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World Brain 2

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on March 5, 2016 at 10:48:21 pm
 

Top : Science : Psychology : Psychology Conceptual Network : Consciousness : Global Consciousness : World Mind : World Brain 2

 

Requirements to World Brain 2  

World Brain 2 Action Plan

World Brain 2 Participants

World Brain 2 on FB

Cognitive Processes of World Brain

 

Communication on FB:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/125513674232534/permalink/876176262499601/

 

https://openintelligence.wordpress.com/constructing-the-world-mind/

Original Text

Comments

Reflection

Constructing the World Mind

 

In the late 1930s. H. G. Wells perceived the world to be on the edge of social, political and environmental disaster. In response. Wells conceived of what he called a “world knowledge apparatus’ based on the creation of an efficient learning network.

 

This interactive book is designed to show how, through using both the World Wide Web and traditional paper and print, Wells’ vision could be implemented as a practical communication process. This document is organized by a framework of questions – those which were used to interrogate the source books shown on the opposite page. In order to identify the common threads of meaning in these books, we gathered and re-organized what the authors were saying under five categories.

 

 

Purposes: (what the World Mind offers) opportunities

Learning to survive in harmony

Can our society double up its mind-capacity? It must do so or die; and I can see no reason why it may not widen its consciousness of complex conditions far enough to escape wreck.” – Henry Adams, American educationalist [1838 – 1919]

 

H. G. Wells thought that the only way out of humanity’s seemingly headlong rush towards self-destruction was by inventing a global process of learning. It is for this reason that he set the goal of organising what he called a World Encyclopaedia. As we approach the Third Millennium the systemic social and environmental breakdown — the mass extinction of species — caused by human behavior, which Wells feared so much, appears to be just about to engulf the planet.

 

It is as if here and now — in nearly our last moment — before the life-destroying process becomes irreversible that an opportunity is being presented for helpless, dispersed individuals to pool their knowledge in order to find a way out of our self-made predicament, or at least, as James Lovelock suggests, to pass on some useful knowledge to any survivors left after a cataclysm.

 

 The purpose of these pages is to carry on the work started by Wells in the 1930s by using them to create a group learning process focused on the subject of the World Mind itself. They are also a demonstration of how a systematic method of analysing and synthesising information, called Content Analysis, and a form of Tony Buzan’s Mindmapping (TM) can be used as fundamental tools in the actual construction of a World Mind which could learn fast enough to avert social and environmental catastrophe.

THEN …. from the 1930s

ENDS

Organizing – Constructing a World Encyclopedia

A common, systematic global organization of the world’s knowledge is conceived by H. G. Wells as the only way for humanity to achieve a “common conception of a common purpose.” What he called the World Encyclopedia would, he said, act as a “clearing house of misunderstandings” without being subject to “narrowing dogmas,” while remaining open to “corrective criticism.” According to Wells, this new organ would clearly distinguish “bed rock fact” from visions, projects and theories, but would have an inevitable “bias” towards “organization, comparison, construction and creation”. In 1972 Manfred Kochen envisaged many such “organs” would emerge with the aim of creating a global community brain which he named WISDOM (Worldwide Intelligence Service for the Development of Omniscience in Mankind). See WISDOM Organisations List.

common conception of a common purpose.” 

 

Peter Turchin uses the word Assabiya in his analysis of the cycles of how empires rise and fall.  Assabiya grows and falls in the face of a threat to coherence. It occurs not only in the cognitive space. As important are qualities of the affective and material space.

When aWaves, cWaves, mWaves are in sync coherence of an nTube increases.

 

 

 

Learning – A lifelong requirement

H. G. Wells says the World Brain’s purpose would be to “make it easier for individuals to learn by and for themselves,” while systematically providing “almost infinitely adaptable” lifelong learning requirements aimed at all sectors of society.

{Same with LikeInMind Purposes - DVS}  
(Same with Intent of Nemetics)
 

Harmonizing- In an “age of imperative construction”

In the Critical Introduction, Adamantine’s editor, Alan Mayne links H. G. Wells World Brain concept with both John Amos Comenius citing his 1643 tract, Patterns of Universal Knowledge, proposing “an internal peace of minds inspired by a system of ideas and thinking”, and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s idea of the noosphere, described as “a network of ideas and thought covering the whole planet”. In H. G. Wells view, this “rehabilitation of thought and learning” would bring to the world a more “progressive, adaptable and recuperative” form of religious expression. In order to achieve what Wells called “the beginning of a new world”, first a “synthesis of knowledge” would have to be undertaken by evolving a “networking organism”  (Mayne) or a “widespread world intelligence conscious of itself” (Wells).  Wells believed it would be the “New world or nothing,” and expected people’s lives would be changed “essentially and irrevocably” in the face of what he saw as mankind’s “primary need in this age of imperative construction.”

