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| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Introducing our initiative</h2></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>A historical parallel</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Think about the world at the twilight of the Middle Ages and the dawn of the Renaissance. Recall the devastating religious wars, terrifying epidemics... Bring to mind the iconic image of the scholastics discussing "how many angels can dance on a needle point". And another iconic image, of Galilei in house arrest a century after Copernicus, whispering "and yet it moves" into his beard.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Observe that the problems of the epoch were not resolved by focusing on those problems, but by a slow and steady development of an entirely new approach to knowledge. Several centuries of accelerated and sweeping evolution followed. Could a similar advent be in store for us today?</p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 "> [[File:Galilei.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Galileo Galilei]]</center></small> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Our discovery</h3> | ||
| + | <p>"If I have seen further," Sir Isaac Newton famously declared, "it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." The point of departure of our initiative was a discovery. We did not discover that the best ideas of our best minds were drowning in an ocean of glut. [[Vannevar Bush]], a [[giants|<em>giant</em>]], diagnosed that nearly three quarters of a century ago. He urged the scientists to focus on that disturbing trend and find a remedy. But needless to say, this too drowned in glut.</p> | ||
| + | <p>What we <em>did</em> find out, when we began to develop and apply [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a remedial practice, was that now just as in Newton's time, the insights of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] add up to a novel approach to knowledge. And that just as the case was then, the new approach to knowledge leads to new ways in which core issues are understood and handled.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 "> [[File:Newton.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Isaac Newton]]</center></small> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Our strategy</h3> | ||
| + | <p>“You never change things by fighting the existing reality", observed Buckminster Fuller. "To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” So we built [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a model (or technically a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]]) of a new way to work with knowledge (or a [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]); and of a new institution (the [[transdiscipline|<em>transdiscipline</em>]]) that is capable of developing this new new approach to knowledge as an academic and real-life | ||
| + | [[praxis|<em>praxis</em>]] (informed practice).</p> | ||
| + | <p>By sharing this model we do not aim at conclusive answers. Our aim is indeed much higher – it is <em>to open up a creative frontier</em> where the ways in which knowledge is created and used, and more generally the ways in which our creative efforts are directed, are brought into focus and <em>continuously</em> recreated and improved.</p> </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 "> [[File:Fuller.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[R. Buckminster Fuller]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | |||
| + | ----- | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Introducing knowledge federation</h2></div> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Connecting the dots</h3> | ||
| + | <p>As our logo might suggest, [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] means 'connecting the dots' – combining disparate pieces of information and other knowledge resources together, so that they may make sense, or function, in a new way. We adopted this [[keywords|<em>keyword</em>]] from political and institutional federation, where smaller entities are united to achieve greater visibility and impact – while preserving some suitable degree of their identity and autonomy.</p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 "> [[File:KFlogoC.jpg]] <br><small><center>Knowledge Federation logo</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>Already what we normally do with ideas and pieces of information to turn them into knowledge may rightly be considered [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]]. You may have an idea in mind – but can you say that you really <em>know</em> it before you have checked if it's consistent with your other ideas? And with the ideas of others? And even then – can you say that your idea is <em>known</em> before other people have integrated it with <em>their</em> ideas?</p> | ||
| + | <p>Science too federates knowledge. But science does that in an idiosyncratic way – by modeling the mechanisms of nature; and by explaining observable phenomena as their consequences.</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>A natural approach to knowledge</h3> | ||
| + | <p>What we have undertaken to put in place is what might be called the <em>natural</em> approach to knowledge. Think on the one side of all the knowledge we own, in academic articles and also broader. Include the heritage of the world traditions. Include the insights reached by creative people daily. Think on the other side of all the questions we <em>need</em> to have answered. Think of all the insights that could inform our lives, the rules of thumb that could direct our action. Imagine them occupying distinct levels of generality. The more general an insight is, the more useful it can be. You may now understand [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as whatever we the people may need to do to create, organize, synchronize, update and keep up to date various elements of this hierarchy.</p> | ||
| + | <p> Put simply, [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] is the creation and use of knowledge as we may need it – to be able to understand the increasingly complex world around us; to be able to live and act in it in an informed, sustainable or simply <em>better</em> way.</p> | ||
| + | <p>You may think of [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a way to liberate science from disciplinary constraints, combine it with what we've learn about knowledge and knowledge work from journalism, art and communication design, and apply the result to illuminate any question or issue where prejudices and illusions still need to be dispelled. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Our vision is of an <em>informed</em> post-traditional and post-industrial society – where our understanding and handling of the core issues of our lives and times reflect the best available knowledge; where knowledge is created and integrated and applied with that goal in mind; and where information technology is developed and used accordingly. </p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Big picture science</h3> | ||
| + | <p>If the word "paradigm" may not mean much to you, think of [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] simply as big picture science. </p> | ||
| + | <blockquote>There is only one quality more important than "know how". This is "know what" by which we determine not only how to accomplish our purposes but what our purposes are to be. </blockquote> | ||
| + | <p>This Norbert Wiener's observation is the key to understanding what practical difference a suitable big picture science can make. Science has given us a colossal know-how. We now need a similarly powerful know-what to direct the power of that know-how beneficially and safely.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We also need the big picture science, the know-what, to be able to understand what the academic results mean, why they are relevant to us. The know-what knowledge is needed to give the disciplinary academic results the real-life impact they merit.</p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Wiener.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Norbert Wiener]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>The media informing, in its present-day form, cannot give us a usable big picture. The task of understanding and synthesizing the knowledge we own is well beyond what the journalists can do on their own. </p> | ||
| + | <p>With the information we have, we are like people lost in a forest, who can only see the trees but not the forest. By seeing the trees, we are able to navigate through them. By not seeing the forest, we are unable to find a way to come out. We choose our way in the only way that's still available – by finding a well-frequented trail and following the crowd. But the crowd too can be lost!</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Our proposal</h3> | ||
| + | <p>We are not proposing to replace journalism, or science, but to complement them. And to connect them with one other, and also with the arts and the technological innovation and other creative fields.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We are submitting a case for a new socio-technical infrastructure, with its own division and organization of creative work, just as science and journalism now have. We need the [[praxis|<em>praxis</em>]] of producing big-picture knowledge, guiding principles, rules of thumb – to inform us about the core issues of our personal and social lives. What issues may require such knowledge? What might the information that carries it be like? In what way will it be created? We need a new <em>academic</em> [[praxis|<em>praxis</em>]] to answer such questions. Our purpose is to provide sufficiently rich and solid answers to consolidate a proof of concept, to show that this indeed can be done. And to initiate the doing.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>And yet it's a paradigm</h3> | ||
| + | <p>"But we cannot just create a new academic field out of nothing", we imagine might be your complaint. Our ideas of what constitutes good knowledge have been evolving since antiquity – and now find their foremost expression in science and philosophy. In the four detailed modules we show that the insights reached in science and philosophy now <em>enable</em>, and that the new information technology and our civilization's condition <em>demand</em> that we – that is, those of us who are academic professionals or otherwise professionally in charge of giving good knowledge to people – develop an entirely new set of fundamental principles and practices that will orient our handling of knowledge; and our innovation and other creative work in general.</p> | ||
| + | <p>While we (in the spirit of [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]]) do our best to maintain a manner of speaking accessible to a general audience, an academic reader will have no difficulty recognizing that what we are describing, or submitting a case for, is a new [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] in knowledge work. Thomas Kuhn characterized a paradigm as (1) a new way to conceive a domain of interest which (2) resolves the reported anomalies and (3) opens up a new frontier to research. We shall see in Federation through Images that fundamental anomalies in our handling of knowledge have been reported – and how those anomalies can be resolved by developing knowledge work on an entirely different foundation. We shall see in Federation through Stories that core parts of the new media technology were created (by Douglas Engelbart and his SRI-based "Laboratory for Augmenting Human Intellect") as part of an effort to give our society the socio-technical light bulb – and how we ended up using this technology to create fancy candles. We shall see in Federation through Conversations that also the reported core <em>pragmatic</em> anomaly (that our civilization is on a self-destructive course) may be reversed within the proposed [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]. And we shall see in Federation through Applications a mature portfolio of examples or [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]], which together provide recognizable contours of a vibrant and multifaceted creative frontier.</p> | ||
| + | <p>A related part of our purpose is to prime the further development and practical deployment of this new [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] – by offering [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as an initial [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]].</p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | ----- | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2 style="color:red">Reflection</h2></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Different thinking</h3> | ||
| + | <p><blockquote> | ||
| + | We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them. | ||
| + | </blockquote> | ||
| + | In what ways might our thinking need to be different, if we should understand and develop a new [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]? </p> | ||
| + | <p>First of all, we need to give it the time it requires. A paradigm being a harmonious yet complex web of relationships, some amount of mental processing is obviously unavoidable if we should form a coherent mental image, see that the things do fit together and make good sense when rearranged in the new way.</p> | ||
| + | <p>A reward will come instantly – as with a touch of calm insight we come to realize that <em>we don't need to be so busy</em>. That we're just spinning the wheels of a wasteful and dysfunctional social machinery – and being too busy to see that. </p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Einstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Albert Einstein]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Systemic thinking</h3> | ||
| + | <p>The second way in which our thinking will need to change is that it will become <em>systemic</em>. Systemic thinking is the kind of thinking that grants us the insight just mentioned, and reveals solutions.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We've prepared this very brief and down-to-earth [[intuitive introduction to systemic thinking]] to help you slow down and reflect – and already get an inkling of the key insight.</p> </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | ----- | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Knowledge federation introduces itself</h2></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Knowledge federation as a language</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Science taught us to think in terms of velocities and masses and experiments and natural causes. [[knowledge federation|<em>Knowledge federation</em>]] too introduces a way to think and speak.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We'll now let [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] introduce itself in its own manner of speaking. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Before we do that, this brief historical note will help you see why that manner of speaking is just a straight-forward adaptation of conventional science.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Science as a language</h3> | ||
| + | <p>The rediscovery of Aristotle (whose works had been preserved by the Arabs) was a milestone in medieval history. But the scholastics used his rational method to only argue the truths of the Scriptures. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Aristotle's natural philosophy was common-sense: Objects tend to fall down; the heavier objects tend to fall faster than the lighter ones. Galilei saw a flaw in this theory and proved it wrong <em>experimentally</em>, by throwing stones from the Leaning Tower of Pisa.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Galilei – undoubtedly one of Newton's "giants" – also brought mathematics into this affaire: <em>v = gt</em>. The constant <em>g</em> can be measured by an experiment. We can then use the formula to predict <em>precisely</em> what speed <em>v</em> an object will have after <em>t</em> seconds of falling.</p> | ||
| + | <p>This approach to knowledge proved to be so superior to what existed, and so fertile, that it naturally became the standard of excellence that <em>all</em> knowledge was expected to emulate. </p> | ||
| + | <h3>A curious-looking mathematical formula</h3> | ||
| + | <p>But why use only maths?</p> | ||
| + | <p> [[File:Modernity.jpg]] <br><small><center>Modernity ideogram</center></small></p> | ||
| + | <p></p> | ||
| + | <p>[[ideograms|<em>Ideograms</em>]] can be understood as a straight-forward generalization of the language of mathematics. Think of the above exemplar as a curious-looking mathematical formula. Just as Galilei's formula did, this [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] describes a relationship (called [[patterns|<em>pattern</em>]]) between two things, represented by the bus and its headlights. But while mathematical formulas can express only quantitative relationships, an [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] can represent virtually <em>any</em> relationship, even an emotional one. </p> | ||
| + | <p>An ideogram can also express the nature of a situation (for which we use the keyword [[gestalt|<em>gestalt</em>]])! Imagine us riding in a bus with candle headlights, through dark and unfamiliar terrain and at an accelerating speed. By depicting modernity as a bus with candle headlights, the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] points to an incongruity and a paradox. In our hither-to modernization we have forgotten to modernize something quite essential – and ended up in peril.</p> | ||
| + | <p>But this situation has a remedy!</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Unraveling the paradox</h3> | ||
| + | <p>A mathematical formula is just an abstract relationship, which acquires a concrete meaning – becomes "physics" – when we interpret its variables; when we say that <em>v</em> is the velocity of a falling object and <em>t</em> is the elapsed time. The formula then tells us how those entities are to be adjusted to each other.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Notice that even when interpreted in this way, the relationship remains an ideal one. "Free fall" is only an abstraction; Galilei's formula will not explain the falling of a parachutist or a feather.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In an analogous way, the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] expresses an abstract relationship between two entities, the bus and its headlights. It tells us how those entities are to be adjusted to one another. We can now make this abstract relationship concrete, and also useful, by assigning concrete interpretations to those two entities – just as we do in science.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We take advantage of the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] and define four new concepts. They will help us explain precisely what may need to be done to resolve the disquieting situation the [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] is pointing to. They will also allow us to point precisely to four ways in which our creation and use of knowledge, our creative work in general, and societal evolution (or ride into the future) at large may need to be different.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Notice that what we are talking about is still just an abstract theory. Its relevance and accuracy will need to be confirmed by resorting to experience. That is what the remainder of this website, its four main modules, will provide.</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>Design epistemology</h3> | ||
