Difference between revisions of "Holotopia: Five insights"

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<center><h2><b>H O L O T O P I A &nbsp;&nbsp;  P R O T O T Y P E</b></h2></center><br><br>
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<center><h2>[[Holotopia|<b>H O L O T O P I A &nbsp;&nbsp;  P R O T O T Y P E</b>]]</h2></center><br><br>
  
 
<div class="page-header" > <h1>Five Insights</h1> </div>
 
<div class="page-header" > <h1>Five Insights</h1> </div>
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[[File:FiveInsights.JPG]]
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[[File:FiveInsights.JPG]]<br>
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<center><small>The <em>holotopia</em> vision is made concrete in terms of <em>five insights</em>.</small></center>
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<small>The Five Insights <em>ideogram</em></small>  
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<blockquote>
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The <em>holotopia</em> vision is made concrete in terms of five interrelated insights.</blockquote>  
 
</div> </div>
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>[[Holotopia:Convenience paradox|Convenience paradox]]</h2></div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7">
 
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<blockquote>
 
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The Renaissance liberated our ancestors from preoccupation with the afterlife, and empowered them to seek happiness here and now. Their lifestyle changed, and culture blossomed. Have we followed the pursuit of happiness to its end? Or could a surprising new turn, a "change of course", still be possible?
 
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</blockquote>
 
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<p>We <em>federate</em> information from a broad variety of cultures, historical eras and sources, to illuminate the <em>way</em> to human fulfillment.</p>
 
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<p>Lacking such information, and following our general cultural bias, we've confused happiness with <em>convenience</em>—i.e. with what <em>appears</em> as attractive at the moment. Needless to say, this error of perception has been endlessly amplified by advertising.</p>
 
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<p>We use the <em>holoscope</em> to show that <em>convenience</em> is a deceptive, illusory value. And that in the shadow of this delusion, an endless possibilities for improving our lives—through <em>human development</em>—are waiting to be uncovered.</p>
 
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<p>We show that this turn of our fortunes can be made by pursuing <em>wholeness</em>, not <em>convenience</em>.</p>
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>[[Holotopia:Power structure|Power structure]]</h2></div>
 
<div class="col-md-3"><h2>[[Holotopia:Power structure|Power structure]]</h2></div>
 
<div class="col-md-7">
 
<div class="col-md-7">
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<blockquote>
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<blockquote>  
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At the turn of the 20th century, it appeared that the technology would liberate us from drudgery and toil, and empower us to engage in finer human pursuits. But we seem to be more busy and stressed than ever! What happened with all the time we've saved?
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Powered by ingenuity of innovation, the Industrial Revolution radically improved the efficiency of human work. Where could the next revolution of this kind be coming from?
 
</blockquote>  
 
</blockquote>  
  
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<p>We look at <em>the systems in which we live and work</em>. Imagine them as gigantic machines, comprising people and technology, whose function is to take our daily work as input, and turn it into socially useful effects. If we are stressed and busy—should we not see if <em>they</em> might be wasting our time? And if the result of our best efforts are problems rather than solutions—should we not see whether <em>they</em> might be causing those problems?</p>
 
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<p>We <em>federate</em> insights from a variety of sources, including both technical sciences and the humanities, to develop a <em>view</em> where <em>the systems in which we live and work</em> are seen as <em>power structures</em>—which are both <em>results</em> of power struggle, and <em>implements</em> of disempowerment.</p>
 
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<p>Those insights show that there <em>is no</em> "invisible hand", which we can rely on to turn our self-serving acts into the greatest common good. As the Modernity <em>ideogram</em> might suggest, <em>enormous</em> improvements of our condition can be reached by deliberately making our <em>socio</em>–technical systems more <em>whole</em>.
 
 
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<blockquote>  
 
<blockquote>  
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The printing press revolutionized communication, and enabled the Enlightenment. Without doubt, the Internet and the interactive digital media constitute a similar revolution, which is well under way. Are we really calling <em>that</em> a 'candle'?
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The printing press revolutionized communication, and enabled the Enlightenment. But the Internet and the interactive digital media constitute a similar revolution. Hasn't the change we are proposing, from 'the candle' to 'the lightbulb', <em>already</em> been completed?  
 
