There is no problem communicating a message today. There is a massive problem with having it heard. Likewise, there is no problem collecting information today, but there is a massive problem in separating valuable information from garbage. In that statement lies the future of our intellectual pursuits, and especially of research and library science.
I've been told that information doubles every 18 months. Regardless of whether this is truth or merely an urban myth, what is beyond dispute is that humanity's pile of data is expanding far, far faster than our ability to comprehend the growing, disorganized heap of factoids. The problem of trivia is not a trivial problem, and to see this, let's move forward 20 years and consider what we will experience then.
Let's accept, for argument's sake, that knowledge does double every 18 months. In 15 years, therefore, it will double ten times, which means that for every fact we encounter now, we will then have more than 1,000. Imagine if you had to cope with 1,000 times more information than you do right now. How would that change your life and your profession?
First, you would not be able to read faster, work harder, or spend more time in order to keep up. If you have 20% more information, working harder is a possibility. If you have 1,000 times more, the task becomes impossible. Next, decisions will be more complex. There will be more involved decisions; there will be more specialists to consult; there will be more relevant information to know. And this inevitably means that we, as a society, will make worse decisions, using only a small part of the available information. In particular, our governments, businesses, and organizations will make more bad decisions than they do now. And the mass media, which will be enormously fragmented, will report things at a level of shallowness that will make the Jerry Springers of the world seem like Bertrand Russell. Perception will become reality, and very quickly.
With more bad decisions and more facts will come more divisiveness. Community depends on shared values and shared perceptions of the way the world should be. With an explosion of facts, and ever narrower narrowcasters targeting progressively tinier market niches, community will disappear. Marshall McLuhan was almost right when he talked about the Global Village, but he left out one letter: 's'. We will live in Global Villages, divided into affinity groups unrelated by geography, and will have little in common with our neighbours. We are dividing ourselves by the information we choose and by the facts we exclude. A bleak picture, to be sure, but the last thing out of Pandora's Box is hope.
Let us start by remembering that it is not information that is important, but understanding, and through it, wisdom. We do not need to examine every pebble on the beach to know it is a seashore. What we need is discrimination and purpose. If all information, if all the factoids lined up in their seductive, shiny packages, if all the data bits arrayed in their orderly data cores, were equal, then we would well and truly be lost. But not all information is created equal, and humanity has been through this before, so let's look backwards: what strategy did our forebearers devise in the Renaissance, when it was no longer possible for one person to know everything?
They looked for the meaningful fact, and sought to place it in context. In scientific endeavour, we do not merely collect a grab bag of observations, but take our observations and string them into theory so that we may grasp them as a generality, not as meaningless specifics. In our relations with other people, we devise strategies, such as social graces, courtesies, and manners, that allow us to deal with the many people whom we have never met before. In researching a term paper, we look not for the random fact, but the one that supports or contradicts what we are trying to verify.
As a futurist, studying all of human reality, I've divided the world into a hierarchy of information that is relevant to my studies, deciding which are the major forces moving the world. I construct theories about the way these forces are operating and the trends they are creating, then look for the meaningful facts that support or refute my theories. If a theory is damaged too often, I discard it, and seek another. (One futurist brilliantly described this state of mind as 'strong opinions, weakly held.')
This allows me to slice across the surface of what is happening, and to zero in on the meaningful. This approach encourages perception, discrimination, and thoughtfulness. Since I started this about eight years ago, I've found it much easier to deal with the daily downpour of data. Headlines rarely surprise or inform me.
Perception, discrimination, selection, consideration, context, thought, understanding, then wisdom; this is the path we need to follow.
Our hope out of Pandora's Box is purpose; to seek the meaningful fact, and to place it as a piece in the puzzle process that is the understanding of the world, then to stand back from that puzzle, regard the picture made whole, and to comprehend at last what we are truly seeing. This is the beginning of wisdom. To do anything less will be to be crushed beneath the weight of our own knowledge.
Seek the meaningful fact and meaning follows from within, not from without.
© Copyright, IF Research, November 1999.
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