| + | <p>The larger issue here is [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] – by which we mean the assumptions and values that determine what knowledge is considered worth creating and relying on.</p> | ||
| + | <p> If you consider the light of the headlights to be information or knowledge, and the headlights to represent the activities by which knowledge is created and applied, then you'll easily understand the interpretation we are pointing at. The [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]] means considering knowledge and knowledge work as man-made things; and as essential building blocks in a much larger thing, or things, or systems. This new [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] empowers us to develop knowledge and knowledge work and to apply them and to assess their value based on how well they serve their core roles within larger systems – such as 'showing the way'.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Notice how thoroughly this [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] reconfigures the value matrix that orients our knowledge work today. When knowledge is considered to be pieces in a reality puzzle, then every piece might seem equally relevant. The media can then select whatever its audiences may be interested in. But when knowledge is conceived of as the light that needs to show us the next curve on the road, then the priorities are entirely different. Relevance, and the nature and the quality of information that provides the right insight and guidance, become core issues.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Furthermore those core issues become <em>research</em> issues. The research that tends to be most valued and considered academically fundamental or "basic" is the one whose aim is to <em>discover</em> the details of the puzzle of nature. In the order of things pointed to by the [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]], it is the research whose goal is to <em>construct</em> the core elements of an entirely different puzzle – of the socio-technical system or systems by which knowledge is created and disseminated – that becomes fundamental or basic. The most honored product of conventional science is an academic <em>article</em> in a reputed publication. In this new order of things the honor belongs just as much to the most impactful creative act, of any kind – that may bring the process of dissolving the core anomaly a step further.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In Federation through Images we will explain how exactly this idea can be extended into a complete [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]. To see that the [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] is at the core of every [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]], and of the general paradigm we call science in particular, notice that Galilei was not tried for claiming that the Earth was moving. That was just a technical detail. It was his [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] that got him into trouble – his belief that one may hold and defend an opinion as probable after it has been declared contrary to Holy Scripture. Galilei was required to "abjure, curse and detest" those opinions (Wikipedia).</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>Knowledge federation</h3> | ||
| + | <p>You may now understand [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as simply <em>suitable</em> 'headlights', as the quest for those 'headlights', and as the 'factory' ([[transdiscipline|<em>transdiscipline</em>]]) capable of creating them. You may also understand [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as the knowledge and knowledge work that follow by consistent application of the [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]]. </p> | ||
| + | <p>This definition leaves open the question – Is there an approach to knowledge that can make the kind of difference in our overall condition that the difference between having proper headlights and driving with a pair of candles might suggest? Does the quest the [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] is pointing to have a solution? Our purpose when presenting this [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] is to show that it indeed does. </p> | ||
| + | <p>The Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] also bears a subtler message. What the bus with candle headlights is lacking above all are the high-beam headlights – which can illuminate a large-enough stretch of the road to provide for safe driving. But isn't that exactly what "the big picture science" will produce?</p> | ||
| + | <p>The Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] is an example of a suitable big-picture result – which reveals the nature of our situation, and shows what needs to be done.</p> | ||
| + | <p>The lightbulb cannot be produced by improving the candle. The resolution of our quest is in the exact sense of the word a [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] – a fundamentally and thoroughly <em>new</em> way to conceive of knowledge and to organize its handling. To create the lightbulb, we need to know that this is possible. And we also need a model to guide us. What's being shared here is a description of that model. Why waste time trying to improve 'the candle' – if it's really 'the lightbulb' we should be talking about and creating?</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>Systemic innovation</h3> | ||
| + | <p>If you consider the movement of the bus to be the result of our creative efforts or of "innovation", then [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] is what resolves the paradox that the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] is pointing to. You may understand [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] as <em>informed</em> innovation, as the way we'll innovate when a strong-enough light's been turned on. </p> | ||
| + | <p>We practice [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] when our primary goal is to make <em>the whole thing</em> functional or vital or [[wholeness|<em>whole</em>]]. Here "the whole thing" may of course be a whole hierarchy of things, in which what we are doing or creating has a role. </p> | ||
| + | <p>There are two complementary ways to say what [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] is. One is to (focus on the bus and) say that [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] is innovation on the scale of the large and basic socio-technical systems, such as education, public informing, and knowledge work at large. The other one is to (focus on the headlights and) say that [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] is innovation whose primary aim and responsibility is the good condition or functioning or [[wholeness|<em>wholeness</em>]] of the system or systems in which what we are creating has a role. But of course those two definitions are just two ways of saying the same thing. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Here too there's a subtle message. You'll easily understand the reason, why a dramatic improvement in the way we use our capacity to create or innovate is possible, if you just compare the principle the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] is pointing at with the way innovation is directed today. The dollar value of the headlights is course a factor to be considered; but it's insignificant compared to the value of the whole bus (which in reality may be our civilization and all of us in it; or all our technology taken together; or the results of our daily work, which move the 'bus' forward; or whatever else may be organizing our efforts and driving us toward a future). It is this difference in value – between the dollar value of the headlights and the real value of this incomparably larger entity and of all of us in it – that you may bear in mind as [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]]'s <em>value proposition</em>. The dramatic message of our image is that [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] is what can make the difference between "the whole thing" turning into a mass suicide machine – and a well-functioning vehicle, capable of taking us anywhere we may reasonably want to be.</p> | ||
| + | <p>To see that the change this is pointing to reaches well beyond industrial innovation, to see why we indeed propose [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] as the signature theme of an impending Renaissance-like change, notice that what we are talking about is just one of our characteristic oversimplifications, which has enabled us to reduce a complex issue (value) in a complex reality to a single parameter (dollar value) – and then direct the power of science and technology accordingly.</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>Guided evolution of society</h3> | ||
| + | <p>If you'll consider the movement of the bus to be our society's travel into the future, or in a word its <em>evolution</em>, then [[guided evolution of society|<em>guided evolution of society</em>]] is what resolves the paradox. Our ride into the future, posits the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]], must be illuminated by suitable information. We must both create and <em>use</em> information accordingly.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We took this [[keywords|<em>keyword</em>]] from Bela H. Banathy, who considered the guided evolution of society to be the second great revolution in our civilization's history – the first one being the agricultural revolution. While in this first revolution we learned to cultivate our bio-physical environment, in the next one we'll learn to cultivate our socio-cultural environment. Here is how Banathy formulated this vision: | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | 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 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. | ||
| + | </blockquote> </p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | ----- | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Completing Engelbart's unfinished revolution</h2></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>A contemporary iconic story</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Of the many potentially iconic stories you will find of these pages, there is one that we feel compelled to highlight already here – the story of Douglas Engelbart and his "unfinished revolution". Engelbart and his lab created significant parts of the knowledge media technology we have today. And they did that by pursuing a much larger vision, whose essence has remained ignored – and to whose completion we have endeavored to contribute. | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | Digital technology could help make this a better world. But we've also got to change our way of thinking. | ||
| + | </blockquote> | ||
| + | As we shall see in Federation through Stories, these two sentences were intended to frame Engelbart's message to the world. We shall see that the required new thinking is precisely what we've been pointing to.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Engelbart, as we shall show, envisioned and initiated [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] and [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] – although he never used these keywords.</p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"> [[File:Doug.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Douglas Engelbart]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>To a number of us in Knowledge Federation, Doug has been both an inspirational figure and an admired friend. Our initiative grew in part out of a Silicon Valley-based initiative called The Program for the Future, whose purpose is to explain and complete Engelbart's vision. We are making this website public on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Engelbart's Demo – where the revolutionary technology and ideas he and his research lab created were first shown to public.</p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | ----- | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Summary and highlights</h2></div> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"><h3>A socio-technical lightbulb</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Consider what's presented on these pages as a complete [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] of a socio-technical lightbulb – which includes everything from the principles of operation and the technical design and prototype on the one side, to the examples of application and the marketing strategy on the other. Our purpose is to show that such a lightbulb can and needs to be created and put to use. And to initiate the [[praxis|<em>praxis</em>]] of using lightbulbs as headlights, instead of candles.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In the four detailed modules by which this presentation is completed, we shall use [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] to explain, showcase and already begin to put into general use [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]]. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Each module will apply and demonstrate a specific set of techniques – and focus on a specific aspect of our design.</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>Federation through Images</h3> | ||
| + | <p>The focus here is, metaphorically, on the principle of operation; electricity, and not fire, can give us the strong light we need. That part of our knowledge work whose purpose is to orient the people in the complex reality we now live in can and needs to be developed on an entirely new foundation. </p> | ||
| + | <p>We show, further, that this fundamental work is not a deviation from the academic tradition, but a natural continuation of it. We show that the insights of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] not only enable – but indeed <em>enjoin</em> such a step.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We use [[ideograms|<em>ideograms</em>]] – metaphorical and often paradoxical images to sum up the findings of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]]. The result is a cartoon-like introduction to the philosophical underpinnings of a refreshingly novel approach to knowledge.</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>Federation through Stories</h3> | ||
| + | <p>We illuminate our theme by telling four iconic real-life stories – about the [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] and their insights, whom we consider to be suitable icons for our four main [[keywords|<em>keywords</em>]].</p> | ||
| + | <p>We use [[vignettes|<em>vignettes</em>]] – short, lively, catchy, sticky... real-life people and situation stories – to explain and empower the core ideas of daring thinkers. [[vignettes|<em>Vignettes</em>]] are in essence what the journalists do to introduce a relevant or complex idea, to bring it down to earth and make it palpable to people – they tell it through a story about a person. A vignette liberates an insight from the language of a discipline and enables a non-expert to 'step into the shoes' of a [[giants|<em>giant</em>]], to 'look through his eye glasses'. By combining [[vignettes|<em>vignettes</em>]] into [[threads|<em>threads</em>]], and threads into higher units of meaning, we take this process of [[knowledge federation|<em>federation</em>]] all the way to the kind of direction-setting principles we've been talking about.</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>Federation through Applications</h3> | ||
| + | <p>We cover the [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] / [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] creative frontiers by showing examples. What might public informing be like, which could weave together insights from relevant fields of knowledge, and orient us in the complex world? How can we make a technical scientific result, when it bears widely applicable or even transformative messages, accessible to non-academic audiences? In what way may education need to be different, to enable – instead of inhibiting – the transition into our next evolutionary phase? How can we change real-life institutions? In what way might our understanding of "democracy" need to change? Those and various other questions about the emerging [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] are answered by showing concrete practical applications – already embedded in practice.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Those applications are technically called [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]]. In this approach to knowledge, [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] serve as (1) models (because they embody systemic solutions which can then be adapted to other situations), (2) interventions (because they are embedded in practice, and acting on practice with the aim to transform it) and (3) experiments (because they show us what works well, and what may need to be improved or changed). </p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>Federation through Conversations</h3> | ||
| + | <p>The goal here is to put the new approach to knowledge into actual use – and thereby complete the [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]]. </p> | ||
| + | <p>The word "conversations" might be misleading. The conversations we have in mind are orchestrated, media-enabled ways to reconfigure the actual 'headlights', or our "public sphere", by (1) fertilizing it with core ideas of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]]; (2) invigorating it by engaging everyone's collective intelligence; (3) bringing in a whole new culture of communication, which we point to by the keyword [[dialogs|<em>dialog</em>]]; (4) focusing it on core, transformative themes; (5) using a whole orchestra of new media technology – and letting the technology make a difference.</p> | ||
| + | <p>So imagine you had a flexible searchlight which you could point at any issue or theme. Suppose that your task is to show its value, what it can do and what difference it may make, by pointing it to some chosen handful of themes. Which themes would you choose?</p> | ||
| + | <p>In Federation through Conversations we introduce and offer three such [[dialogs|<em>dialogs</em>]]. </p> | ||