</blockquote>  
 
</blockquote>  
  
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<h3>Scope</h3>
 
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<p>In the manner that we just outlined, we consider the people connected by technology as a gigantic system, a <em>collective mind</em>. And we look at the 'program' or process, which constitutes our <em>collective mind</em>'s very principle of operation. </p>
 
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<h3>View</h3>
 
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<p>Once again we've adopted something from the past, without considering the options.  By using the principle that the printing press made possible—broadcasting—we've failed to take advantage of their <em>main</em> distinguishing trait.</p>
 
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<p>Far from giving us the awareness we need, the new technology is keeping us dazzled. Instead of empowering us to see and change our world, it keeps us overwhelmed, and passive.</p>
 
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<p>A <em>radically</em> better way to use the information technology is now possible, and also necessary. To make it a reality, our relationship with information, <em>and</em> with technology, need an update.</p>
 
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<h3>Action</h3>
 
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<p>Just as the human mind does, our <em>collective mind</em> must <em>federate</em> knowledge; not merely broadcast information.</p> 
 
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<h3>Federation</h3>
 
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<p>The new media were <em>created</em> to enable the change we are proposing—a half-century ago, by Douglas Engelbart and his SRI-based team. And Engelbart too was following the lead suggested by Vannevar Bush, already in 1945. </p>
 
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<p>The non-technical, humanities side of this coin is no less interesting. Already Friedrich Nietzsche warned us that the overabundance of impressions is leaving us dumbfounded, unable to "digest" the overload of impressions and to act. Guy Debord, more recently, contributed far-reaching insights, which now need to be carefully digested. </p>
 
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<p>The <em>prototypes</em> here include the <em>knowledge federation</em> as a <em>transdiscipline</em>—which is offered to serve as an evolutionary organ, and supplement the function our society, and <em>academia</em> are lacking.</p>
 
 
</div> </div>  
 
</div> </div>  
  
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Socialized reality</h2></div>
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>[[Holotopia:Socialized reality|Socialized reality]]</h2></div>
 
<div class="col-md-7">
 
<div class="col-md-7">
 
<blockquote>
 
<blockquote>
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At the core of the Enlightenment was a profound change of our way to truth and meaning—from seeking them in the Bible, to empowering the reason to find <em>new</em> ways. Galilei in house arrest was our <em>reason</em> that was kept in check, and barred from taking its place in the evolution of ideas. Have we reached the end of this all-important evolutionary process, which Socrates and Plato initiated twenty-five centuries ago? Can the <em>academia</em> still make a radical turn, and guide our society to make an even larger one?
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The Enlightenment was before all a change of <em>epistemology</em>. An ancient praxis was revived, which developed <em>knowledge of knowledge</em>. On that as foundation, a completely <em>new</em> worldview emerged—which led to "a great cultural revival", and to <em>comprehensive</em> change. On what grounds could a similar chain of events begin today?
 
</blockquote>  
 
</blockquote>  
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<h3>Scope</h3>
 
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<p> The [[Holotopia:Socialized Reality|Socialized Reality]] <em>insight</em> is about the fundamental assumptions that serve as the foundation on which truth and meaning are created. It is also about a possibility that a deep change, of the foundation, may naturally lead to a sweeping change, "a great cultural revival"—as the case was during the Enlightenment.</p>
 
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<p>
 
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We look at the very foundations, that is—the fundamental assumptions, based on which truth and meaning are constructed. Being the foundations that underlie our thinking, they are not something we normally look at and think about. It is, indeed, as if those <em>foundations</em> were hidden under the ground, and now need to be escavated.</p>
 
  
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<h3>View</h3>
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</div> </div>  
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<p>Without even noticing that, from the traditional culture we've adopted a myth incomparably more subversive than the myth of creation. This myth now serves as the main foundation stone, on which the edifice of our culture has been built.</p> 
 
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<p>By conceiving our pursuit of truth and meaning as a "discovery" of bits and pieces of an "objective reality" (and thus failing to perceive truth and meaning, and information that conveys them, as an essential part of the 'machinery' of culture),  we've at once damaged our cultural heritage—<em>and</em> given the instruments of cultural creation away, to the forces of counterculture. In our present order of things <em>anything goes</em>—as long as it does not <em>explicitly</em>  contradict "the scientific worldview".</p>
 
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<p>While the counterculture is creating our world, the scientists are caught up in their traditional "objective observer" role...</p>  
 
  
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<h3>Action</h3>
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<div class="row">
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<p>We show how a completely new <em>foundation</em> for truth and meaning can be constructed—which is independent of any myths and unverifiable assumptions. On this new <em>foundation</em>, a completely new academic and societal reality can be developed.</p>  
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>[[Holotopia:Narrow frame|Narrow frame]]</h2></div>
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<p>This new <em>foundation</em> can be developed by doing no more than <em>federating</em> the information we already own.</p>
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<div class="col-md-7">
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<p>Federating knowledge means not just "connecting the dots", but also making a difference.</p>
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<blockquote>Science gave us a completely new way to look at the world. It gave us powers that the people in Galilei's time couldn't dream of. What might be the theme of the <em>next</em> revolution of this kind?
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</blockquote>  
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<h3>Federation</h3>  
 