“networking organism” = Internet of Sense? - DVS


The Internet of Things is the physical world conscious of itself - Nemetics 

"physical world conscious of itself" -
When machines can communicate to create feed back loops to affect behavior it can fairly be called an operational definition of conscious of itself. I think it is a useful stretch of the word. .

 

 

MEANS

Interactive processing – Emphasising the key concepts of cyberspace

H. G. Wells emphasises the necessity to “fully recognise that communication is a two way process” and also the importance of effective presentation, while Alan Mayne calls the Brain a “social networking” organism or “nervous system.”

Knowledge Working – Learning to create an “intellectual authority”

People whom H. G. Wells called “intellectual workers”  would, he predicted, arise from the world’s universities and research institutions and cooperate in order to create an “intellectual authority” – consisting of a “network” linking centres of learning with the people of the world, whom he conceived as its “general intelligence”.  

“intellectual workers” = Knowledge Workers? - DVS


This process is not observed. Universities are known as the least progressive organisations: Most Inert Social Institutions. - DVS
He misses the knowledge workers required by Industry. Pockets of change are happening in Universities. MJ  
 
The goals of Wells’ life long learning society are listed as: developing individual talents, fostering “each individual’s capacity for independent thinking” and providing the practical knowledge needed “for working and everyday life.”   See Server of Ready Solutions as a "Pattern Database" with real-time Direct Access to Particular Information - DVS
The requirements of business organizations MJ
 

H. G. Wells predicts that knowledge workers will move from the assembly of knowledge to its digestion, with the ultimate objective of achieving wisdom, defined as having “a sense of knowing what to do, when handling complex problems that require understanding and effective decisions.” 

NOW ….in the  1990s

ENDS

Instrument of evolution

For H. G. Wells, the purpose of the World Brain was primarily instrumental. It was a way to organise human thinking and knowledge by using information management techniques to make it easier for humans to learn. The matter-of-fact practicality of his vision contrasts with the more spiritual aspects expressed in notions, such as Sri Aurobindo’s “Supermind” and Teillard de Chardin’s noosphere in which the unfolding of complexity is conceived as a process of God meeting his creation at the Omega point.

Any work with knowledge, assembly, digestion, etc. requires access to particular knowledge in real time, matter of seconds, as demonstrated by LikeInMind: Findability Experiment - DVS


Knowledge, assembly, digestion is called Connectivism in the world of education.
Fork to Connectivism 

 

The spiritual aspect highlights what is usually missing from the tech or intellectual world - feelings and intent. The authentic intents are always based on feelings. The words are chosen to make those feelings explicit. MJ

 
The 1990s sources tended to conceive evolution as a process — now seen to be more of unfolding complexity, than of genetic competition — which is an end in itself. In the words of Hans Swegen, “we are in the forefront of evolution and evolution will use our abilities to shape its continued development” as an open process with “no defined goals.” The view is that a learning organ must be a means to its own end which is learning, the same as evolution. Rather than means to it's own ends, Wisdom to make sound judgments about challenges and opportunities - MJ  
 This linking of human intelligences into global — even galactic and universal — metaminds as part of the inevitable pattern of evolution, contrasts with James Lovelock’s much more practical and alarming view which sees a world knowledge compendium as “a guide book for our survivors to help them rebuild civilisation without repeating too many of our mistakes.”  galactic and universal  Maybe... I see it more as getting emotions into the mix.   

MEANS
Technical means found, intellectual means lost?

The 1990s versions of the World Brain concept — being less practical perhaps — put their faith in evolution as the principle means by which the world brain phenomenon will come to pass. H. G. Wells put his faith in promoting ways of enhancing human learning as the best means of “socially constructing” the global mind. For both H. G. Wells and James Lovelock, the World Brain is a project needing

  • human attention,
  • major policy decisions and
  • some form of money to realise.1

The irony is that now that the technological means to create a world knowledge resource are here in the form of worldwide computer networking and multimedia databases, the intellectual means pointed to by H. G. Wells in the 1930s seem to have been forgotten.2

1 How are we going to collect the required resources, above? I still think, the project will be unrealistic without an Action Plan, measurements of the factors and progress towards the established goal. - DVS
Measure the number of hits and the number of people who are editing. The quantity doesn't matter as much as the patterns. If you see a jump, something happened. Try to infer why it happened and then do more of that. If any growth pattern continues, you can be pretty sure you are doing something right. If not keep tweaking until the spurt of growth occurs.  The size of the spurt is irrelevant. 