| + | <p>The first one is focusing on <em>the</em> key question – how to handle the contemporary issues; how to change the evolutionary course that our evolution has taken. The title of the conversation is The Paradigm Strategy. which should suggest that we are proposing that there's a natural and perhaps also easy solution – to shift the whole general paradigm. The reason is that the paradigm is ready to be shifted. But to make its point, this conversation zooms in on the way our society has been evolving since the beginning of the civilization. [[giants|<em>Giants</em>]] from sociology, cognitive science, anthropology, history... are called to the witness stand. Their insights are combined to produce a basic guiding insight – why this direction has always been far from perfect; and why it now just <em>has to</em> be changed.</p> | ||
| + | <p>A subtler insight that this conversation may bring to our [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] quest is that what once used to be considered as "the reality picture" and the measure of what's to be considered as true – now becomes perceived as an instrument of our problematic socialization.</p> | ||
| + | <p>While this first conversation is intended to be for informed global change makers, its themes and contents are perhaps well beyond the interest of a general audience. The second conversation we offer is meant to remedy this, by focusing on a theme that so many people are passionate about – religion.</p> | ||
| + | <p>The multimedia document to prime this conversation is the multimedia book in the making titled "Liberation" and subtitled "Religion for the Third Millennium". This is intended to be the very first book in the Knowledge Federation Trilogy.</p> | ||
| + | <p>It is now common to consider "religion" as believing in something without any rational evidence; "religion" is conceived as a worldview. But what if there's a whole other way – which involves a <em>liberation</em> from dogmas and worldviews of any kind?</p> | ||
| + | <p>Science, it is believed, liberated us from an age-old religious worldview, and empowered us to pursue happiness here, in our earthly existence. But what in the process we have understood <em>both</em> religion <em>and</em> happiness? What if both can be conceived in a way that reconciles them – so that they may bring us into a whole new phase of our evolution.</p> | ||
| + | <p>As always, these general ideas are presented through [[vignettes|<em>vignettes</em>]]. The lead [[giants|<em>giant</em>]] here is Thailand's enlightened monk Buddhadasa, who discovered that the essence of the Buddha's teaching was not what's been believed; that all religions have the same essence, which is a kind of a natural law; and that all of them suffered similar institutional deformations (which brings in through the back door our core issue, of the nature of our societal evolution, which the first conversation is about.</p> | ||
| + | <p>And finally the third conversation will be about our proposal – to add self-reflection and self-organization to the repertoire of honored and supported academic activities. Or in other words, about [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a concrete way of doing that. </p> | ||
| + | <p>The conversing about [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] is hereby offered as a practical way to begin academic self-reflection and initiate academic self-organization.</p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | |||
| + | |||
| + | --- OLDER --- | ||
| + | |||
| + | |||
| + | |||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Introducing our initiative</h2></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>A historical parallel</h3> | ||
| + | <p>To understand the vision that motivates our initiative, think about the world at the twilight of the Middle Ages and the dawn of the Renaissance. Recall the devastating religious wars, terrifying epidemics... Bring to mind the iconic image of the scholastics discussing "how many angels can dance on a needle point". And another iconic image, of Galilei in house arrest a century after Copernicus, whispering "and yet it moves" into his beard.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Observe that the problems of the epoch were not resolved by focusing on those problems, but by a slow and steady development of an entirely new approach to knowledge. Several centuries of accelerated and sweeping evolution followed. Could a similar advent be in store for us today?</p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Galilei.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Galileo Galilei]]</center></small> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Our discovery</h3> | ||
| + | <p>"If I have seen further," Sir Isaac Newton famously declared, "it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." The point of departure of our initiative was a discovery. We did not discover that the best ideas of our best minds were drowning in an ocean of glut. [[Vannevar Bush]], a [[giants|<em>giant</em>]], diagnosed that nearly three quarters of a century ago. He urged the scientists to focus on that disturbing trend and find a remedy. But needless to say, this too drowned in glut.</p> | ||
| + | <p>What we <em>did</em> find out, when we began to develop and apply [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a remedial <em>praxis</em>, was that now just as in Newton's time, the insights of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] add up to a novel approach to knowledge. And that just as the case was then, the new approach to knowledge leads to new ways in which core issues are understood and handled.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Newton.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Isaac Newton]]</center></small> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Our strategy</h3> | ||
| + | <p>“You never change things by fighting the existing reality", observed Buckminster Fuller. "To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” So we built [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a model (or technically a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]]) of a new way to work with knowledge (or a [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]); and of a new institution (the [[transdiscipline|<em>transdiscipline</em>]]) that is capable of developing this new new approach to knowledge in academic and real-life practice.</p> | ||
| + | <p>By sharing this model we do not aim at conclusive answers. Our aim is indeed much higher – it is <em>to open up a creative frontier</em> where the ways in which knowledge is created and used, and more generally the ways in which our creative efforts are directed, are brought into focus and <em>continuously</em> recreated and improved.</p> </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Fuller.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[R. Buckminster Fuller]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | |||
| + | ----- | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Introducing knowledge federation</h2></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Connecting the dots</h3> | ||
| + | <p>As our logo might suggest, [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] means 'connecting the dots' – combining disparate pieces of information and other knowledge resources into higher-order units of meaning. We adopted this [[keywords|<em>keyword</em>]] from political and institutional federation, where smaller entities are united to achieve higher visibility and impact – while preserving some degree of their identity and autonomy.</p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Big picture science</h3> | ||
| + | <p>If the word "paradigm" does not mean much to you, think of [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as big picture science. </p> | ||
| + | <blockquote>"There is only one quality more important than "know how". This is "know what" by which we determine not only how to accomplish our purposes but what our purposes are to be." </blockquote> | ||
| + | <p>This Norbert Wiener's observation is the key to understanding what difference this may make practically. Science has given us a tremendously powerful "know how". We now need a similarly powerful "know what" to know how to use it beneficially and safely. We need the big picture science, the "know what", to be able to understand what specific results mean – and why they are relevant to us. The "know what" knowledge is needed to give disciplinary academic results the real-world impact they need to have.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Contemporary media informing does not give us the big picture either. Furthermore, a journalist alone cannot possibly synthesize the knowledge we own into a big picture.</p> | ||
| + | <p>With the information we have, we are like the people lost in a forest, who can see the trees and can navigate through them. But who cannot see the whole forest and the world beyond it, and choose which way to go. We choose our way in the only way that's still possibl3e – by finding a trail with a crowd of people and just following them. But also large crowds of people can be lost!</p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Wiener.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Norbert Wiener]]</center></small> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Our vision</h3> | ||
| + | <p>We are not proposing to replace science and journalism, but to complement them. And also to link them together, and with other creative fields, such as the arts and the technological innovation.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We are proposing that it is mandatory to put in place a new socio-technical infrastructure, with its own division and organization of creative work, just as science and journalism now have. We need the <em>praxis</em> (informed practice) of producing big-picture information, guiding principles, rules of thumb – to inform the most basic issues in our personal and social existence. What issues may benefit from such information? What might this information need to be like? In what way or ways may they be created? We need a new <em>academic praxis</em> to answer those questions. Part of our purpose is to provide sufficiently rich and solid answers to consolidate a proof of concept. To show that this can and needs to be done. And to initiate the doing.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>A natural approach to knowledge</h3> | ||
| + | <p>What we have undertaken to put in place is what one might call the <em>natural</em> approach to knowledge. Think on the one side of all the knowledge we own, in academic articles and also broader. Include the heritage of the world traditions. Include the insights reached by creative people daily. Think on the other side of all the questions we <em>need</em> to have answered. Think of all the insights that could inform our lives, the rules of thumb that could direct our action. Imagine them occupying distinct levels of generality. The more general an insight is, the more useful it can be. You may now understand [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as whatever we the people may need to do to maintain, organize, update and keep up to date the various elements of this hierarchy.</p> | ||
| + | <p> Put simply, [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] is the creation and use of knowledge as we may need it – to be able to understand the increasingly complex world around us; to be able to live and act in it in an informed, sustainable or simply <em>better</em> way.</p> | ||
| + | <p>You may think of [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a way to liberate science from disciplinary constraints, combine it with what we've learn about knowledge and knowledge work from journalism, art and communication design, and apply the result to illuminate any question or issue where prejudices and illusions still need to be dispelled. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Our vision is of an <em>informed</em> post-traditional or post-industrial society – where our understanding and handling of the core issues of our lives and times reflect the best available knowledge; where knowledge is created and integrated and applied with that goal in mind; and where information technology is developed and used accordingly. </p> | ||
| + | <h3>And yet it's a paradigm</h3> | ||
| + | <p>"But you cannot just create a new academic field out of nothing", we imagine might be your complaint. "Our ideas of what constitutes good knowledge have been evolving since antiquity – and now find their foremost expression in science and philosophy." Part of our purpose will be to show that the state of the art in science and philosophy not only enables, but indeed <em>requires</em> that we – that is, those of us who are academic professionals or otherwise professionally in charge of giving good knowledge to people – develop an entirely new set of fundamental principles and practices that will orient our handling of knowledge, and our innovation and other creative work in general.</p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | ----- | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2 style="color:red">Intermission</h2></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Different thinking</h3> | ||
| + | <p><blockquote> | ||
| + | We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them. | ||
| + | </blockquote> | ||
| + | We would not be echoing Einstein's familiar adage, if it did not point to the very first step with which our journey together needs to begin.</p> | ||
| + | <p> In what ways may our thinking need be different, if we should be able to understand and develop a [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]? </p> | ||
| + | <h3>Slow thinking</h3> | ||
| + | <p>First of all, we'll need to give it the time it requires.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Slow thinking is to "same thinking" as slow food is to fast food – it does take a bit more time; but it also gives far better nourishment and digestion. A paradigm being a harmonious yet complex web of relationships, some amount of mental processing is obviously unavoidable.</p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Einstein.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Albert Einstein]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <h3>Systemic thinking</h3> | ||
| + | <p>The second characteristic of the new thinking is that it's <em>systemic</em>. We now invite you to pause and reflect about what exactly this may mean; and what practical differences it may make. To help you, we have prepared a very brief [[intuitive introduction to systemic thinking]]. It will point to some down-to-earth social realities for you to look at in this new way – and already anticipate what all this may mean <em>concretely</em>.</p> </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | ----- | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Knowledge federation introduces itself</h2></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Knowledge federation as a language</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Science taught us to think in terms of velocities and masses and experiments and natural causes. Knowledge federation too is a way to think and speak.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We'll now let [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] introduce itself in its own manner of speaking. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Before we do that, this brief historical note will help you see why that manner of speaking is just a straight-forward adaptation of conventional science.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Science as a language</h3> | ||
| + | <p>The rediscovery of Aristotle (whose works had been preserved by the Arabs) was a milestone in medieval history. But the scholastics used his rational method to only argue the truths of the Scriptures. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Aristotle's natural philosophy was common-sense: Objects tend to fall down; the heavier objects tend to fall faster than the lighter ones. Galilei saw a flaw in this theory and proved it wrong <em>experimentally</em>, by throwing stones from the Leaning Tower of Pisa.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Galilei – undoubtedly one of Newton's "giants" – also brought mathematics into this affaire: <em>v = gt</em>. The constant <em>g</em> can be measured by an experiment. We can then use the formula to predict <em>precisely</em> what speed <em>v</em> an object will have after <em>t</em> seconds of falling.</p> | ||
| + | <p>This approach to knowledge proved to be so superior to what existed, and so fertile, that it naturally became the standard of excellence that <em>all</em> knowledge was expected to emulate. </p> | ||
| + | <h3>A curious-looking mathematical formula</h3> | ||
| + | <p>But why use only maths?</p> | ||
| + | <p> [[File:Modernity.jpg]] <br><small><center>Modernity ideogram</center></small></p> | ||
| + | <p></p> | ||
| + | <p>[[ideograms|<em>Ideograms</em>]] can be understood as a straight-forward generalization of the language of mathematics. Think of the above example as a curious-looking mathematical formula. Just as Galilei's formula did, this [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] describes a relationship (called [[patterns|<em>pattern</em>]]) between two things, represented by the bus and its headlights. But while mathematical formulas can express only quantitative relationships, an [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] can represent virtually <em>any</em> relationship, even an emotional one. </p> | ||
| + | <p>An ideogram can also express the nature of a situation (for which we use the keyword [[gestalt|<em>gestalt</em>]])! Imagine us riding in a bus with candle headlights, through dark and unfamiliar terrain and at an accelerating speed. By depicting modernity as a bus with candle headlights, the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] points to an incongruity and a paradox. In our hither-to modernization we have forgotten to modernize something quite essential – and ended up in peril.</p> | ||
| + | <p>But there's a natural remedy!</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Unraveling the paradox</h3> | ||
| + | <p>What this [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] expresses is an abstract relationship between two things – the bus and its headlights. This abstract relationship can now be made concrete, and also useful, by assigning a concrete meaning to those two things – just as we do in physics, when we say that <em>v</em> is the velocity of a falling object and <em>t</em> is the elapsed time.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We shall now take advantage of the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] to assign meaning to four new concepts. They will help us explain, in precise terms, how exactly the disquieting situation our image is pointing to can be transformed. If the possibilities we'll be pointing to might seem at first incredible or even preposterous, please be aware that for the moment we are still only explaining an abstract theory. Its relevance and accuracy will need to be confirmed by resorting to experience – which is what we'll be doing in the remainder of this website.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Design epistemology</h3> | ||