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<p>To show that the correspondence of our models with reality is a myth (widely held belief that cannot be rationally verified), it is sufficient to quote Einstein (as a popular icon of modern science). But since we are here talking about the very foundation stone on which our proposal has been developed, we take this <em>federation</em> quite a bit further.</p>
 
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<p>An essential point here is to understand "reality" as an instrument that the <em>traditional</em> culture developed to socialize us into a worldview, and its specific order of things or <em>paradigm</em>. By understanding <em>socialization</em> as a form of power play and disempowerment, we provide in effect a <em>mirror</em> which we may use to self-reflect, and see our world and our condition in a new way. The insights of Pierre Bourdieu and Antonio Damasio are here central. A variety of others are also provided.</p>  
 
 
</div> </div>  
 
</div> </div>  
  
  
 
<div class="row">
 
<div class="row">
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Narrow frame</h2></div>
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>[[Holotopia:Convenience paradox|Convenience paradox]]</h2></div>
 
<div class="col-md-7">
 
<div class="col-md-7">
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<blockquote>Science replaced the faith in the bible and the tradition. The revolutionary changes that resulted gave us powers that people a few generations ago couldn't even dream of. We can not be calling <em>that</em> a 'candle'?
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<blockquote>
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</blockquote>  
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The Renaissance liberated our ancestors from preoccupation with the afterlife, and empowered them to seek happiness here and now. The lifestyle changed, and the culture blossomed. How could the <em>next</em> such change begin?  
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</blockquote>
  
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<h3>Scope</h3>
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</div> </div>  
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<p>We look at science as an instrument that expands, but also determines and confines our vision. We take off our 'eyeglasses', and we take a closer look.</p>
 
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<h3>View</h3>
 
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<p>Science was never <em>created</em> for the role in which it now finds itself—the role which Benjamin Lee Whorf branded "the Grand Revelator of modern Western culture". Science found itself in that role by proving its superiority on a much narrower terrain—where causal explanations of natural phenomena are found. </p>
 
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<p>Consequently science constitutes—as Werner Heisenberg pointed out—a <em>narrow frame</em>, a way of looking at the world that for some purposes served some purposes well (notably developing science and technology), and other purposes quite poorly (notably the development of culture, which would enable us to use the power of technology meaningfully and safely). </p>
 
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<p>An even more basic problem is that science constitutes a fixed and narrowly focused way of looking at the world. It has been said that to a person with a hammer in his hand everything looks like a nail. Are even the best among us doomed to explore the world by just endlessly looking for the next 'nail'?</p>
 
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<h3>Action</h3>
 
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<p>By <em>federating</em> knowledge, a general-purpose <em>methodology</em> can be developed, which preserves the prerogatives of science, and avoids its disadvantages. This way to knowledge enables us to choose our themes according to relevance; and to create guiding insights in all walks of life—and on any desired level of generality or detail.</p>
 
  
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<h3>Federation</h3>
 
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<p>Again quoting Einstein is sufficient. Werner Heisenberg, however, provided us a <em>direct</em> formulation of the <em>narrow frame</em> insight; and also an explanation why the modern physics constitutes a rigorous disproof of the fundamental premises on which the <em>narrow frame</em> has been adopted as the method by which we pursue truth and meaning.</p>
 
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<p>Our <em>prototypes</em> show how the <em>narrow frame</em> evolution can be reversed.</p>
 
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</div> </div>
 
  
 
<div class="page-header" ><h2>Sixth insight</h2> </div>
 
<div class="page-header" ><h2>Sixth insight</h2> </div>
  
 
<div class="row">
 
<div class="row">
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>The five insights are inextricably related</h2></div>
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>The five insights form a whole</h2></div>
 
<div class="col-md-7">
 
<div class="col-md-7">
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<blockquote>
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By putting the <em>five insights</em> together, a larger, new, overarching insight results.
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<h3>The black arrows point to a vicious cycle</h3>
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</blockquote>
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<p>Follow the black arrows in the Five Insights <em>ideogram</em>, to see that the anomalies they connect together cause or <em>create</em> one another:
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<h3>The black arrows form a vicious cycle</h3>
 
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<p>We may now follow the black arrows in the Five Insights <em>ideogram</em>, and see that the anomalies that are linked by those arrows cause or <em>create</em> one another:
 