Q2MJ: My concern is how we accumulate all the resources together. - DVS


2Interesting Point!! I have same question from the very beginning of my development of LikeInMind!! Would anyone comment critically, please? I would be more interested in knowing more on HOW to remove this barrier!! - DVS  

 

  • human attention,
     

Attention is Notice. Engage. We can watch it emerge by watching the patterns of the aWave, cWave, mWave.  In general the mWave is not subject to human volition. Demography, technology, organization of work are the evolutionary forces. Patterns of aWaves represents how much people care. The technology allows that caring to become explicit. Once explicit it can be shared which provides a positive feedback loop.  "I am not alone" is a common realization at the beginning of every social movement.

Changes in the aWave are visible through Exchange. When three people engage with LIM on a regular basis, you will get to an inflection point. 

Q2MJ: I am not sure how we will do all those measurements technically. - DVS

Quickly, any type of world question requires a global authority. So the UN, UNICEF and so on are the places to look for funding.
Most authorities will agree on the why things are needed, and often on what needs doing, but then fall over when trying to work out how to get things done.
This is a repeating pattern, and one where the ST community have a big role to play, if we can work together collaboratively.
Which is what I'm working on now.
Hope this helps, PJ

Needs: (what the World Mind requires) requirements

– NEEDS –

Fast Growing Awareness

The human tendency to ignore or resist the need to change until events impose it may yet prove fatal to our species. We should remember that every civilisation in history has been destroyed, even without the potential for destruction we possess through our technology. The prospect that new civilisations may evolve from the remnants of our own, or that new lifeforms may evolve in a new, post-human ecosystem is barely a consolation.

 

We live in a world in which the Ice-caps caps are literally cracking up as a result of global warming. Ocean currents, which are the life blood of the global ecosystem, are already being disrupted. The consequences will be as inescapable, as they are incalculable. Nevertheless, people still insist on flying the polar routes in ever increasing numbers of ozone destroying planes. Every day they use cars which pollute the air they breath, and add massive quantities of carbon dioxide to the mix of green house gases. People watch their local communities and economies wither and die, while simultaneously importing and exporting luxury goods and foodstuffs from the other side of the world, wasting massive amounts oil, one of the world’s most precious resources.

 

People believe in ideologies propagated by self-interested elites and narrowly focused professionals because the knowledge is not available for them to think about the issues themselves. Probably by far the most dangerous of these ideologies is the free trade doctrine, now enshrined in the World Trade Organisation (WTO), which is threatening the world’s most valuable assets, its cultural and environmental diversity. Backed by the might of international capital, the power of this ideology appears more absolute than any power in human history. The treaties on which it is based have been decided more on the basis of dogma and global commercial interests than understanding of its effects on cultural and bio-diversity or climate change and without any consultation with the people it will affect most.

Sorry for repeating: Action Plan, please? - DVS

 The action plan is to continuously improve LIM. Small, slow, steady is the Nemetics Approach. (!!! Added to World Brain 2 Action Plan - DVS)
 

THEN ….from the 1930s

INDIVIDUALS

Recognize Urgency – Do or Die

In H. G. Wells’ view, the world is in a race between education and catastrophe and “catastrophe is winning.” He laments that the “urgency of adaptation has still to be grasped” now that humankind has become what he called “a new animal”, so much more “incredibly swift and strong — except in the head”. For Wells it was a case of either “the evolution of a new more powerful type of man” or “the extinction of our species.”

   

Recognize Perils – The Perils of Ignoring Ignorance

In H. G. Wells view knowledge is “unused and misapplied” so that policy makers are ill-equipped “to be aware of or fully appreciate” the knowledge available to solve their (our – Ed]. problems. He quotes John Maynard Keynes warning that they are “so ignorant that there is knowledge and of what knowledge is, that they do not understand that it matters.”  All these problems are despite policy makers being “overworked”  and “overloaded with information”. {}

Findability / Discoverability Problem? - DVS
Knowledge must be prepared for Decision Making: solved by addressing IVAN Dimensions - DVS
 

Wells blames “intellectual impatience” for “disastrously making discordance’s worse” due to what he calls a “particular spasmodic conception of the change needful.” Other commentators are cited blaming the content of education and the unorganised flood of information as being particularly limiting factors.  