| + | <p>When we say [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] we mean the assumptions and values that determine what knowledge we'll consider worth creating and relying on. </p> | ||
| + | <p>To see that the [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] is at the core of every [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]], and of the general paradigm we call science in particular, notice that Galilei was not tried for claiming that the Earth was moving. That was just a technical detail. It was his [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] that got him into trouble – his belief that one may hold and defend an opinion as probable after it has been declared contrary to Holy Scripture. Galilei was required to "abjure, curse and detest" those opinions (Wikipedia).</p> | ||
| + | <p>Can you imagine what the next change on that scale might be like? If we "stand on the shoulders of giants" today – what new [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] may we be able to foresee? </p> | ||
| + | <p> If you consider the light of the headlights to be information or knowledge, and the headlights to represent the activities by which knowledge is created and applied, then you'll easily understand the answer we are proposing. The [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]] means considering knowledge and knowledge work as man-made things; and as essential building blocks in a much larger thing, or things, or systems. This new [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] empowers us to develop knowledge and knowledge work and to apply them and to assess their value based on how well they serve their core roles within larger systems – such as 'showing the way'.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Notice how thoroughly this [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] reconfigures the value matrix that orients our knowledge work work today. When knowledge is conceived as just pieces in a reality puzzle, then every piece might seem equally relevant, and the media can select whatever its audience may be interested in. But when knowledge is conceived as the light showing us the next curve on the road, then the priorities are entirely different. Relevance, and the nature and the quality of information that provides the right insight and guidance, become core issues.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Furthermore those also become core <em>research</em> issues. The research that is most valued today and considered academically fundamental or "basic" is the one whose aim is to <em>discover</em> the details of the 'puzzle' of nature. In the order of things pointed to by the [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]], it is the research whose goal is to <em>construct</em> the core elements of an entirely different puzzle – of the socio-technical system or systems by which knowledge is created and disseminated – that becomes fundamental or basic. And if a physical product of conventional research is an academic <em>article</em> in a reputed academic publication, in this new order of things the creative frontier becomes much broader – and includes any creative act that may bring the process of dissolving the core anomaly a step further.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Knowledge federation</h3> | ||
| + | <p>You may now understand [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as simply a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] 'headlights'. And as knowledge and knowledge work that follow by consistent application of the [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]].</p> | ||
| + | <p>The Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] also bears some subtler messages. What we are lacking above all are the 'high beams' – which may show us a long-enough stretch of the road on which we are driving. You may now see the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] as the first example. provides one. This image both provides the view of a situation as a whole, and points to what needs to be done.</p> | ||
| + | <p>There's also this other subtlety: No sequence of improvements of the candle will produce the lightbulb. The resolution of our quest is in the exact sense of the word a [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] – a fundamentally and thoroughly <em>new</em> way to conceive of knowledge and to organize its handling. To create the lightbulb, we need to know that this is possible. And we also need a model to guide us. You may now understand what's being told here as a description of that model. It's what we need so that we may waste no time trying to improve 'the candle' – when it's really the 'the lightbulb' we should be talking about and creating.</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>Systemic innovation</h3> | ||
| + | <p>If you consider the movement of the bus to be the result of our creative efforts or of "innovation", then [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] is what resolves the paradox that the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] is pointing to. You may understand [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] as <em>informed</em> innovation, as the way we'll innovate when a strong-enough light's been turned on and we see the whole terrain; and where the road we've taken is leading to, and those other roads too. </p> | ||
| + | <p>We practice [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] when our primary goal is to make <em>the whole thing</em> functional or vital or [[wholeness|<em>whole</em>]]. Here "the whole thing" may of course be a whole hierarchy of things, in which what we are doing or creating has a role. </p> | ||
| + | <p>There are two complementary ways to say what [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] is. One is to (focus on the bus and) say that [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] is innovation on the scale of the large and basic socio-technical systems, such as education, public informing, and knowledge work at large. The other one is to (focus on the headlights and) say that [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] is innovation whose primary aim and responsibility is the good condition or functioning or [[wholeness|<em>wholeness</em>]] of the system or systems in which what we are creating has a role. But of course those two definitions are just two ways of saying the same thing. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Here too there's a subtle message. You'll easily understand the reason, why a dramatic improvement in the way we use our capacity to create or innovate is possible, if you just compare the principle the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] is pointing at with the way innovation is directed today. The dollar value of the headlights is course a factor to be considered; but it's insignificant compared to the value of the whole bus (which in reality may be our civilization and all of us in it; or all our technology taken together; or the results of our daily work, which move the 'bus' forward; or whatever else may be organizing our efforts and driving us toward a future). It is this difference in value – between the dollar value of the headlights and the real value of this incomparably larger entity and of all of us in it – that you may bear in mind as [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]]'s <em>value proposition</em>. The dramatic message of our image is that [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] is what can make the difference between "the whole thing" turning into a mass suicide machine – and a well-functioning vehicle, capable of taking us anywhere we may reasonably want to be.</p> | ||
| + | <p>To see that the change this is pointing to reaches well beyond industrial innovation, to see why we indeed propose [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] as the signature theme of an impending Renaissance-like change, notice that the dollar value is just one of our characteristic oversimplifications, which has enabled us to reduce a complex issue (value) in a complex reality to a single parameter – and then apply rational or 'scientific' thinking to optimize our behavior accordingly.</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <h3>Guided evolution of society</h3> | ||
| + | <p>If you'll consider the movement of the bus to be our society's travel into the future, or in a word its <em>evolution</em>, then [[guided evolution of society|<em>guided evolution of society</em>]] is what resolves the paradox. Our ride into the future, posits the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]], must be illuminated by suitable information. We must both create and <em>use</em> information accordingly.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We took this [[keywords|<em>keyword</em>]] from Bela H. Banathy, who considered the guided evolution of society to be the second great revolution in our civilization's history – the first one being the agricultural revolution. While in this first revolution we learned to cultivate our bio-physical environment, in the next one we'll learn to cultivate our socio-cultural environment. Here is how Banathy formulated this vision: | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | 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 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. | ||
| + | </blockquote> </p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | ----- | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Summary and highlights</h2></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"><h3>How to read the rest of this website</h3> | ||
| + | <p>The first and most important thing you need to know is that what's being presented here is not only or even primarily an idea or a proposal or an academic result. We intend this to be an <em>intervention</em> into our academic and social reality. And more specifically an invitation to a conversation. </p> | ||
| + | <p>And when we say "conversation", we don't mean "just talking". The conversations we want to initiate are intended to <em>build</em> communication in a certain new way, both regarding the media and the manner of communicating, <em>and</em> regarding the themes. We use the [[dialogs|<em>dialog</em>]] – which is a manner of speaking that sidesteps all coercion into a worldview and replaces it by genuine listening, collaboration and co-creation. By conversing in this way we also bring due attention to completely new themes. We evolve a public sphere, or a [[collective mind|<em>collective mind</em>]], capable of thinking new thoughts, and of developing public awareness about those themes. Here in the truest sense the medium is the message.</p> | ||
| + | <p>The details being presented are intended to ignite and prime and energize those [[dialogs|<em>dialogs</em>]]. And at the same time <em>evolve</em> through those [[dialogs|<em>dialogs</em>]]. In this way we want to prime our collective intelligence with some of the ideas of last century's [[giants|<em>giants</em>]], and then engage it to create insights about the themes that matter. </p> | ||
| + | <p>There are at least four ways in which the four detailed modules of this website can be read. </p> | ||
| + | <p>One way is to see it as a technical description or a blueprint of a new approach to knowledge (or metaphorically a lightbulb). Then you might consider | ||
| + | <ul> | ||
| + | <li> Federation through Images as a description of the underlying principle of operation (how electricity can create light that reaches further than the light of fire)</li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Stories as a description of the suitable technology (we have the energy source and the the wiring and all the rest we need)</li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Application as a description of the design, and of examples of application (here's how the lightbulb may be put together, and look – it works!)</li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Conversations as a business plan (here's what we can do with it to satisfy the "market needs"; and here's how we can put this on the market, and have it be used in reality</li> | ||
| + | </ul></p> | ||
| + | <p>Another way is to consider four detailed modules as an Enlightenment or next Renaissance scenario. In that case you may read | ||
| + | <ul> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Images as describing a development analogous to the advent of science</li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Stories as describing a development analogous to the printing press (which provided the very illumination by enabling the spreading of knowledge)</li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Applications as describing the next Industrial and technological Revolution, a new frontier for innovation and discovery</li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Conversations as describing the equivalent of the Humanism and the Renaissance (new values, interests, lifestyle...)</li> | ||
| + | </ul></p> | ||
| + | <p>The third way to read is to see this whole thing as a carefully argued <em>case</em> for a new [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] in knowledge work. Here the focus is on (1) reported anomalies that exist in the old [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] and how they may be resolved in the new proposed one and (2) a new creative frontier, that every new [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] is expected to open up. Then you may consider | ||
| + | <ul> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Images as a description of the fundamental anomalies and of their resolution</li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Stories as a description of the anomalies in the use and development of information technology, and more generally of knowledge at large</li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Applications as a description or better said of a map of the emerging creative frontier, showing – in terms of real-life [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]] what can be done and how</li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Conversations as a description of societal anomalies that result from an anomalous use of knowledge – and how they may be remedied</li> | ||
| + | </ul></p> | ||
| + | <p>And finally, you may consider this an application or a showcase of [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] itself. Naturally, we'll apply and demonstrate some of the core technical ideas to plead our case. You may then read | ||
| + | <ul> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Images as a description and application of [[ideograms|<em>ideograms</em>]] – which we've applied to render fundamental-philosophical ideas of giants accessible, and in effect create a cartoon-like introduction to a novel approach to knowledge</li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Stories brings forth [[vignettes|<em>vignettes</em>]] – which are the kind of interesting, short real-life stories one might tell to a party of friends over a glass of wine, and which enable one to "step into the shoes of a giant" or "see through his eyeglasses" </li> | ||
| + | <li>ALT...We use [[vignettes|<em>vignettes</em>]] – short, lively, catchy, sticky... real-life people and situation stories – to explain and empower some of the core ideas of daring thinkers. A vignette liberates an insight from the language of a discipline and enables a non-expert to 'step into the shoes' of a leading thinker, 'look through his eye glasses'. By combining [[vignettes|<em>vignettes</em>]] into [[threads|<em>threads</em>]], and threads into higher units of meaning, we take this process of [[knowledge federation|<em>federation</em>]] all the way to the kind of direction-setting principles we've just been talking about. </li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Applications as a portfolio of [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]] – a characteristic kind of results that suit the new approach to knowledge – which in [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] serve as (1) models (showing how for ex. education or journalism may be different, who may create them and how), (2) interventions ([[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]] are embedded in reality and acting upon real-life practices aiming to change them) and (3) experiments (showing us what works and what doesn't).<li> | ||
| + | <li>Federation through Applications as a small portfolio of [[dialogs|<em>dialogs</em>]] – by which the new approach to knowledge is put to use</li> | ||
| + | </ul></p> | ||
| + | <h3>Highlights</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Instead of providing you an "executive summary", which would probably be too abstract for most people to follow, we now provide a few anecdotes and highlights, which – we feel – will serve better for mobilizing and directing your attention, while already extracting and sharing the very essence of this presentation. As always, we'll use the ideas of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] as 'bread crumbs' to mark the milestones in our story or argument.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Social construction of truth and meaning</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Sixty years ago, in "Physics and Philosophy", [[Werner Heisenberg]] explained how | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | the nineteenth century developed an | ||
| + | extremely rigid frame for natural science which formed not | ||
| + | only science but also the general outlook of great masses of | ||
| + | people. | ||
| + | </blockquote> | ||
| + | He then pointed out how this frame of concepts was too narrow and too rigid for expressing some of the core elements of human culture – which as a result appeared to modern people as irrelevant. And how correspondingly limited and utilitarian values and worldviews became prominent. Heisenberg then explained how modern physics disproved this "narrow frame"; and concluded that | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | one may say that the most important change brought about by its results consists in the dissolution of this rigid frame of | ||
| + | concepts of the nineteenth century. | ||
| + | </blockquote></p> | ||