 
<ul>
 
<ul>
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<li>By using narrowly conceived self-interest as guiding light (which we here called <em>convenience</em>), we co-create, without seeing that, destructive <em>power structures</em></li>  
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<li>It is the <em>power structure</em> that created dysfunctional communication</li>
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<li>Our inability to see and reconfigure our <em>collective mind</em> is just a special case of the anomaly we called <em>power structure</em></li>  
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<li>It is the lack of communication that keeps us in <em>socialized reality</em></li>  
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<li>Lacking information that can 'show us the way', we have no other recourse but to be <em>socialized</em> to accept the present <em>paradigm</em> as "the reality"</li>  
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<li>It is by founding knowledge in "reality" that we ended up with the <em>narrow frame</em></li>  
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<li>Once we've adopted "mirroring reality" to be what truth and information are about—then it follows as a natural consequence to adopt the traditional science as the method by which truth and meaning are created</li>
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<li>It is by using the <em>narrow frame</em> that we mistook <em>convenience</em> for happiness</li>
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<li>Since the <em>narrow frame</em> tells us next to nothing about the possibilities of "human development", we had no other resort but to "pursue happiness" by pursuing <em>convenience</em></li>
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<li>It is our pursuit of convenience that makes us create <em>power structures</em></li>  
 
</ul>  
 
</ul>  
 
</p>  
 
</p>  
  
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<h3>The red arrows form a benign cycle</h3>  
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<h3>The red arrows point to a benign cycle</h3>  
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<p>The red arrows show that we cannot really change one of the insights they connect together, without also changing the other.</p>  
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<p>Follow the red arrows to see that we cannot really change one of the insights they connect, without also changing the other.</p>  
 
<ul>  
 
<ul>  
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<li>To step beyond the <em>convenience paradox</em> and <em>develop</em> the "human quality" (as Aurelio Peccei claimed we must), our <em>collective mind</em> must be able to <em>federate</em> the insights that illuminate the way; to begin to transform our <em>collective mind</em> (which we offered as the natural place to begin or the <em>leverage point</em> for transforming our situation), our values must enable us to forego turf strife,  and begin to self-organize</li>  
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<li>To stand up to the <em>power structures</em>, we must liberate ourselves from the <em>socialized reality</em></li>  
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<li>The <em>power structure</em> and the <em>socialized reality</em> are really just two sides of a single coin—which are the 'hardware' and the 'software' side of our societal <em>order of things</em>: The power holder (<em>power structure</em>) has once again acquired the prerogative to legitimize itself and make itself virtually invisible—by socializing us to accept it as "reality"</li>  
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<li>Our <em>collective mind</em> cannot be structured to <em>federate</em> knowledge, unless we have a method for doing that</li>  
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<li>Similarly, the <em>collective mind</em> and the <em>narrow frame</em> are the 'hardware' and the 'software' aspects of our knowledge work</li>  
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<li>To liberate ourselves from <em>socialized reality</em>, our values need to be different</li>
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<li>We cannot see through the <em>convenience paradox</em>, by including ourselves in the equation—unless our culture gives us the capability to 'see ourselves in the <em>mirror</em>'</li>  
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<li>To broaden the <em>narrow frame</em>, we must see and unravel the <em>power structure</em> that keeps it in place</li>  
 +
<li>To step beyond <em>convenience</em>, we need a <em>collective mind</em> that federates knowledge</li>
 
</ul>  
 
</ul>  
 
</div> </div>  
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Large change can be easy</h2></div>
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>The <em>holotopia</em> strategy follows</h2></div>
 
<div class="col-md-7">
 
<div class="col-md-7">
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<p>We can now see <em>why</em> a comprehensive change can be easy, even when smaller and obviously necessary changes may have proven impossible. The strategy that defines the <em>holotopia</em> naturally follows: Instead of struggling with any of the details, we focus on changing the <em>order of things</em> as a whole.</p>
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<p>We can now see <em>why</em>  
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<p>And here, changing the way in which we look at the world and see the world is of course the key.</p>  
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<blockquote>
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<p>So we may not need to occupy Wall Street. But we <em>may</em> need to occupy the university! It is <em>immensely</em> good news that our future is not in the hands of the professionals whose social function is to turn money into more money—but in the hands of publicly sponsored intellectuals! </p>
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a comprehensive change can be easy, even when smaller and obviously necessary changes may have proven impossible.  
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<p>The changes we want to see in the world, including all those <em>holotopian</em> ones that vastly surpass our highest hopes—can be triggered in the most natural way by carrying the evolution of knowledge a step further.</p>
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</blockquote>
 +
The strategy that defines the <em>holotopia</em> naturally follows: Instead of struggling with the details, we focus on changing the whole <em>order of things</em> they compose together.</p>  
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<p>  
 