Surprising that Systematic and Systemic Organisation of Information (Global Body of Knowledge) is still missing while being a goal of the science as an social institution for centuries!! (Death of Science) LikeInMind is the only known platform organising knowledge in Systematic and Systemic way for easy access and reuse. - DVS

 I don't see it as missing. It's now coming to coherence all over the world in many platforms, transmedia and transliteracy is an uber trend.
 

SOCIETIES

Social Construction – “Lively and continuous invention”

Against the “menace” of “a general ignorance,” the inability of scientists to communicate, and what he believed to be the “urgent failings of the teaching profession,” H. G. Wells holds up a vision which he considered “no utopian dream” but a forecast of a world community “to which I believe we are driving now,” enlightened by science and brought about by “lively and continuous invention.”

Death of Science? - DVS  
Wells regarded the formation of such a community as our “primary need in this age of imperative construction,” an age in which the theoretical and the practical would be “of equal importance.”   !!! Sounds like STA Methodology? :)
Due to the current tilt in our culture towards "scientific" and often fruitless theorising, I would ask participants to FOCUS ON ACTIONS & PRACTICAL OUTCOMES. We have plenty of theory. Even more theory, languages and other artefacts will emerge during our journey. That's one of the fundamentals of STA Methodology - DVS
 

Moral Transformation – No evidence of the only hope

What H. G. Wells called “a mechanical unification of the world” he saw as “demanding profound moral and ideological readjustments”- while the necessary “mental and moral adaptation is lagging dreadfully behind the change in our conditions”. Wells also expresses his “deep disrespect” for the concept of the dignity of human history, which he characterises as “pure comedy, if it were not so largely tragic, so frequently dismal, generally dishonorable and occasionally quite horrible.”
The need for sensitivity and a “world heart” is expressed: Wells advocates that global environmental problems, the “massacre of important animals” and the waste and exhaustion of resources, should be “matters of universal knowledge and concern,” and he warns against the awesome destructiveness of bomb technology.

Related to Wholeness Principles? - DVS  

NOW ….in the  1990s

INDIVIDUALS

“Clear and simple words against ignorance”

James Lovelock echoes H. G. Wells in his plea for “a guidebook written in clear and simple words.”1 According to Lovelock, this book would counteract the influence of “books and television programmes that present, either the single minded view of the specialist or persuasion from a talented lobbyist”.2He laments that the 1990s are “adversarial not thoughtful times,” hearing only the partial arguments of special interest groups. 

1 !!! Refer to IVAN Dimensions and pattern matching problem at delivery complex and complicated information. - DVS

2 Lossless Participation - DVS
We need to define principles of Cohesion of Participants based on the Wholeness Principles, and namely, on following the Unity of Thoughts, Emotions and Feeling of The Truth. Activities based on principles different from Wholeness are expected leading to scattering of efforts and failure of the projects. Not only principles but also methods of work should be agreed and followed. - DVS
 
They agree on the urgent do-or-die nature of the problem, as well as on the perils of ignorance. To quote Lovelock on this point: “We are so ignorant of those individual acts of genius [which] established civilisation that we now give equal place on our bookshelves to astrology, creationism and homeopathy. Imagine trying to cope with a cholera epidemic using knowledge gathered from a tattered book on alternative medicine.” 
However, despite Lovelock’s misgivings, there is growing evidence that collaboration, as opposed to competition, is becoming increasingly part of 1990s rhetoric, and sometimes part of the practice in the spheres of management and
Particularly in this citation, the Wholeness Principle is not followed. I believe, that alternative medicine, and homeopathy in particular, has a long-term effect. It's healing capabilities are very limited for treatment of critical cases and emergency. Each method must be published without any bias. LikeInMind provides a possibility to publish any and every points of view for further analysis, verification and/or constructive criticism. In future P2PCI platform the mechanisms of Auto-Correlation of Experts to Areas of Expertise will filter and deliver information relevant to the fields of expertise / research topics, etc, in accordance with individual profiles and preferences. - DVS  

