Holotopia

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Seeing things whole

We have proposed a new approach to knowledge (or technically a paradigm). We'll refer to it here by its (less technical) pseudonym holoscope, which points to its distinguishing characteristic—namely that it allows us to put together disparate pieces of information, and show a theme or an issue as a whole.

Science gave us new ways to look at the world, and our vision expanded beyond bounds. The telescope and the microscope enabled us to see the things that were too distant or too small to be seen by the naked eye. At the same time, science had the tendency to keep us focused on things that were either too distant or too small to be relevant – compared to all those big and important things that now demand our attention. Holoscope is conceived as way to look at the world that helps us see the whole – from all sides, and in correct proportions.

Perspective-S.jpg

Every theme has a visible and a subtle side. The holoscope illuminates what has remained hidden, to show an issue in correct shape and proportions—and how it may need to be handled.

Holotopia as a vision

A complete model (or technically a prototype) of the holoscope having been described on our website Holoscope.org, and explained in a variety of ways on Dino's blog Holoscope.info, we here describe a proof of concept application, which is in development. We present it as an answer to the question "What difference could this new approach to knowledge make?"

Supposed that you had in your hand a flashlight, which you could use to illuminate any theme or issue. What would you point it to?

We here use the holoscope to 'illuminate the way'. Our aim is not to predict the future, but to show a possible future. And to begin to follow a course by which this future can be reached.

The holotopia is more desirable future than the common utopias. Yet it is fully realizable. We already own all the knowledge needed for its fulfillment.

Bussy.jpg By depicting our society as a bus, and the way we handle knowledge as a pair of candle headlights, the holoscope renders the nature of our condition in a nutshell.


The five insights

The holotopia vision is made concrete in terms of five insights. The idea is to show that when a core theme of interest is illuminated by the light of available knowledge—we see it in a completely new light; and in a similar way as we might see the way this theme was handled in the Middle Ages. By doing this, we give a positive answer to the question posited in the Holoscope.org's opening paragraphs:

Think about the world at the twilight of the Middle Ages and the dawn of the Renaissance: devastating religious wars, terrifying epidemics… Think of the scholastics pondering about the angels dancing on a needlepoint; and Galilei in house arrest, whispering “and yet it moves” into his beard. 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 comprehensive evolution followed. Could a similar advent be in store for us today?


FiveInsights.JPG

What makes the holotopia 'work', its 'engine' if you will, are its five insights. strategically located in five pivotal areas. Each of them alone is sufficient to see the 'conventional wisdom' and the habitual practice in that domain in a similar light as we now see their counterparts in Galilei's time. Still the most interesting are their interdependencies.

Together, the five insights show in clear light the holotopia's main insight—that a comprehensive and fundamental change can be easy, even when much smaller and obviously necessary changes may have proven impossible.