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One of our <em>prototypes</em> is a book manuscript titled "What's Going On?", and subtitle "A Cultural Revival". The point was to re-define what constitutes the news; and the spectacle. What's presented in the book is a most spectacular moment in human history, which we are living through right now.</p>  
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One of our <em>prototypes</em> is a book manuscript titled "What's Going On?", and subtitle "A Cultural Revival". The book redefines what constitutes the news—by pointing to a breathtakingly spectacular event taking place in our own time. Slowly!</p>  
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<p>The "problems" we are experiencing are like cracks in the walls of a house whose foundations are failing. Indeed (when we dig a bit under the surface of things and take a look)—there <em>aren't</em> any foundations, really, to speak about. What's there has never been <em>constructed</em>. We are just building on whatever terrain things happened to be placed. Just building further. And higher. </p>  
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<p>By knowing what's going on in this way, we know what needs to be done. The "problems" we are experiencing are like cracks in the walls of a house whose foundations are failing. Our situation calls for <em>rebuilding</em>, not fixing.</p>  
 
</div>  
 
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<div class="col-md-3">
 
[[File:Whats_Going_On.gif]]<br>
 
[[File:Whats_Going_On.gif]]<br>
 
<small>What's Going on <em>ideogram</em></small>  
 
<small>What's Going on <em>ideogram</em></small>  
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</div> </div>
 
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<div class="page-header" > <h2>Ten dialogs</h2> </div>
 
  
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<div class="row">
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<p>This more informed and more effective strategy has "leverage points" through which it is most easily pursued—exactly as the bus with candle headlights might suggest.</p>  
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<div class="col-md-3"></div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7">
 
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<blockquote>The <em>five insights</em> here present us with a context within which age-old themes and challenges can be explored and understood in a completely new way—<em>in the context of</em> the emerging <em>paradigm</em>, the <em>holotopia</em>. </blockquote>
 
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<p>Hence we here, in this context, open the dialogs on fifteen most timely themes—which we label by the <em>five insights</em>, and their ten direct relationships. Since we've already seen the insights, only ten conversations remain to be described.</p>
 
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<p>We provide here only the titles and some hints—and leave it to the <em>dialogs</em> to unpack their meaning, and develop it further.</p>  
 
 
</div> </div>  
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Co-opt Wall Street—the Future of Business</h2></div> 
 
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<div class="col-md-7">
 
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<p>The [[Co-opt Wall Street—the Future of Business]] conversation takes place in the context provided by the Convenience Paradox <em>insight</em> and the Power Structure <em>insight</em>.</p>
 
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<p>How can the emerging re-evolution have enough power to overthrow the powerful? No conflict of power is needed; we can just simply co-opt them!</p>
 
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<p>The power and the powerful, as we've come to perceive them, are both part and parcel of the <em>power structure</em>. The key is to see that our <em>real</em> interests, both personal and global, run counter to the interests of the <em>power structure</em>. </p>
 
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<p>The Adbusters left us a useful concept, "decooling"; a decooling of the popular notions of success and power is ready to take place.</p> 
 
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</div></div>
 
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<div class="row">
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Cybernetics and the Future of Democracy</h2> </div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7"><p>The [[Cybernetics and the Future of Democracy]] conversation has the Power Structure insight and the Collective Mind insight as context.</p>
 
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<p>Cybernetics has taught us that to be governable, a system must have a certain minimal structure—which our systems, and notably our democracies, do not have. Can <em>anyone</em> be in control—in a bus with candle headlights?</p>
 
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<p>Here belongs also the <em>Wiener's paradox</em>—the easily demonstrable fact that the information, as produced in <em>academia</em> has lost its agency (capability to be turned into knowledge, and action). The Wiener–Jantsch–Reagan <em>thread</em>, detailed in Federation through Conversations, provides a suitable springboard story (and we may make this conversation a jour by adding also Donald Trump). </p>
 
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</div></div>
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Ludens—A <em>Recent</em> History of Humankind</h2> </div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7">
 
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<p>The [[Ludens—A Recent History of Humankind]] conversation combines the Collective Mind <em>insight</em> and the Socialized Reality <em>insight</em>.</p>
 
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<p>While we may be biologically equipped to evolve as the <em>homo sapiens</em>, we have in recent decades devolved culturally as the <em>homo ludens</em>, man the (game) player—who shuns knowledge and merely learns his various roles, and plays them out competitively. </p>
 