SOCIETIES

A culture of the book

Much as H. G. Wells argued for a “world encyclopedia” which would be created by means of social construction and knowledge invention, James Lovelock envisages a society organised around a book, much as European society used to be organised around the Bible; but the book would have “to acknowledge science”. 
Science has discredited itself: Death of Science. Should we probably consider just a "Scientific Method" instead? I do not like idea of Science as a modern religion... :) - DVS  

 

Agree: Knowledge Management as a practice of "extraction", arrangement, storage and delivery of individual and group knowledge has discredited itself. KMers switched to conventional methods of HR and Staff Management under "KM sauce". The only practice of working with Knowledge as it supposed to be, to my knowledge, is LikeInMind. - DVS

It is germane that the more advanced thinking in the field of information “science” conceives of knowledge management as primarily as a social, rather than a solitary mental activity, while corporate group knowledge working is increasingly construed as being a part of community and team building using techniques of constructive cooperation. Moral transformation is beginning to happen as people begin to value things, such as knowledge systems and ecological systems in more consciously qualitative ways. This revaluation, in which harmonious sustainability as highest value and mere survival as very much second best, will reorient the value of money towards being a means, rather than as an end, as it is in financial profit driven economies.

 

https://openintelligence.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/components.jpg

 

Components: (how World Mind can be designed) design

– COMPONENTS –

Information objects traded on a knowledge market

1 We should not expect too much from AI: Sociological Feasibility of Artificial Intelligence. It's area of expertise will be limited by safety, security and other critical decision making factors. STA Methodology also postulates emergence of concepts from situation being analysed, i.e. Locality defines coherence of data, models, concepts, actors, methods, intelligence and decision making processes. In the "best case", AI will be just one of the Actors of the decision making. In the "worst case", AI will be absent from the any particular Locality. People would need to communicate their information and knowledge and come to decisions collectively. - DVS

 

2 Exactly!!! Findability and Discoverability is defined by degree of Synchronisation of Associative Networks, Our Associative Networks, Dear Participants!! - DVS

 

3 Gamification ? - DVS

 

4 PBIIMS? - DVS

 

The components of what H. G. Wells advocated provide a picture of an omnipresent organ, consisting of an ever growing knowledge base fed by a global community of scholars and information professionals. Although H. G. Wells expected the operation of the World Brain to be funded publicly, he was worried about the dangers of a kind of intellectual monopoly. A component unforeseen by H. G. Wells, which may well take care of his doubts, is the emergence of a free market for knowledge. A huge number of “knowledge objects” already exist — as H. G. Wells well knew. The element most needed now is organizing and compiling them into an intuitively understandable framework that enables common access.

There is a controversial strain of thought among the Artificial Intelligence community which advocates the use of computer systems to carry out this knowledge processing. Even they admit, though, that the project will take many years before it becomes a practical proposition, assuming a true understanding of people’s intelligence and knowledge processes is reached. {1} In the words of Tony Kent, software pioneer, “finding useful information is an intelligent process requiring intelligent people because at the end of the day only the intelligent can recognize what is useful.” Meanwhile, there is a huge abundance of human intelligence all over the world, most of it wasted, because of lack of knowledge. What are we waiting for? {2}

 

James Lovelock hints at some important components of the intelligence process which must be present if any kind of human learning organization is to work. It must be fun {3} and it must be rewarding {4}. Although, as Lovelock says, durable hard copy versions of the World Encyclopedia must be widely available for use in case of emergency. In the meantime deploying multimedia computer networks in the service of a global learning enterprise must be desirable … and more fun and much cheaper than long-lasting print alone.

 

THEN ….from the 1930s

FORM

An omnipresent organ

Connecting People by Connecting Their Knowledge? - DVS

H. G. Wells envisages a “new world organ” which would, “using the continually increasing facilities of photography,” render the world wide “reduplication of indexes of records continually easier.”  Wells even wrote that the World Brain “might have the form of a network” with its files and conferences at “the core of its being” . According to Wells, frequently reissued volumes of “the essential Encyclopaedia” would spawn “swarms of pamphlets.”