| + | <p>If we now (in the spirit of [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]], and the emerging [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]) consider that the social role of the university (as institution) is to provide good knowledge and viable standards for good knowledge – then we see that just this Heisenberg's insight alone gives us an <em>obligation</em> – which we've failed to respond to for sixty years.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Heisenberg.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Werner Heisenberg]]<br>the icon of [[design epistemology]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>The substance of Federation through Images is to show how <em>the fundamental insights reached in 20th century science and philosophy allow us to develop a way out of "the rigid frame" </em> – which is a rigorously founded methodology for creating truth and meaning about any issue and at any level of generality, which we are calling [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]]. You may understand [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] as an adaptation of "the scientific method" that makes it suitable for providing the kind of insights that our people and society need, or in other words for [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]]. In essence, [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] is just a generalization of the scientific approach to knowledge, based on recent scientific / philosophical insights – as we've already pointed out by talking about [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]], which is of course the epistemological foundation for [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]]. </p> | ||
| + | <h3>Information technology</h3> | ||
| + | <p>You may have also felt, when we introduced [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as 'the light bulb' that uses the new technology to illuminate the way, that we were doing gross injustice to IT innovation: Aren't we living in the Age of Information? Isn't our information technology (or in other words our civilization's 'headlights') indeed <em>the most modern</em> part of our civilization, the one where the largest progress has been made, the one that best characterizes our progress? In [[STORIES|Federation through Stories]] we explain why this is not the case, why the candle headlights analogy works most beautifully in this pivotal domain as well – by telling the story of Douglas Engelbart, the man who conceived, developed, prototyped <em>and demonstrated</em> – in 1968 – the core elements of the new media technology, which is in common use. This story works on many levels, and gives us a <em>textbook</em> example to work with when trying to understand the emerging [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] and the paradoxical dynamics around it (notice that we are this year celebrating the 50th anniversary of Engelbart's demo...).</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"> | ||
| + | <p> | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | Digital technology could help make this a better world. But we've also got to change our way of thinking. | ||
| + | </blockquote> | ||
| + | These two sentences were (intended to be) the first slide of Engelbart's presentation of his vision for the future of (information-) technological innovation in 2007 at Google. We shall see that this 'new thinking' was precisely what we've been calling [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]]. Engelbart's insight is so central to the overall case we are presenting, that we won't resist the urge to give you the gist of it right away.</p> | ||
| + | <p>The printing press analogy works, because the printing press was to a large degree the technical invention that led to the Enlightenment, by making knowledge so much more widely accessible. The question is what invention may play a similar role in the emerging <em>next</em> phase of our society's illumination? The answer is of course the "network-interconnected interactive digital media" – but there's a catch! Even the printing press (let it symbolize here the Industrial Age and the paradigm we want to evolve beyond) merely made what the scribes were doing more efficient. To communicate, people still needed to write and publish books, and hope that the people who needed what's written in them would find them on a book shelf. But the network-interconnected interactive digital media is a disruption of a completely <em>new</em> kind – it's not a broadcasting device but a "nervous system" (this metaphor is Engelbart's own); it interconnects us people in such a way that we can think together and coordinate our action, just as the cells in a sufficiently complex organism do!</p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Doug.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Douglas Engelbart]]<br>the icon of [[knowledge federation]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>To see that this is not what has happened, think about the "desktop" and the "mailbox" in your computer: The new technology has been used to implement the physical environment we've had around us – including the ways of doing things that evolved based on it. Consider the fact that in academic research we are still communicating by publishing books and articles. Haven't we indeed used the new technology to re-create 'fancy candles'. </p> | ||
| + | <p>To see the difference that makes a difference, imagine that your cells were using your own nervous systems to merely <em>broadcast</em> data! Think about your state of mind that would result. Then think about how this reflects upon our society's state of mind, our "collective intelligence"...</p> | ||
| + | <p> When we apply the Industrial Age efficiency thinking and values, and use the Web to merely broadcast knowledge, augment the volume, reduce the price – then the result is of course information glut. "We are drowning in information", Neil Postman observed! A completely new phase in our (social-systemic evolution) – new division, specialization and organization of the work with information, and beyond – is what's called for, and what's ahead of us.</p> | ||
| + | <p>There are in addition several points that spice up the Engelbart's history, which are the reasons why we gave it the name (in the Federation through Stories) "the incredible story of Doug): | ||
| + | <ul> | ||
| + | <li>Engelbart saw this whole new possibility, to give our society in peril a whole new 'nervous system', already in 1951 – when there were only a handful of computers in the world, which were used solely for numerical scientific calculations (he immediately decided to dedicate his career to this cause</li> | ||
| + | <li>Engelbart was unable to communicate his vision to the Silicon Valley – even after having been recognized as The Valley's "giant in residence" (think about Galilei in house arrest...)</li> | ||
| + | </ul> </p> | ||
| + | <p>So the simple conclusion we may draw from this story is that to draw <em>real</em> benefits from information technology, [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] must replace the conventional reliance on the market. And conversely – that the contemporary information technology is an <em>enabler</em> of large-scale systemic change, because it's been <em>conceived</em> to serve that role.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Innovation and the future of the university</h3> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><p> | ||
| + | Fifty years ago Erich Jantsch made a proposal for the university of the future, and made an appeal that the university take the new leadership role which, as he saw it, was due. | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | [T]he university should make structural changes within itself toward a new purpose of enhancing the society’s capacity for continuous self-renewal. | ||
| + | </blockquote> | ||
| + | </p> | ||
| + | <p>Suppose the university did that. Suppose that we opened up the university to take such a leadership role. What new ways of working, results, effects... could be achieved? What might this new creative frontier look like, what might it consist of, how may it be organized?</p> | ||
| + | <p>The technique demonstrated here is the [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]] – which are the characteristic products of [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]]. Here's a related question to consider: If we should aim at <em>systemic</em> impact, if our key goal is to re-create systems including our own – then the traditional academic articles and book cannot be our only or even our main product. But what else <em>should</em> we do? And how?</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Jantsch.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Erik Jantsch]]<br>the icon of [[systemic innovation]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>The [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]] here serve as | ||
| + | <ul> | ||
| + | <li>models, embodying and exhibiting systemic solutions, how the things may be put together, which may then be adapted to other situations and improved further</li> | ||
| + | <li>interventions, because they are (by definition) embedded within real-life situations and practices, aiming to change them</li> | ||
| + | <li>experiments, showing what works and what doesn't, and what still needs to be changed or improved</li></ul></p> | ||
| + | <p>In Federation through Images we exhibit about 40 [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]], which together compose the single central one – of the creative frontier which we are pointing to by our four mentioned main keywords. We have developed it in the manner of prospectors who have found gold and are preparing an area for large-scale mining – by building a school and a hospital and a hotel and... What exactly is to be built and how – those are the questions that those [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]] are there to answer.</p></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><p> | ||
| + | In 1968 The Club of Rome was initiated, as a global think tank to study the future prospects of humanity, give recommendations and incite action. Based on the first decade of The Club's work, Aurelio Peccei – its founding president and motor power – gave this diagnosis: | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | The future will either be an inspired product of a great cultural revival, or there will be no future. | ||
| + | </blockquote></p> | ||
| + | <p>If there was any truth in Peccei's conclusion, then the challenge that history has given our generation is at the same time a historical opportunity.</p> | ||
| + | <p>The last time "a great cultural revival" happened, the "Renaissance" as we now call it, our ancestors liberated themselves from a worldview that kept them captive – where the only true happiness was to be found in the afterlife. Provided of course that one lived by the God's command, and by the command of the kings and the bishops as His earthly representatives. Is it indeed possible – and what would it take – to see our own time's prejudices and power issues in a similar way as we now see the ones that the Enlightenment liberated us from? What new worldview might help us achieve that? What new way of evolving our culture and organizing our society might we find to replace them? These, in a nutshell, are the questions taken up in Federation through Conversations.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Peccei.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Aurelio Peccei]]<br>the icon of [[guided evolution of society]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Symbolic power and re-evolutionary politics</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Another way to approach this part of our presentation is to say "Now that we've created those 'headlights' – can we use them to illuminate 'the way'? Can we see where we are headed, and find a better road to follow?" Which of course means that we must explore the way we've been evolving, as culture and as society; because that's 'the way', isn't it?</p> | ||
| + | <p>If this challenge may seem daunting, the [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] again come to our rescue. Pierre Bourdieu, for one, who saw French imperialism show its true face in the war in Algeria in the late 1950s. And who, as Algeria was gaining independence, saw the old power relationship mutate and take a completely new form – so that the power was no longer in weaponry and in the instruments of torture, but in economy and the instruments of culture. This insight made Bourdieu a sociologist; he understood that the society, and the power, evolve and function in a completely different way than what we've been told.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Bourdieu.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Pierre Bourdieu]]<br>the icon of [[symbolic power]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>We federate Bourdieu. We connect his insights with the insights of Antonio Damasio, the cognitive neuroscientist who discovered that we were not the rational choosers we believed we were. Damasio will help us understand why Bourdieu was so right when he talked about our worldview as <em>doxa</em>; and about the <em>symbolic power</em> which can only be exercised without <em>anyone's</em> awareness of its existence. We also [[knowledge federation|<em>federate</em>]] Bourdieu's insights with... No, let's leave those details to Federation through Conversations, and to our very conversations.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Let's conclude here by just highlighting the point this brings us to in the case we are presenting: When this [[knowledge federation|<em>federation</em>]] work has been completed, we'll not end up with another worldview that will liberate us from the old power relationships and empower us to pursue happiness well beyond what we've hitherto been able to achieve. We shall liberate ourselves from socialization into any fix worldview altogether! We'll have understood, indeed, how the worldview creation and our socialization into a fixed worldview has been <em>the</em> key instrument of the sort of power we now must liberate ourselves from.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In this way the circle has been closed – and we are back where we started, at [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] as issue. We are looking at the way in which truth and meaning are socially created – which is of course what this presentation is about.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Far from being "just talking", the conversations we want to initiate <em>build</em> communication in a certain new way, both regarding the media used and the manner of communicating. We use the [[dialogs|<em>dialog</em>]] – which is a manner of speaking that sidesteps all coercion into a worldview and replaces it by genuine listening, collaboration and co-creation. By conversing in this way we also bring the public attention to completely new themes. We evolve a public sphere capable of developing public awareness about those themes. Here in the truest sense the medium is the message. </p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>Religion and pursuit of happiness</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Modernity liberated us from a religious worldview, by which happiness is to be found in the afterlife (provided we do as the bishops and the kings direct us in this life). We became free to pursue happiness here and now, in this life. But what if in the process we've misunderstood <em>both</em>religion <em>and</em>happiness?</p> | ||
| + | <p>It has turned out that the key [[memes|<em>meme</em>]] is already there; and that it only needs to be [[knowledge federation|<em>federated</em>]]. This [[memes|<em>meme</em>]] also comes with an interesting story, which lets itself be rendered as a [[vignettes|<em>vignette</em>]]. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Early in the 20th century a young monk in Thailand spent a couple of years in a monastery in Bangkok and thought "This just cannot be it!" So he decided to do as the Buddha did – he went alone into a forest and experimented. He also had the original Pali scriptures with him, to help him find the <em>original</em> way. And reportedly he did!</p> | ||
| + | <p>What Buddhadasa ("the slave of the Buddha", as this [[giants|<em>giant</em>]] of religion called himself) found out was that the essence of the Buddha's teaching was different, and in a way <em>opposite</em> from how Buddhism is usually understood and taught. And not only that – the practice he rediscovered is in its essential elements <em>opposite</em> from what's evolved as "the pursuit of happiness" in most of the modern world. Buddhadasa saw the Buddha's discovery, which he rediscovered, as a kind of a natural law, the discoveries of which have marked the inception of all major religions. Or more simply, what Buddhadasa discovered, and undertook to give to the world, was "the essence of religion". </p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Buddhadasa.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Buddhadasa]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>You may of course be tempted to disqualify the Buddha's or Buddhadasa's approach to happiness as a product of some rigidly held religious belief. But the epistemological essence of Buddhadasa's teaching is that it's not only purely <em>evidence-based</em> or experience-based – but also that the liberation from <em>any</em> sort of clinging, and to clinging to beliefs in particular, is <em>the</em> essential part of the practice.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In the Liberation book we federate Buddhadasa's teaching about religion by (1) moving it from the domain of religion as belief to the domain of the pursuit of happiness; (2) linking this with a variety of other sources, thus producing a kind of a roadmap to happiness puzzle, and then showing how this piece snuggly fits in and completes the puzzle; (3) showing how religions – once this [[memes|<em>meme</em>]] was discovered – tended to become instruments of negative socialization; and how we may now do better, and need to do better.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Knowledge federation dialog</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Finally, we need to talk about our [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]], about [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]]. While this conversation will complete the [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] (by creating a feedback loop with the help of which it will evolve further), the real theme and interest of this conversation is of course well beyond what our little model might suggest.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In the midst of all our various evolutionary mishaps and misdirections, there's at least this one thing that has been done right – the academic tenure. And the ethos of academic freedom it institutionalized. What we now have amounts to a global army, of people who've been selected and trained and publicly sponsored to think freely. If our core task is a fresh new evolutionary start – beyond "the survival of the fittest" and the power structures it has shackled us with – then it's hard to even imagine how this could be done without engaging in some suitable way this crucially important resource.</p> | ||
| + | <p>How are we using it?</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | |||
| + | |||
| + | <!-- CLIPPINGS | ||
| + | |||
| + | |||
| + | |||