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<p>The point here is to see that our <em>collective mind</em> being as it is (mostly only <em>broadcasting</em> knowledge), we have no other recourse but to deal with the complex reality in the <em>homo ludens</em> way—i.e. by being socialized into our roles.</p>
 
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<p> The Nietzsche–Ehrlich–Giddens <em>thread</em>, detailed in Federation through Conversations, may provide a suitable start.</p>
 
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</div> </div>
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Future Science</h2> </div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7"><p>The [[Future Science]] conversation combines the Socialized Reality <em>insight</em> and the Narrow Frame <em>insight</em>.</p>
 
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<p>Here we take up the academic <em>dialog</em> in front of the <em>mirror</em>: Has science become a "plagiarist of its own past", as Benjamin Lee Whorf warned us?</p>
 
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<p>Can the <em>academia</em> now make a decisive step 'through the <em>mirror</em>' (by redefining the relationship we as culture have with information)—and lead our society to the other side?</p>
 
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</div> </div>
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Liberation—The Future of Religion</h2></div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7"><p>The [[Liberation—The Future of Religion]] conversation has the Socialized Reality <em>insight</em> and the Convenience Paradox <em>insight</em> as context.</p>
 
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<p>In the traditional societies, religion has played the all-important role of connecting the people to an ethical purpose, and to each other. Heisenberg made a case for the <em>narrow frame</em> insight by pointing the demolition of religion it caused, and the erosion of values that resulted. Can this trend be reversed?</p>
 
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<p>Can we put an end to religion-inspired hatred, terrorism and conflict—by <em>evolving</em> religion further?</p>
 
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<p>The story of Buddhadasa's rediscovery of the Buddha's original insight—in which he recognized the essence of all religion—might be a natural way to begin. The point here is to (create a way to knowledge that enables us to) perceive the <em>liberation</em> from any <em>narrow frame</em>—religions <em>or</em> scientific—and indeed from all forms of egoism and hence of <em>power structure</em> and power-based identity, as the very core of the Buddha's teaching, and as an enlightened way to happiness. </p>
 
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</div> </div>
 
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<div class="row">
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>From One to Infinity—The Future of Happiness</h2></div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7"><p>The [[From One to Infinity—The Future of Happiness]] conversation combines the Convenience Paradox <em>insight</em> and the Collective Mind <em>insight</em>. </p>
 
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<p>All we know about happiness is in the interval between zero (complete misery) and one ("normal" happiness); but what about the rest? What about the happiness between one and plus infinity?</p>
 
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<p>This conversation is about the humanity's best kept secret—that there are <em>realms</em> of thriving and fulfillment, beyond what we've experienced and know it exists. </p>
 
−
<p>While (related to <em>convenience paradox</em>) we defined <em>culture</em> and <em>cultivation</em> by analogy with cultivation of plants, there is a core difference here that needs to be overcome through concerted action: The results of <em>inner</em> cultivation cannot be seen!</p>
 
−
<p>Could this insight constitute the very 'carrot' that Peccei might have been looking for?</p> 
 
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</div> </div>
 
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<div class="row">
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>How to Put an End to War</h2></div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7"><p>The [[How to Put an End to War]] conversation takes place in the context provided by the Power Structure <em>insight</em> and the Socialized Reality <em>insight</em></p>
 
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<p>Alfred Nobel had the right idea: Empower the creative people and their ideas, and the humanity's all-sided progress will naturally be secured. But our creativity, when applied to the cause of peace, has largely favored the palliative approaches (resolving specific conflicts and improving specific situations), and ignoring those more interesting <em>curative</em> ones. What would it take to <em>really</em> put an end to war—once and for all? </p>
 
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<p>A combination of the <em>power structure</em> insight and the <em>socialized reality</em> insight will help us see <em>why</em> putting an end to  is realistically possible: The war is only possible when we live in a worldview which we've been socialized to accept as "reality" by the <em>power structure</em>! </p>
 
−
<p>The Chomsky–Harari–Graeber <em>thread</em>, discussed in Federation through Conversations, will provide us a suitable start.</p>
 
−
</div> </div>
 
−
 
 
−
<div class="row">
 
−
<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Largest Contribution to Knowledge</h2></div>
 
−
 
 
−
<div class="col-md-7"><p>The [[Largest Contribution to Knowledge]] conversation has the Collective Mind <em>insight</em> and the Narrow Frame <em>insight</em> as context.</p>
 