 

CONTENT

A perpetually growing knowledge base

All features are realised at LikeInMind and can be demonstrated. - DVS

To H. G. Wells, the world encyclopaedia would not be “a row of volumes printed and published”, but would rather be a “mental clearing house for the mind … where knowledge and ideas are received, sorted, summarised, digested, clarified and compared,” and trends, forecasts and alternative scenarios are considered. He believed that up-to-date selections, abstracts and quotations {Wiki and Agile Principles. - DVS} would be “carefully collated and edited” in such a way as to be “not a miscellany, but a concentration, a clarification and a synthesis” written in “clear understandable language.” However, to overcome the problem of too much knowledge creating information overload, Wells thought that “wisdom” defined as “the ability to use understanding to mobilise and coordinate all resources into appropriate and timely action” would form an essential component of the World Brain. This “common backbone” linking theoretical and practical knowledge, Wells describes as “a perpetual digest and conference on the one hand and a system of publication and distribution on the other” which would become a “learning organism in its own right.”

 

STRUCTURE

Inventing the concept of hypertext

“effective schemes for classification” = "taxonomy": Home ? - DVS

“extensive and comprehensive indexes” = Topics? - DVS

1 Lossless Participation? - DVS

H. G. Wells believed he was outlining “a scheme for the reorganisation and reorientation of information and education throughout the world.” He advocated “effective schemes for classification”  and “extensive and comprehensive indexes” , the “construction” of which would be “closely coordinated”. According to Wells, these retrieval tools would be cross-referenced to assist users in viewing information from “various viewpoints and approaches.” {1}

 

PEOPLE

The key global resource

“systematic collaborative effort” is what LikeInMind is built on. - DVS

Multidisciplinary - Yes!
Not only "scholars, scientists and intellectuals" will have "broadening and enlightening both popular and specialist minds": LikeInMind is a Collective Intelligence platform of participants with different backgrounds. LikeInMind is where flows of data and knowledge are collected and analysed in the way similar to SenseMaker: see P2PCI.

“specialised editors and summarists” are already working - that's us, MJ? :)

"synthesise and abstract the content of existing sources" is a part of LikeInMind Purposes

IVAN For Education will realise these suggestions. See PBIIMS Proposal and IVAN Dimensions

"people to spend their lives in the process of self-managed learning, the results of which would be “distributed through the general information channels of the world”" - according to the principles of Open-Source Everything? - DVS

In H. G. Wells view the World Encyclopaedia would be created by the “systematic collaborative effort” of a multidisciplinary worldwide group of scholars, scientists and intellectuals, who would be continuously communicating with a well-informed public feeling as if they were “really participating” in what Alan Mayne describes as networks of

  • policy and decision makers,
  • professional advisers,
  • generalists and
  • holistic thinkers.

He expected the new organ to develop a directorate and staff of “specialised editors and summarists” who would synthesise and abstract the content of existing sources, and that many of the professional activities within education would be replaced “by a new set of activities, the encyclopaedic work, the watching brief” aimed at broadening and enlightening both popular and specialist minds. Wells thought education would be transformed in such a way as to bring back the “original university idea” of masters surrounded by freely formed groups of student helpers, although he warned against a “professor-ridden world” as being as dangerous as a “theologian-ridden world”. After finishing formal education, Wells wanted people to spend their lives in the process of self-managed learning, the results of which would be “distributed through the general information channels of the world”.

FUNDING

The advantages and dangers of a world monopoly

“greatly improved system for providing appropriate rewards for the originators and publishers of intellectual property” - Proposal Developed: PBIIMS Proposal

Monopoly would not be possible if knowledge shared in P2P format: P2P Collective Intelligence - DVS

H. G. Wells saw the World Encyclopeadia as being “in effect a world monopoly” with resources “on a scale quite beyond” any publisher which in Alan Mayne’s view could afford a “greatly improved system for providing appropriate rewards for the originators and publishers of intellectual property”. However, Wells warned of the dangers of “private mercenary exploitation” especially by early promoters seeking “proprietorship” and the influence of “opinionated cults and propaganda.”

NOW ….in the  1990s

FORM

A new level of conceptual organisation

Self-Organising Teams are yet to be observed on LikeInMind.

"cede a small part of their ego sovereignty in order to participate more effectively in self-reflexive group collaboration" is one of the

With the exception of James Lovelock who insists on durable paper as the only safe medium, 1990s sources agree that it will be multimedia computer networks and indexing systems which will form H. G. Wells “omnipresent organ.” According to Hans Swegen, “the self-reflexive mind and the global mind are both self-organised information processes in the mind dimension”. He sees human beings  as introducing a new “autopoietic” [self-organising] level of the “dissipative [input-output type] process of the self-reflexive mind.” He says it is the self-organising information process that has created the brain and its development, not the contrary.” Using processes such as computer conferencing, it is possible to construct self-conscious discussion threads in which different minds work on the same problem using a common intellectual framework. The process of sharing a framework of thought requires individuals to cede a small part of their ego sovereignty in order to participate more effectively in self-reflexive group collaboration.

