves', by which our 'turf strife' is structured in a specific way.</p>
+<p>To explain the dynamics of the game or the field, Bourdieu adapted two additional keywords, each of which has a long academic history: "habitus" and "doxa". A habitus is composed of embodied behavioral predispositions, and may be thought of as distinct 'roles' or 'avatars' in the 'game'. A king has a certain distinct habitus; and so do his pages. The habitus is routinely maintained through direct, body-to-body action (everyone bows to the king, and you do too), without conscious intention or awareness. Doxa is the belief, or embodied experience, that the given social order is <em>the</em> reality. "Orthodoxy" acknowledges that multiple "realities" coexist, of which only a single one is "right"; doxa ignores even the <em>possibility</em> of alternatives.</p>
+<p>Hence we may understand <em>socialized reality</em> as something that 'gamifies' our social behavior, by giving everyone an 'avatar' or a role, and a set of capabilities.  Doxa is the 'cement' that makes such <em>socialized reality</em> relatively permanent.</p>
+<p>A [[vignette|<em>vignette</em>]] involving Antonio Damasio as cognitive neuroscientist completes this <em>thread</em>, by helping us see that the "embodied predispositions" that are maintained in this way have a <em>decisive role</em>, contrary to what the 19th century science and indeed the core of our philosophical tradition made us believe. Damasio showed that our socialized <em>embodied</em> predispositions act as a cognitive filter—<em>determining</em> not only our priorities, but also the <em>options</em> we may be able to rationally consider. Our embodied, socialized predispositions are a reason, for instance, why we don't consider showing up in public naked (which in another culture might be normal). </p>
+-------
+<p>This conclusion suggests itself: Changing <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>—however rational, and necessary, that may be—is for <em>similar</em> reasons inconceivable. </p>
+<blockquote>We are incapable of changing our <em>systems</em>, because we have been <em>socialized</em> to accept them as reality.</blockquote>
+<p>We may now condense this diagnosis to a single keyword: <em>reification</em>. We are incapable of replacing 'candle headlights' because we have <em>reified</em> them as 'headlights'! "Science" has no systemic purpose. Science <em>is</em> what the scientists are doing. Just as "journalism" is the profession we've inherited from the tradition. </p>
+<p>
+[[File:Beck-frame.jpeg]]
+</p>
+<p>But <em>reification</em> reaches still deeper—to include the very <em>language</em> we use to organize our world. It includes the very concepts by which we frame our "issues". Ulrich Beck continued the above observation:</p>
+<blockquote>
+"Max Weber's 'iron cage' – in which he thought humanity was condemned to live for the foreseeable future – is for me the prison of <em>categories and basic assumptions</em> of classical social, cultural and political sciences."
+</blockquote>
+<p>We may now see not only our inherited physical institutions or <em>systems</em> as 'candles'—but also our inherited or socialized concepts, which determine the very <em>way</em> in which we look at the world.</p>
+<p><em>Reification</em> underlies <em>both</em> problems. It is what <em>keeps us</em> in 'iron cage'.</p>
 -------

Difference between revisions of "Holotopia"

Revision as of 12:36, 1 September 2020

Contents

HOLOTOPIA

An Actionable Strategy

Imagine...

Our proposal

A proof of concept application

A vision

A principle

A method

Five insights

Scope

Power structure

Scope

Diagnosis

Remedy

Collective mind

Scope

Diagnosis

Remedy

Socialized reality

Scope

Diagnosis

Remedy

Narrow frame

Scope

Diagnosis

Remedy

Convenience paradox

Scope

Diagnosis

Remedy

A great cultural revival

A revolution in innovation

A revolution in communication

A revolution in the relationship we have with information

A revolution in method

A revolution in culture

The sixth insight

A strategy

Tactical assets

A pilot project