−
<p>It is easy to see (and we've shown that already) why the <em>systemic</em> contributions to human knowledge (improvements of the 'algorithm' by which knowledge is handled in our society) are incomparably larger than <em>specific</em> contributions of knowledge. But there is a contribution to human knowledge that is still larger—the contribution of a way in which the <em>systemic</em> solutions for knowledge work can continuously evolve!</p>
 
−
<p>This conversation is, in other words, about our proposal to add <em>knowledge federation</em> to the academic repertoire of fields—and thereby the capability to evolve knowledge and knowledge-work systems by <em>federating</em> knowledge.</p>
 
−
<p>Such <em>federation</em>, of course, involves working with the <em>collective mind</em> as systems or 'hardware', and  with the <em>narrow frame</em> as methods or 'software'</p>
 
−
</div> </div>
 
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<div class="row">
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>From Zero to One—The Future of Education</h2></div>
 
−
<div class="col-md-7"><p>The [[From Zero to One—The Future of Education]] conversation is in the context of the Socialized Reality <em>insight</em> and the Convenience Paradox <em>insight</em>. </p>
 
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−
<p>In the context of those two insights, it is easy to see why, as Ken Robinson pointed out, "education kills creativity": Education has largely evolved as a way to <em>socialize</em> people into a "reality picture", and hence as an instrument of <em>power structure</em>. What sort of people does the <em>power structure</em> need? The MIddle Ages needed to socialize people to give their bodies to the king, and their minds to the Church. What do the contemporary <em>power structures</em> need?</p>
 
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<p>The title of this conversation is adapted from Peter Thiel's book, where it's intended to point to <em>a certain kind of</em> creativity. We know all about taking things that already exist from one to two, and to three and up to one hundred and beyond. What we need is the capability to conceive of and create things that <em>do not yet exist</em>.</p>
 
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<p>Can we conceive an education that has no longer <em>socialization</em>, but "human development" as goal? </p>
 
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</div> </div>
 
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<div class="row">
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Future Art</h2></div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7">
 
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<p>The [[Future Art]] conversation takes place in the context of the Narrow Frame insight and the Power Structure insight. </p>
 
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<p>Art has always been an instrument of cultural reproduction; and on the forefront of social change. When Duchamp exhibited the urinal, he challenged the traditional <em>conception</em> of art. The question is—what's next? What will art be like, in a world where our core task is not only to question an outdated <em>order of things</em>, but to <em>create</em> a whole new one?</p>
 
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<p>By placing it between an insight that demands that new forms of expression be created, and another one that demands new societal structures, this conversation offers to art a vast new frontier.</p>
 
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<p>Debord's Society of the Spectacle can here be <em>federated</em>.</p> 
 
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</div> </div>
 
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<div class="page-header" > <h2>Restoring purpose to information, and to knowledge its agency</h2> </div>
 
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<div class="row">
 
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<div class="col-md-3"></div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7">
 
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<p>Having used the <em>holoscope</em> to illuminate our general condition, and to <em>federate</em> The Club of Rome's core findings and call to action, we are now ready to revisit our proposal, and see how it firs into the big picture we've created. Let's begin by re-emphasizing our main point, that "the core of our proposal is to change the relationship we have with information". In the language of our metaphor, we are <em>not</em> saying "Here is a 'lightbulb', to replace those 'candles'."
 
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</p>
 
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<blockquote>
 
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By proposing to <em>academia> to add <em>knowledge federation</em> to its repertoire of activities and fields, we are proposing an 'electromechanical workshop', which will develop and install new 'sources of illumination', and to improve them continuously—by taking advantage of new knowledge of knowledge, and information technology.
 
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</blockquote>
 
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In what follows we look at this proposal from several points of view.</p>
 
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</div> </div>
 
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<div class="row">
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2>Use of knowledge resources</h2></div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7">
 
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<p>The point of view here is the <em>academia</em>'s prerogative to give to the academic workers, and to the rest of the world, conceptual and methodological tools, processes and institutional structures for handling knowledge. The question here is how this prerogative is used.</p>
 
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<p>It is the prerogative of <em>academia</em> to tell everyone what information and knowledge are about, how they are to be created and used etc. Considering that our theme of focus is "a great cultural revival", we are especially interested in the workflow of knowledge in and from the humanities.</p>
 
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<p>Considering that the tools, processes and institutional structures in knowledge work will decide the <em>effects</em> and the effectiveness of knowledge work, we must ask—<em>how</em> are those tools, processes and institutional structures created?</p>
 
−
<p>The obvious answer is that they are not. They are simply inherited from the past. Instead of considering them as part of their creative frontier <em>par excellence</em>, the academic workers are <em>socialized</em> to accept them as part and parcel of their vodation. <em>That</em> is what (applied to the <em>academia</em>) the metaphor of the candle headlights is intended to signify.</p>
 