| + | <p>What we offer here is a 'view from a mountain top', or a 'view in the light of a lightbulb' (created by federating knowledge) of the need and the possibility for a new paradigm in knowledge work or creative work. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Our point of departure are three disruptive changes that developed during the past century: | ||
| + | <ul> | ||
| + | <li>fundamental insights have been reached in the sciences, which challenged or disproved the assumptions based on which our knowledge-related values, and practices, have developed</li> | ||
| + | <li>new information technology enables, and as we shall see also <em>demands</em> that we reconsider and change the way we handle knowledge</li> | ||
| + | <li>our civilization has reached a condition, and also a level of development or maturity, where what we need as information is entirely different than what the case was just a generation or two ago</li> | ||
| + | </ul></p> | ||
| + | <p>It has indeed turned out that each of those changes have been so clear-cut and so spectacularly large in degree, that each of them alone provides more than a sufficient reason for engaging in the kind of changes that we are about to describe and propose. We highlight that by weaving together the stories and the insights of [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] that represent the main milestones in the mentioned disruptive changes. We see that what's really going on in our time, and what's really worth seeing and attending to, is not Donald Trump but a sweeping Enlightenment-like change. And we already get glimpses of iconic characters and stories that might represent it, as Galilei and Newton were the icons of the previous such change.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In each of the four modules in which our case is presented, we look at our case from a different angle. You may understand them with the help of our metaphorical image, the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]], as showing respectively that (1) we have, and need a different principle of operation – not fire but electricity; (2) we have the technology that is needed for creating the light bulb; (3) a plan of a lightbulb, together with the proof of concept – showing in what way the lightbulb can be created, and what practical differences it may make; (4) the larger picture, where by looking at our civilization's evolution 'in the light of the lightbulb', and the particular point in it where we now find ourselves, we see our own times and mores in a similar way as we may see the mindset of the Middle Ages – which of course makes the change immanent.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Here and also in those four modules, we use the technique that is common in journalism – which is to present a larger issue by telling a concrete story, which typically involves a [[giants|<em>giant</em>]] and one of his core insights. This will give some real-life touch and zest to our stories – but it will leave you the challenge of seeing the larger picture we are pointing at by talking about concrete people and things.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In each of the four modules we apply a different set of [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] techniques. In this way we also illustrate [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]].</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Federation through Images</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Our ideas of what constitutes "good" information have been evolving since antiquity, and they now find their foremost expression in science and philosophy. In [[IMAGES|Federation through Images]] we show that the developments in 20th century's science and philosophy empower the next disruptive change, along the lines we've just discussed.</p> | ||
| + | <p>You may interpret what's told there in the light of our Modernity image, and the challenge to create the (socio-technical) 'light bulb": Is there a whole new principle of operation, so that we may no longer use 'fire' but 'electricity', and be provide a light so strong that it can illuminate our way as far as our speed might now require?</p> | ||
| + | <p>We answer by 'standing on the shoulders of giants'; we show that surprisingly many of the 20th century's [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] in science and philosophy saw that the new insights challenged the very foundations based on which our knowledge-work practices developed, and the very criteria we commonly use to assign value to knowledge and to knowldge work. </p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"> | ||
| + | <p>And we'll represent them all here by a single one – [[Werner Heisenberg]]. Who sixty years ago, in "Physics and Philosophy", explained how | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | the nineteenth century developed an | ||
| + | extremely rigid frame for natural science which formed not | ||
| + | only science but also the general outlook of great masses of | ||
| + | people. | ||
| + | </blockquote> | ||
| + | He then pointed out how this frame of concepts was too narrow and too rigid for expressing some of the core elements of human culture – which as a result appeared to modern people as irrelevant. And how correspondingly limited and utilitarian values and worldviews became prominent. Heisenberg then explained how modern physics disproved this "narrow frame"; and concluded that | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | one may say that the most important change brought about by its results consists in the dissolution of this rigid frame of | ||
| + | concepts of the nineteenth century. | ||
| + | </blockquote></p> | ||
| + | <p>If we now (in the spirit of [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]], and the emerging [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]) consider that our social role is to provide good knowledge and viable standards for good knowledge – then we see that just this Heisenberg's insight alone gives us an <em>obligation</em> – which we've failed to respond to for sixty years.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Heisenberg.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Werner Heisenberg]]<br>the icon of [[design epistemology]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>The substance of Federation through Images is to show how <em>the fundamental insights reached in 20th century science and philosophy allow us to develop a way out of "the rigid frame" </em> – which is a rigorously founded methodology for creating truth and meaning about any issue and at any level of generality, which we are calling [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]]. You may understand [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] as an adaptation of "the scientific method" that makes it suitable for providing the kind of insights that our people and society need, or in other words for [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]]. In essence, [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]] is just a generalization of the scientific approach to knowledge, based on recent scientific / philosophical insights – as we've already pointed out by talking about [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]], which is of course the epistemological foundation for [[polyscopy|<em>polyscopy</em>]]. </p> | ||
| + | <p>As the technique for extracting and presenting core insights of leading thinkers we used the metaphorical and often paradoxical images called [[ideograms|<em>ideograms</em>]]. The result is a cartoon-like introduction to the philosophical underpinnings of a refreshingly novel approach to knowledge.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Federation through Stories</h3> | ||
| + | <p>The abstract definition of [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] we've given a moment ago, and the "value proposition" to make the kind of difference that the comparison of the dollar value of the headlights with the value of the entire bus and the people in it may suggest, may have left you wondering: Are there real-life, practical examples that confirm this theory? </p> | ||
| + | <p>You may have also felt, when we introduced [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as 'the light bulb' that uses the new technology to illuminate the way, that we were doing gross injustice to IT innovation: Aren't we living in the Age of Information? Isn't our information technology (or in other words our civilization's 'headlights') indeed <em>the most modern</em> part of our civilization, the one where the largest progress has been made, the one that best characterizes our progress? In [[STORIES|Federation through Stories]] we explain why this is not the case, why the candle headlights analogy works most beautifully in this pivotal domain as well – by telling the story of Douglas Engelbart, the man who conceived, developed, prototyped <em>and demonstrated</em> – in 1968 – the core elements of the new media technology, which is in common use. This story works on many levels, and gives us a <em>textbook</em> example to work with when trying to understand the emerging [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] and the paradoxical dynamics around it (notice that we are this year celebrating the 50th anniversary of Engelbart's demo...).</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"> | ||
| + | <p> | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | Digital technology could help make this a better world. But we've also got to change our way of thinking. | ||
| + | </blockquote> | ||
| + | These two sentences were (intended to be) the first slide of Engelbart's presentation of his vision for the future of (information-) technological innovation in 2007 at Google. We shall see that this 'new thinking' was precisely what we've been calling [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]]. Engelbart's insight is so central to the overall case we are presenting, that we won't resist the urge to give you the gist of it right away.</p> | ||
| + | <p>The printing press analogy works, because the printing press was to a large degree the technical invention that led to the Enlightenment, by making knowledge so much more widely accessible. The question is what invention may play a similar role in the emerging <em>next</em> phase of our society's illumination? The answer is of course the "network-interconnected interactive digital media" – but there's a catch! Even the printing press (let it symbolize here the Industrial Age and the paradigm we want to evolve beyond) merely made what the scribes were doing more efficient. To communicate, people still needed to write and publish books, and hope that the people who needed what's written in them would find them on a book shelf. But the network-interconnected interactive digital media is a disruption of a completely <em>new</em> kind – it's not a broadcasting device but a "nervous system" (this metaphor is Engelbart's own); it interconnects us people in such a way that we can think together and coordinate our action, just as the cells in a sufficiently complex organism do!</p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Doug.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Douglas Engelbart]]<br>the icon of [[knowledge federation]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>To see that this is not what has happened, think about the "desktop" and the "mailbox" in your computer: The new technology has been used to implement the physical environment we've had around us – including the ways of doing things that evolved based on it. Consider the fact that in academic research we are still communicating by publishing books and articles. Haven't we indeed used the new technology to re-create 'fancy candles'. </p> | ||
| + | <p>To see the difference that makes a difference, imagine that your cells were using your own nervous systems to merely <em>broadcast</em> data! Think about your state of mind that would result. Then think about how this reflects upon our society's state of mind, our "collective intelligence"...</p> | ||
| + | <p> When we apply the Industrial Age efficiency thinking and values, and use the Web to merely broadcast knowledge, augment the volume, reduce the price – then the result is of course information glut. "We are drowning in information", Neil Postman observed! A completely new phase in our (social-systemic evolution) – new division, specialization and organization of the work with information, and beyond – is what's called for, and what's ahead of us.</p> | ||
| + | <p>There are in addition several points that spice up the Engelbart's history, which are the reasons why we gave it the name (in the Federation through Stories) "the incredible story of Doug): | ||
| + | <ul> | ||
| + | <li>Engelbart saw this whole new possibility, to give our society in peril a whole new 'nervous system', already in 1951 – when there were only a handful of computers in the world, which were used solely for numerical scientific calculations (he immediately decided to dedicate his career to this cause</li> | ||
| + | <li>Engelbart was unable to communicate his vision to the Silicon Valley – even after having been recognized as The Valley's "giant in residence" (think about Galilei in house arrest...)</li> | ||
| + | </ul> </p> | ||
| + | <p>So the simple conclusion we may draw from this story is that to draw <em>real</em> benefits from information technology, [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]] must replace the conventional reliance on the market. And conversely – that the contemporary information technology is an <em>enabler</em> of large-scale systemic change, because it's been <em>conceived</em> to serve that role.</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <p>We use [[vignettes|<em>vignettes</em>]] – short, lively, catchy, sticky... real-life people and situation stories – to explain and empower some of the core ideas of daring thinkers. A vignette liberates an insight from the language of a discipline and enables a non-expert to 'step into the shoes' of a leading thinker, 'look through his eye glasses'. By combining [[vignettes|<em>vignettes</em>]] into [[threads|<em>threads</em>]], and threads into higher units of meaning, we take this process of [[knowledge federation|<em>federation</em>]] all the way to the kind of direction-setting principles we've just been talking about. </p> | ||
| + | <h3>Federation through Applications</h3> | ||
| + | <p>In [[APPLICATIONS|Federation through Applications]] we showcase the creative frontier that is opening up.</p> | ||
| + | <p>One way to enter it is by taking a look at your smartphone; appreciate so many fruits of finest human work and ingenuity that had to come together to produce this true wonder of technological micro-gadgetry. Then consider the even more wonderful <em>neglect</em> which we have shown toward those incomparably more important mega-gadgets – in which people and technology come together to give us the knowledge we need. The last century gave us the airplane, the washing machine, the TV and the computer. If this century's inventions are going to be <em>systems</em> that make ourselves and our society and our environment whole and thriving (a better way to inform the public; a better way to direct our creative work; a better way to (re-)educate the young and the old; or a completely new approach to healthcare or to tourism) – then who, and in what way, will do that sort of innovation? What might be its results? What technologies might enable it? What practical differences might this make? What can we do to ignite such a change? </p> | ||
| + | <p>Alternatively you may consider what's presented here as a sufficiently complete prototype of the (socio-technical) 'light bulb', with examples of application, which amounts to a proof of concept, showing "It works – and look what we'll be able to see when it's been turned on!"</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><p> | ||
| + | Fifty years ago Erich Jantsch made a proposal for the university of the future, and made an appeal that the university take the new leadership role which, as he saw it, was due. | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | [T]he university should make structural changes within itself toward a new purpose of enhancing the society’s capacity for continuous self-renewal. | ||
| + | </blockquote> | ||
| + | </p> | ||
| + | <p>Suppose the university did that. Suppose that we opened up the university to take such a leadership role. What new ways of working, results, effects... could be achieved? What might this new creative frontier look like, what might it consist of, how may it be organized?</p> | ||
| + | <p>The technique demonstrated here is the [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]] – which are the characteristic products of [[systemic innovation|<em>systemic innovation</em>]]. Here's a related question to consider: If we should aim at <em>systemic</em> impact, if our key goal is to re-create systems including our own – then the traditional academic articles and book cannot be our only or even our main product. But what else <em>should</em> we do? And how?</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Jantsch.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Erik Jantsch]]<br>the icon of [[systemic innovation]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>The [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]] here serve as | ||
| + | <ul> | ||
| + | <li>models, embodying and exhibiting systemic solutions, how the things may be put together, which may then be adapted to other situations and improved further</li> | ||
| + | <li>interventions, because they are (by definition) embedded within real-life situations and practices, aiming to change them</li> | ||
| + | <li>experiments, showing what works and what doesn't, and what still needs to be changed or improved</li></ul></p> | ||
| + | <p>In Federation through Images we exhibit about 40 [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]], which together compose the single central one – of the creative frontier which we are pointing to by our four mentioned main keywords. We have developed it in the manner of prospectors who have found gold and are preparing an area for large-scale mining – by building a school and a hospital and a hotel and... What exactly is to be built and how – those are the questions that those [[prototypes|<em>prototypes</em>]] are there to answer.</p></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Federation through Conversations</h3> | ||
| + | <p> In [[CONVERSATIONS|Federation through Conversations]] the theme is the larger societal change – and the change of our understanding of core issues.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><p> | ||
| + | In 1968 The Club of Rome was initiated, as a global think tank to study the future prospects of humanity, give recommendations and incite action. Based on the first decade of The Club's work, Aurelio Peccei – its founding president and motor power – gave this diagnosis: | ||
| + | <blockquote> | ||
| + | The future will either be an inspired product of a great cultural revival, or there will be no future. | ||
| + | </blockquote></p> | ||