CONTENT

The new scholasticism

Highlighted problems are solved.

"important source of pleasure, devotion and useful facts" - yet to be achieved, added to the World Brain 2 Action Plan. Conflicts with Wiki and Agile Principles of LiM as a project development space?

"to learn better and more wisely from what is already known" - is LiM practice of systematic and systemic arrangement of knowledge: AIMS

"knowledge is the highest value artifact, while “owning” physical artifacts beyond a personal capacity to use them or having excess money is considered unethical" is close to Sharing Economy?

- DVS

James Lovelock’s list of content for the his knowledge compendium is remarkably similar to that of H. G. Wells. He writes, “It would range from simple things, such as how to light a fire, to our place in the Solar System and the Universe. It would be a primer of philosophy and science — it would provide a top down look at the earth and ourselves.” Lovelock’s survival guide must “by the quality of its writing” also serve as an important source of pleasure, devotion and useful facts. Both Wells and Lovelock imply that humankind must change the direction of its quest for knowledge. The object of inquiry would be less to find new knowledge, but more to learn better and more wisely from what is already known. Imagine the economic consequences, the beneficial environmental impact, if mankind took up a scholastic, self-reflective mentality, in which knowledge is the highest value artifact, while “owning” physical artifacts beyond a personal capacity to use them or having excess money is considered unethical. There is a growing number of people for whom such values would be far from alien.

STRUCTURE

Still hidden from view

"commonly agreed classification schemas" are not possible: Theory of Classification and Incompleteness Theorem. Synchronisation of Virtual Associative Networks and integration into IVAN is proposed instead.
" development of the organization of information" is proposed in two ways:

"first “several global sub-centres” which will eventually merge into a localized “main global brain”" - Due to difficulties in merging of, as well as difficulties with Findability, Discoverability and Reuse of Data and Knowledge published in fragmented and dispersed "several sub-centres", Unified Conceptual Space is proposed instead. LiM is the acting localised prototype of the “main global brain”.

- DVS

Although the tools to make H. G. Wells vision of classification and indexing practical are now available almost for free on the World Wide Web, outside the library profession, the process of organizing knowledge according to commonly agreed classification schemas has hardly started, although much of the knowledge of how do it already exists. However, if complexity theory holds, in Hans Swegen’s view, “On the planetary level, matter further organizes itself into information processes. Evolution then becomes a development of knowledge or you may say a development of the organization of information.” He expects a structure to form from this information process yielding first “several global sub-centres” which will eventually merge into a localized “main global brain”.

PEOPLE

“Grains of thought”

“wisdom rather than knowledge would have become our goal.” - Classification of information into Knowledge / Wisdom, etc. is highly questionable as depending on applications, matter of further research: Signals - Data - Information - Knowledge - Wisdom. We do not know and cannot agree on what Wisdom is. For the meantime, Information as a common and universal term is suggested instead.

"neural communication between self-reflexive minds" sounds more like Internet of Thoughts that is thought practically impossible due to extremely low Signal-to-Noise level.

"how to promote self-managed collaborative learning which forms the core of the learning organization" - Indeed!! How to promote self-organising teams and knowledge sharing?!! How to convince people in accepting mentality of Sharing Economy and change behavioural patterns to sharing? - DVS

H. G. Wells’ vision of systematic, self-managed collaborative learning is echoed in Peter Russell’s “superorganism” composed of “cultural creatives” engaged in the pursuit of higher levels of consciousness in which “wisdom rather than knowledge would have become our goal.” In Hans Swegen’s “post-human” terms, “hominid brains will constitute the grains of thought where the self-reflexive minds are based. Besides these biological structures of matter, the global brain will include various technological equipment that man is constantly introducing and that improves and expands neural communication between self-reflexive minds.”

As bureaucratic hierarchies break down, what used to be called management is increasingly about how to promote self-managed collaborative learning which forms the core of the learning organization. Also, science is portrayed in the New Scientist as reviving the ideas of the superorganism and James Lovelock’s Gaia theory “in the light of the modern mathematical theory of complexity.”