−
<p>Then our next question must be—<em>how well</em> do those tools and processes serve us?</p>
 
−
<p>Here we may bring up, fir instance, Bourdieu's "theory of practice". If you are a sociology student, you will probably study it as one of the theories, among so many others; but you won't be asked to <em>do</em> anything with it. And if you are not a sociology student, the chances are (as we have seen) that not only you've never heard about Bourdieu, but that your ideas about the social world are in stark contradiction to whatever Bourdieu was trying to tell us. Put simply, our <em>collective mind</em> has no connections between the research in sociology and the rest of us.</p>
 
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<p>Bourdieu happened to notice this general issue. When a decade ago, when we were "evangelizing" for our reorganization of Knowledge Federation as a <em>transdiscipline</em>, we told the story how Bourdieu teamed up with Coleman, and undertook to put sociology back together. And how Bourdieu made a case for this attempted <em>structural</em> change of sociology, by arguing why it may be "the largest contribution" to the field. It remained to point to the obvious—that Bourdieu's observation is far <em>more</em> true when we look at sociology as a piece in a larger puzzle, of our society.</p>
 
−
<p>To become "a sociologist", one is given a certain 'toolkit' that goes with that title.</p>
 
−
<p>Add to this picture the new media technology—which enabled the power over knowledge, that the "official culture" earlier secured through its control over the media (publishing agencies, opera houses etc.), to escape the "official culture" and fall into the hands of counterculture. </p>
 
−
<p>It takes a bit of courage now to lift up the eyes from these details, and see that in the large picture—the nature and the quality of the <em>academia</em>'s  'toolkit' could be such that it renders even an extraordinarily talented individual, a one who could change the world—<em>entirely</em> useless to the world!</p>
 
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</div> </div>
 
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<div class="row">
 
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<div class="col-md-3"><h2><em>Human development</em>  and <em>socialization</em></div>
 
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<div class="col-md-7">
 
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<p>What consequences does this have for <em>human development</em>?</p>
 
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<p>We here
 
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Latest revision as of 06:44, 1 June 2020

H O L O T O P I A    P R O T O T Y P E



Five Insights

FiveInsights.JPG
The Five Insights ideogram

The holotopia vision is made concrete in terms of five interrelated insights.

Power structure

Powered by ingenuity of innovation, the Industrial Revolution radically improved the efficiency of human work. Where could the next revolution of this kind be coming from?


Collective mind

The printing press revolutionized communication, and enabled the Enlightenment. But the Internet and the interactive digital media constitute a similar revolution. Hasn't the change we are proposing, from 'the candle' to 'the lightbulb', already been completed?

Socialized reality

The Enlightenment was before all a change of epistemology. An ancient praxis was revived, which developed knowledge of knowledge. On that as foundation, a completely new worldview emerged—which led to "a great cultural revival", and to comprehensive change. On what grounds could a similar chain of events begin today?

Narrow frame

Science gave us a completely new way to look at the world. It gave us powers that the people in Galilei's time couldn't dream of. What might be the theme of the next revolution of this kind?


Convenience paradox

The Renaissance liberated our ancestors from preoccupation with the afterlife, and empowered them to seek happiness here and now. The lifestyle changed, and the culture blossomed. How could the next such change begin?


Sixth insight

The five insights form a whole

The black arrows point to a vicious cycle

Follow the black arrows in the Five Insights ideogram, to see that the anomalies they connect together cause or create one another:

  • It is the power structure that created dysfunctional communication
  • It is the lack of communication that keeps us in socialized reality
  • It is by founding knowledge in "reality" that we ended up with the narrow frame
  • It is by using the narrow frame that we mistook convenience for happiness
  • It is our pursuit of convenience that makes us create power structures

The red arrows point to a benign cycle

Follow the red arrows to see that we cannot really change one of the insights they connect, without also changing the other.

  • To stand up to the power structures, we must liberate ourselves from the socialized reality
  • Our collective mind cannot be structured to federate knowledge, unless we have a method for doing that
  • To liberate ourselves from socialized reality, our values need to be different
  • To broaden the narrow frame, we must see and unravel the power structure that keeps it in place
  • To step beyond convenience, we need a collective mind that federates knowledge


The holotopia strategy follows

We can now see why

a comprehensive change can be easy, even when smaller and obviously necessary changes may have proven impossible.

The strategy that defines the holotopia naturally follows: Instead of struggling with the details, we focus on changing the whole order of things they compose together.


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