| + | <p>If there was any truth in Peccei's conclusion, then the challenge that history has given our generation is at the same time a historical opportunity.</p> | ||
| + | <p>The last time "a great cultural revival" happened, the "Renaissance" as we now call it, our ancestors liberated themselves from a worldview that kept them captive – where the only true happiness was to be found in the afterlife. Provided of course that one lived by the God's command, and by the command of the kings and the bishops as His earthly representatives. Is it indeed possible – and what would it take – to see our own time's prejudices and power issues in a similar way as we now see the ones that the Enlightenment liberated us from? What new worldview might help us achieve that? What new way of evolving our culture and organizing our society might we find to replace them? These, in a nutshell, are the questions taken up in Federation through Conversations.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Peccei.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Aurelio Peccei]]<br>the icon of [[guided evolution of society]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Re-evolution, power and politics</h3> | ||
| + | <p>How to make a change? How to change course?</p> | ||
| + | <p>Another way to approach this part of our presentation is to say "Now that we've created those 'headlights' – can we use them to illuminate 'the way'? Can we see where we are headed, and find a better road to follow?" Which of course means that we must explore the way we've been evolving, as culture and as society; because that's 'the way', isn't it?</p> | ||
| + | <p>If this challenge may seem daunting, the [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] again come to our rescue. Pierre Bourdieu, for one, who saw French imperialism show its true face in the war in Algeria in the late 1950s. And who, as Algeria was gaining independence, saw the old power relationship mutate and take a completely new form – so that the power was no longer in weaponry and in the instruments of torture, but in economy and the instruments of culture. This insight made Bourdieu a sociologist; he understood that the society, and the power, evolve and function in a completely different way than what we've been told.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We federate Bourdieu. We connect his insights with the insights of Antonio Damasio, the cognitive neuroscientist who discovered that we were not the rational choosers we believed we were. Damasio will help us understand why Bourdieu was so right when he talked about our worldview as <em>doxa</em>; and about the <em>symbolic power</em> which can only be exercised without <em>anyone's</em> awareness of its existence. We also [[knowledge federation|<em>federate</em>]] Bourdieu's insights with... No, let's leave those details to Federation through Conversations, and to our very conversations.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Let's conclude here by just highlighting the point this brings us to in the case we are presenting: When this [[knowledge federation|<em>federation</em>]] work has been completed, we'll not end up with another worldview that will liberate us from the old power relationships and empower us to pursue happiness well beyond what we've hitherto been able to achieve. We shall liberate ourselves from socialization into any fix worldview altogether! We'll have understood, indeed, how the worldview creation and our socialization into a fixed worldview has been <em>the</em> key instrument of the sort of power we now must liberate ourselves from.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In this way the circle has been closed – and we are back where we started, at [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] as issue. We are looking at the way in which truth and meaning are socially created – which is of course what this presentation is about.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Far from being "just talking", the conversations we want to initiate <em>build</em> communication in a certain new way, both regarding the media used and the manner of communicating. We use the [[dialogs|<em>dialog</em>]] – which is a manner of speaking that sidesteps all coercion into a worldview and replaces it by genuine listening, collaboration and co-creation. By conversing in this way we also bring the public attention to completely new themes. We evolve a public sphere capable of developing public awareness about those themes. Here in the truest sense the medium is the message. </p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | ------ | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>Turning on the light</h2></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"><h3>Where shall we point it?</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Sometimes when we talk about this work people ask "so where do you think this can be applied?" Well, it's a new way to work with information, we answer. So it can be applied wherever information is applied. This is of course true, but it still misses the main point. Which is that <em>our main value proposition is to vastly broaden and strengthen the application of information or knowledge</em>. This leaves a vast range of possible themes for us to talk about. But it's time now to be concrete, and choose one. Or a handful.</p> | ||
| + | <p>So imagine that you had it – a strong and flexible electrical flashlight (metaphorically speaking), which you can point at will toward any question or theme you may want to illuminate. Suppose that a prototype of this flashlight has just been completed, and now you want to demonstrate its value in practice. You want to show it to people, show what it can do, invite – and attract – the people to try it and use it. What themes would you choose?</p> | ||
| + | <p>We've chosen the following three themes. </p> | ||
| + | <h3>The paradigm strategy dialog</h3> | ||
| + | <p>One could say that this is the most natural and straight-forward choice we could have made. The 'road of the bus' is really the course of our civilization's evolution. Can we illuminate <em>that</em> – and show how exactly it's been developing; where we are coming from and where we are headed; and what we <em>should</em> do at this particular point on this road where we currently are, what course should we steer? And how? These are, roughly, the themes of The Paradigm Strategy dialog.</p> | ||
| + | <p>While of course anyone can participate, the intended primary audience are the informed and concerned creatives, the global change makers. Can we engage them to co-create a vision? Can we use the [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] techniques and technologies to orchestrate a global conversation where the best insights of our present best minds are aided by the most relevant insights of the historical [[giants|<em>giants</em>]], to co-create a state-of-the-art vision for all of us, and for our society?</p> | ||
| + | <p>The [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] vision that is offered is what we called the [[paradigm strategy|<em>paradigm strategy</em>]] – which is to focus our energies on shifting the whole paradigm. The insight to be developed is that while even small and obviously necessary changes may be difficult or impossible (because they don't fit into the existing [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]), the biiig change may still be easy (because we are at the point in our evolution where everything's been prepared for it, and where that's just our natural next step). </p> | ||
| + | <p>To illuminate our evolutionary trajectory and the just mentioned view of our present-day position on it we have developed The Paradigm Strategy poster, where a variety of [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] techniques are applied and showcased. The [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] here are the leading thinkers in sociology, cognitive science, philosophy... But not only. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Long story made short – by federating Chomsky as linguist, Harari as historian, Graeber as anthropologist, Nietzsche as philosopher, Bourdieu and Giddens as sociologists, Damasio as cognitive scientist... we arrive at a radically fresh view of the nature of our societal evolution. And of our <em>socialization</em>. Without going into details (which will be shared in Federation through Conversations and of course in the conversations) let's just highlight a single paradigm-shifting detail: Our shared single worldview, which in the earlier paradigm tended to be considered as "the objective truth about the nature reality" (even if we could never really agree what exactly this thing might be...) – now becomes an instrument of our socialization! The <em>liberation</em> from clinging on to this "reality picture" is then seen as our evolutionary step forward. So we have made a full circle and came back to – [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]], which is of course the mother of any paradigm.</p> | ||
| + | <p> Let us here also share an insight, a [[high-level|<em>high-level</em>]] view that follows from this conversation – how we've been evolving socially and culturally as the [[homo ludens|<em>homo ludens</em>]] (man the (game) player). This expression has been used as the title of an old book, but we've polished it and redefined it, so that it has a much more precise and agile meaning what good old Johan Huizinga intended. The point is that the [[homo ludens|<em>homo ludens</em>]] is not the <em>homo sapiens</em>; he does not really seek knowledge or use knowledge. He's become adapted to the complex reality combined with the lack of suitable information – by simply learning his different social roles, and in particular his profession, as one would learn the rules of a game; and by playing competitively, aiming to increase what he (or better said the game) considers as his gains or interests. The [[homo ludens|<em>homo ludens</em>]] learns by seeing what works in practice, and adapting. In the shadow of this evolutionary condition, needless to say, one finds spectacular opportunities for insight and improvement – which should give zest and zeal to this conversation.</p> | ||
| + | <p>An interesting subtlety is that the [[homo ludens|<em>homo ludens</em>]] and the <em>homo sapiens</em> are not only two different cultural species and ways of evolving; they are also signature themes of two <em>incommensurable</em> [[paradigm|<em>paradigms</em>]] (ways of creating truth and meaning). Each of them – by looking in his own characteristic way – sees the other as going extinct, and himself as the paragon of evolution: The [[homo ludens|<em>homo ludens</em>]] just looks around, see that it's the [[homo ludens|<em>homo ludens</em>]] specimen who are succeeding in life, and that the <em>homo sapiens</em> specimen are becoming scarce, and draws the obvious conclusion. The cultural <em>homo sapiens</em> looks at the data, sees the global trends, and the values and behaviors that are causing them, and draws the <em>opposite</em> conclusion.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Liberation dialog</h3> | ||
| + | <p>However timely the [[paradigm strategy|<em>paradigm strategy</em>]] may be as a theme, it is probably too abstract and esoteric for most people. To engage the general public in a conversation, we have prepared a whole other one – which brings in much of the same insights and content, but through a back door, so to speak. The title theme of this dialog, however, is religion, and its nature and future. Here too we have a document that can strike the conversation; it's the book (presently a manuscript) titled "Liberation" and subtitled "Religion for the third millennium". It's the first book in the intended Knowledge Federation trilogy, by which [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] will be introduced to general audiences. </p> | ||
| + | <p>In traditional cultures, religion has served as the ethical and hence also evolutionary guidance; it's provided the moral code and the sense of identity that held the people together in a community. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Religion is also a theme on which the opinions are most strongly held – both when they are <em>pro</em> religion, or a certain specific religion, and when they are against it. So this theme has the potential to truly engage the people. This potential is vastly augmented by the fact that, as it turns out, we have a way of looking at this theme that is likely to upset both the <em>pro</em> and the <em>con</em> side! How is this possible?</p> | ||
| + | <p>You must have noticed that religion has been associated with <em>believing</em> in something, even against evidence. Those beliefs were, furthermore, so strong, that people have been prone to go into armed disputes even over small differences – flagrantly violating the Almighty's explicit command not to kill (delivered by Moses, who's been recognized as a prophet in major Western religions). So the question is – what's really going on here? And – can we understand the issue of religion in a completely new way – which will help us reconfigure our values and our priorities, and bind us together in a society <em>in a completely new way</em>?</p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"> | ||
| + | <p>It has turned out that the key [[memes|<em>meme</em>]] is already there; and that it only needs to be [[knowledge federation|<em>federated</em>]]. This [[memes|<em>meme</em>]] also comes with an interesting story, which lets itself be rendered as a [[vignettes|<em>vignette</em>]]. </p> | ||
| + | <p>Early in the 20th century a young monk in Thailand spent a couple of years in a monastery in Bangkok and thought "This just cannot be it!" So he decided to do as the Buddha did – he went alone into a forest and experimented. He also had the original Pali scriptures with him, to help him find the <em>original</em> way. And reportedly he did!</p> | ||
| + | <p>What Buddhadasa ("the slave of the Buddha", as this [[giants|<em>giant</em>]] of religion called himself) found out was that the essence of the Buddha's teaching was different, and in a way <em>opposite</em> from how Buddhism is usually understood and taught. And not only that – the practice he rediscovered is in its essential elements <em>opposite</em> from what's evolved as "the pursuit of happiness" in most of the modern world. Buddhadasa saw the Buddha's discovery, which he rediscovered, as a kind of a natural law, the discoveries of which have marked the inception of all major religions. Or more simply, what Buddhadasa discovered, and undertook to give to the world, was "the essence of religion". </p></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Buddhadasa.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Buddhadasa]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>You may of course be tempted to disqualify the Buddha's or Buddhadasa's approach to happiness as a product of some rigidly held religious belief. But the epistemological essence of Buddhadasa's teaching is that it's not only purely <em>evidence-based</em> or experience-based – but also that the liberation from <em>any</em> sort of clinging, and to clinging to beliefs in particular, is <em>the</em> essential part of the practice.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In the Liberation book we federate Buddhadasa's teaching about religion by (1) moving it from the domain of religion as belief to the domain of the pursuit of happiness; (2) linking this with a variety of other sources, thus producing a kind of a roadmap to happiness puzzle, and then showing how this piece snuggly fits in and completes the puzzle; (3) showing how religions – once this [[memes|<em>meme</em>]] was discovered – tended to become instruments of negative socialization; and how we may now do better, and need to do better.</p> | ||
| + | <h3>Knowledge federation dialog</h3> | ||
| + | <p>Finally, we need to talk about our [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]], about [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]]. While this conversation will complete the [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] (by creating a feedback loop with the help of which it will evolve further), the real theme and interest of this conversation is of course well beyond what our little model might suggest.</p> | ||
| + | <p>In the midst of all our various evolutionary mishaps and misdirections, there's at least this one thing that has been done right – the academic tenure. And the ethos of academic freedom it institutionalized. What we now have amounts to a global army, of people who've been selected and trained and publicly sponsored to think freely. If our core task is a fresh new evolutionary start – beyond "the survival of the fittest" and the power structures it has shackled us with – then it's hard to even imagine how this could be done without engaging in some suitable way this crucially important resource.</p> | ||
| + | <p>How are we using it?</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | |||
| + | ------- | ||
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| + | <!-- [[{{TALKPAGENAME}}|Discussion]] | ||
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| + | <!-- CLIPPINGS | ||
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| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>What follows is a description of the [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] model, and an invitation to a conversation. The purpose of the conversation will be to discuss the opportunity that our model will illuminate – and by doing that <em>already</em> make concerted progress toward our goal.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We rush to make this clear: When we say "conversation", we don't mean just talking. On the contrary! The idea is to develop a new <em>way</em> of talking in public, an orchestrated, media-enabled and growing global conversation about the themes that matter. The idea is to evolve a [[collective mind|<em>collective mind</em>]] capable of thinking new thoughts, of grasping situations and finding solutions. We intend to bring the [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] and their game-changing insights into the focus of the public eye.</p></div></div> | ||
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| + | <p>By sharing this model, we want to initiate a conversation about the way we handle <em>the</em> most critical resource – human creativity (or insight, ingenuity, capacity to envision and induce change...) and its fruits accumulated through the ages. It is the way we use this resource that what will determine how all our other resources will be used. In this challenging point in human history, we may need to depend on this resource more than we ever did!</p> | ||
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| + | <div class="col-md-7"> | ||
| + | <p>On a similar note, we are not implying that anything might be wrong with the fine work that our academic colleagues are doing. Science rose to prominence owing to its successes in dispelling age-old prejudices, by explaining the natural phenomena. That it ended up in "the Grand Revelator of modern Western culture" role was an unintended consequence of its successes, as Benjamin Lee Whorf observed long ago. Science was not <em>conceived</em> for the role of informing people about basic things in life. The paradigm we are proposing is alternative to or <em>incommensurable</em> to traditional science (in Thomas Kuhn's usage of this word). It represents a different set of values and a different way of looking at the world. It serves an entirely different set of purposes.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We have ample evidence to show that – if our society shall have the kind of benefits that it can and must draw from the results in disciplinary academic work – then (something like) [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] must also be in place.</p> | ||
| + | </div></div> | ||
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| + | If you feel already overloaded with technical-academic ideas, [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] will instantly come to your rescue! You may (unless you are an academic researcher and interested in all this) safely forget all that's just been told about [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]], because the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] expresses the gist of it in a nutshell. What it's saying is that in [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] we are using a different set of values, and a different standard of excellence, to evaluate knowledge and knowledge work. We don't try to tell "the objective truth about reality". Our goal is philosophically more humble, and practically more fastidious: To provide the 'light'; to be the 'headlights'; to show the way.</p> | ||
| + | <p>Last century brought a disruption in the mentioned evolutionary process. Not something small and subtle, but very large and obvious. To model the behavior of small particles of matter, as revealed by the experiments, the physicists needed to thoroughly revise not only the "natural laws", but also the very concepts in terms of which the phenomena were modeled. The "Newton's laws" turned out to be only an approximation. The concepts he used were shown to be not his discovery, but his creation.</p> | ||
| + | <p>"We are not discovering reality", the [[giants|<em>giants</em>]] concluded, "we are <em>constructing</em> (representations of) reality". We shall see evidence of this in Federation through Images, where this disruption and the opportunity it has opened for us will be our theme. Thomas Kuhn, originally a physicist, moved to the philosophy of science and made himself a name there by telling us about the paradigms. Some controversy arose (as it indeed should when the foundations are moving): Do those paradigms <em>really exist</em> in the sciences – or is all this only Kuhn's construction?</p> | ||
| + | <p>What we are calling [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]] is simply an academically clean way by which such controversies can be resolved. A way in which the evolution can be continued by (as we pointed out above) <em>both</em> resolving the fundamental difficulties <em>and</em> putting good knowledge to good use. The whole thing takes only two simple steps: | ||
| + | <ul> | ||
| + | <li>Turn the above conclusion of the [[giants|<em>giants</em>]], or the [[constructivist credo|<em>constructivist credo</em>]] as we are calling it, into a convention (instead of making it as a statement about reality) – by combining it with what Villard Van Orman Quine called "truth by convention" (mathematicians make such conventions when they define their formulas; and when they say "Let <em>x</em> be...")</li> | ||
| + | <li>State – as a convention – that the purpose of knowledge (in the particular context or [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]] we are creating) is not to "objectively describe reality" – but to provide the information and knowledge to contemporary people and society <em>as they may need it</em></li> | ||
| + | </ul> | ||
| + | </p> | ||
| + | <p>This then allows us to define everything else – concepts, methods, and even the values which guide us in knowledge work – by making conventions.</p> | ||
| + | |||
| + | <p>You may notice how the Modernity [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] is at the same time both a question and an answer to that question. A lion's share of our difficulty, when it comes to changing behaviors and directions, is in the age-old <em>reifications</em>: science is what the scientists are doing; public informing is what the journalists are doing. We don't really have a clear sense of purpose beyond that. And even if we would try to give those large things a purpose, someone would surely object "but is that purpose <em>really</em> as you claim it is?". But this [[ideograms|<em>ideogram</em>]] marries the knowledge work with its purpose – by convention. It makes just as little sense to argue against it, as to ask whether <em>x</em> "really is" as a mathematician defined it. | ||
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| + | <p>As we shall show on these pages, we would first of all see that something breathtakingly large happened during the past century. It didn't happen at once, but it did happen in so many places (or minds or academic fields) at the same time that the overall effect is shocking – albeit visible only when best insights of our best minds have been put together. In a nutshell, what has happened was that the rational method (which was empowered during the Enlightenment to challenge not only the scriptures but also all other forms of insight, and which as a result came to believe that it was alone capable of seeing the reality objectively that is, as it truly is) developed to the point that it is now able to understand its own limits. The scientific concepts and methods – which were believed to be the <em>discovery</em> of Newton and other early scientific [[giants|<em>giants</em>]], turned out to be only an approximation, and their <em>creation</em>.</p> | ||
| + | <p>The natural next step in this process then also becomes visible – and that's what we are pointing to (or more precisely what we are [[prototypes|<em>prototyping</em>]]) by the above image and the [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]]. | ||
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| + | </li> | ||
| + | </ul></p> | ||
| + | <p>At the same time, this seemingly all-too-pragmatic [[epistemology|<em>epistemology</em>]] can be shown to provide an academically rigorous foundation for the creation of truth and meaning – which enables the creation of exactly the kind of knowledge that we described above as our vision and goal (well-founded knowledge about any relevant theme, and on any desired level of detail or abstraction). The details will be provided in Federation through Images, and we'll here only give you this hint, which is also necessary for fully understanding the nature of the [[keywords|<em>keyword</em>]] and definitions that are our theme here. What makes us truly able to depart from the traditional concepts, method and reality pictures and [[design|<em>design</em>]] new ones rigorously yet freely, is what philosopher Willard Van Orman Quine called "truth by convention", and identified as "an adjunct of progress in the logical foundations of any science". You'll easily understand why we considered it as an adjunct of progress in the logical foundations of knowledge work at large. Truth by convention (as defined and used within [[design epistemology|<em>design epistemology</em>]]) is the kind of truth that is common in mathematics: "Let <em>x</em> be...". When something is defined by a convention, it is meaningless to argue whether it "really is" as defined. It is this approach to truth that truly makes us able to depart from the age-old <em>reifications</em> and traditional definitions and "correspondence theory" – and <em>construct</em> knowledge and knowledge work without raising a controversy; to leave the reality of 'candles' behind and freely create 'lightbulbs'. Concepts, and also methods, when defined in this way, become human-made and ideal "ways of looking at things" – which we can then use to look at human experience in new ways, and to organize it differently. </p> | ||
| + | <p>The practical relevance of such ideal concepts must then of course be confirmed by showing that they help us see and organize things in reality in more accurate and more useful ways. You'll notice that this is exactly what this website is about.</p> | ||
| + | |||
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| + | <p>It is a glimpse of this uncommon opportunity (that a line of work might exist which, just as good old science did in its day, dares to revisit and revise the very foundations that underlie our pursuit of knowledge, and then offers the kind of knowledge that can be vital and transformative to the people and the society of today) that compelled us to apply our best ability to its exploration and development.</p> | ||
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| + | <p>When making this proposal, we do not imply that anything might be wrong with the fine work our academic colleagues are doing. Science rose to prominence owing to its successes in dispelling age-old superstitions, by explaining the natural phenomena. Science was not <em>conceived</em> for the role of informing people about basic things in life. We are talking here about paradigms that are (in Thomas Kuhn's usage of this keyword) <em>incommensurable</em> – they represent different ways of looking at the world, each better suited for its own set of purposes. We have ample evidence to show that if our society shall have the kind of benefits that it can and must draw from disciplinary research – then (something like) the [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] [[transdiscipline|<em>transdiscipline</em>]] must also be in place.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | |||
| + | ******* | ||
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| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"><h3>We will not solve our world's problems</h3> | ||
| + | <p>[[Donella Meadows]] talked about systemic leverage points as those places within a complex system "where a small shift in one thing can produce big changes in everything". She identified "the mindset or paradigm out of which the goals, rules, feedback structure arise" as <em>the</em> most impactful <em>kind of</em> systemic leverage points. Our proposal is to act in this most impactful way.</p> | ||
| + | <p>We are proposing an approach to contemporary issues that is complementary to the approaches that are focused on those issues.</p> | ||
| + | <p>This does not mean that we are proposing to replace the worthy efforts of our friends and colleagues who are working on specific problems such as the climate change, or on the millennium development goals. What we are proposing is a way to augment their likelihood of success.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Donella.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Donella Meadows]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="row"> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3"></div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-6"> | ||
| + | <h3>We will not change the world</h3> | ||
| + | <p>"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has", wrote [[Margaret Mead]]. You'll find evidence of our thoughtfulness and commitment on these pages.</p> | ||
| + | <p>And yet it is clear to us, and it should be clear to you too, that we <em>cannot</em> really change the world. The world is not only us – it is <em>all of us</em> together! Which of course includes you as well.</p> | ||
| + | <p>So if the world will change, that will be a result of <em>your</em> doing; of <em>your</em> thoughtfulness and commitment!</p> | ||
| + | <p>Collaboration is to the emerging paradigm as competition is to the old one. In Norway (this website is hosted at the University of Oslo) there is a word – dugnad – for the kind of collaboration that brings together the people in a neighborhood on a Saturday afternoon, to gather fallen leaves and branches and do small repairs in the commons, and then share a meal together. Consider this as an invitation to a dugnad – whose purpose is to enkindle society-wide renewal.</p> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
| + | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Mead.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[Margaret Mead]]</center></small></div> | ||
| + | </div> | ||
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| + | <h3>A paradigm</h3> | ||
| + | <p>As a way of handling knowledge, [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] is in the proper sense of that word (as Thomas Kuhn defined it and used it) a [[paradigm|<em>paradigm</em>]]. We offer it as an alternative to the approaches to knowledge where the goal is to create a single "reality picture", with which whatever is to be considered "real" or "true" must be consistent. Isn't the dictatorship of any single worldview an <em>impediment</em> to communication; and to evolution of ideas? In knowledge [[knowledge federation|<em>federation</em>]] the ideas and their authors are allowed to preserve in some suitable degree their autonomy and identity. The goal is still to unify them and make our understanding of the world coherent – but not at all cost! Sometimes good ideas just cannot be reconciled. Sometimes they represent distinct points of view, each of which is useful in its own way.</p> | ||
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<p>To see why the opportunities that our proposal may lead to reach well beyond the improvements of knowledge work, recall the humanity's condition at the eve of the Renaissance: devastating wars, horrifying epidemics, infamous Inquisition trials... Bring to mind the iconic image of Galilei in house prison, a century after Copernicus, whispering "eppur si muove" into his beard. The problems of the day were not resolved by focusing on those problems, but by a slow and steady development of a whole new approach to knowledge. Several centuries of unprecedented progress followed. Could a similar advent be in store for us today?</p></div> | <p>To see why the opportunities that our proposal may lead to reach well beyond the improvements of knowledge work, recall the humanity's condition at the eve of the Renaissance: devastating wars, horrifying epidemics, infamous Inquisition trials... Bring to mind the iconic image of Galilei in house prison, a century after Copernicus, whispering "eppur si muove" into his beard. The problems of the day were not resolved by focusing on those problems, but by a slow and steady development of a whole new approach to knowledge. Several centuries of unprecedented progress followed. Could a similar advent be in store for us today?</p></div> | ||
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<p>“You never change things by fighting the existing reality", observed Buckminster Fuller. "To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” So we built [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a model or a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] of a new way to handle knowledge – as it might be instrumental in revolutionizing our condition.</p> | <p>“You never change things by fighting the existing reality", observed Buckminster Fuller. "To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” So we built [[knowledge federation|<em>knowledge federation</em>]] as a model or a [[prototypes|<em>prototype</em>]] of a new way to handle knowledge – as it might be instrumental in revolutionizing our condition.</p> | ||
<p>The issue that is being proactively problematized on these pages is the way we handle a most precious resource – human creativity (or insight, ingenuity, capacity to envision and induce change...) and its fruits accumulated through the ages. And at the point in our history where we may need to depend on it more than we ever did! Considering the importance of this issue, we spared no effort in developing and describing a complete proof of concept; and setting the stage for its academic and real-life deployment and scaling. By constructing this model, we do not aim to give conclusive answers. Our goal is indeed much higher – it is <em>to open up a creative frontier</em> where the way knowledge is created and handled is brought into focus, and continuously recreated and improved. (This is one of the reasons why we decided to open up this website long before it is finished. To a much lesser degree than now of course, this site will remain a construction site forever.)</p> | <p>The issue that is being proactively problematized on these pages is the way we handle a most precious resource – human creativity (or insight, ingenuity, capacity to envision and induce change...) and its fruits accumulated through the ages. And at the point in our history where we may need to depend on it more than we ever did! Considering the importance of this issue, we spared no effort in developing and describing a complete proof of concept; and setting the stage for its academic and real-life deployment and scaling. By constructing this model, we do not aim to give conclusive answers. Our goal is indeed much higher – it is <em>to open up a creative frontier</em> where the way knowledge is created and handled is brought into focus, and continuously recreated and improved. (This is one of the reasons why we decided to open up this website long before it is finished. To a much lesser degree than now of course, this site will remain a construction site forever.)</p> | ||
| − | <!-- DELETE? <p>We do not purport to make the traditional science obsolete; or to replace the most worthwhile efforts that focus on specific issues such as the climate change or on reaching the Millennium Development Goals. Rather, the aim of our initiative is to to initiate developments that can give far larger visibility and social impact to the results of science – and to other useful sources of insight of course. Our goal is to vastly improve the prospects of problem-oriented approaches to reach <em>their</em> goals. </p> DELETE? | + | <!-- DELETE? <p>We do not purport to make the traditional science obsolete; or to replace the most worthwhile efforts that focus on specific issues such as the climate change or on reaching the Millennium Development Goals. Rather, the aim of our initiative is to to initiate developments that can give far larger visibility and social impact to the results of science – and to other useful sources of insight of course. Our goal is to vastly improve the prospects of problem-oriented approaches to reach <em>their</em> goals. </p> DELETE? |
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<div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Fuller.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[R. Buckminster Fuller]]</center></small></div> | <div class="col-md-3 round-images"> [[File:Fuller.jpg]] <br><small><center>[[R. Buckminster Fuller]]</center></small></div> | ||
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>See</h2></div> | <div class="col-md-3"><h2>See</h2></div> | ||