FUNDING

Making a market

Monopoly would not be possible if knowledge shared in P2P format: P2P Collective Intelligence

All World knowledge cannot be collected by funded groups of people due to limitation in their Localities. Collective Intelligence is possible only when a significant number of participants are agreed on acting (2.5% of population): Tipping Point. Unbelievable increase in quality of life (Social Singularity, AI will not play expected significant role: Sociological Feasibility of Artificial Intelligence) will be the reward to their participation, even without rest of the World (97.5%)

- DVS 

In the time of Bill Gates and Rupert Murdoch, it might seem that H. G. Wells’ fear that the World Encyclopedia would end up being controlled by a monopoly could be very well founded. Luckily, perhaps, as it turns out, the changeability and complexity of the world’s knowledge, not to mention the sheer size of such an undertaking, would take it far beyond the scope of a monopoly. The global mind will be more like a market of individual learners exchanging their learning, possibly using their own “application specific currencies.”

 

Implementation: (how the World Mind can be put into practice) practices Examples: (where the World Mind has been put into practice. which, as you will see, is a set of which this document is a member).

-IMPLEMENTATION –

Goal oriented self-organisation, not ideology

Intents Management

Not sure about "collective human will and intention". That would require all humans followed Wholeness Principles. We should expect the Tipping Point when a number of projects following these principles will come close to 2.5%, not even 15%, to my opinion, due to the obvious effects of Singularity. - DVS

The problem with believing that evolutionary processes will be sufficient to bring about the emergence of a World Brain is that they know no purpose or deadline. People, on the other hand, do require purposes and deadlines if they are to accomplish anything, especially the near miracles which are actually necessary. Without entering too far into philosophical speculation about the level of organization in which our consciousness exists, self-organization requires acts of will and intention which imply political action. Wells expressed frank loathing for political ideologies of any description as the means of implementing a collective human will and intention. He did his personal utmost to amass and organize a collection of knowledge as a prototype, but he refused, perhaps wisely, to set up an implementation process in the face of the overwhelming need to defeat first the Nazi ideology, then the Communist one. The time was obviously wrong and the technology did not yet exist. A small group of dedicated people, informally led by Professor Abe Goodman, have worked since the late 1930s to keep H G Wells’ World Brain ideas alive in inhospitable times of techno-triumphalism and economic greed.
Now the technology does exist. So does the knowledge of how to use it to organize Wells’ World Encyclopedia. But where is the will? It is here. Now. These pages have been designed and written to be a first iteration of an attempt to create a self-conscious World Brain thinking process. When it is established, its first task must be to gather and disseminate — possibly by trading information on a really open market — the knowledge necessary for local people to organize their own economies and communities, the knowledge necessary for them to grow enough food without poisoning themselves and the environment, the knowledge necessary to manufacture high tech equipment, the knowledge needed by people to govern  and take responsibility for themselves. All this knowledge exists. Most of it is in the public domain already. First, though, it must be collected and organized. Then, it must be synthesized and communicated.

THEN ….from the 1930s

THEORY

Constructive Sociology – Proposing a new literate, aesthetic and ethical science

I see no practical outcome from this paragraph, sorry! - DVS

H. G. Wells advocates “research into a field to which scientific standing is not generally accorded,” which he describes as “a science of pure observation” named “constructive sociology.” Wells envisaged research into the trends and requirements of humankind’s social and environmental circumstances. However, he warned that such study could not avoid an “irreducible element of purpose to its problems,” and that it would be “impossible to disentangle social analysis from literature.” He also doubted that constructive sociology would ever be free from “a certain literary, aesthetic and ethical flavouring”.

Evolution – Stranger and stronger than magic

Not sure about “the world’s knowledge apparatus”. A definition is required, to start with. - DVS

H. G. Wells conceived of people as a “manufactured product of which the natural man is the raw nucleus” who has been brought into existence by “educational adaptation….. much swifter than “genetic adaptation.” He emphasises the importance of learning about the growth of “the world’s knowledge apparatus” and marvels how it has grown up “unpremeditated” and “without a plan,” while continuously enlarging the possible scope of “political cooperation at every stage in its growth”.

TECHNIQUES

Practices – Information management as the critical factor

Not only "selection, condensation, expansion or simplification” of existing work" but new Knowledge Generation as a result of Action / practical solution of actual problems is a common practice on LikeInMind.

“assessing different questions and problems from different viewpoints” is practically possible only if done in connection with particular problem in a particular locality: Data or intelligence without context isn’t useful; Wholeness Principles - DVS

H. G. Wells laments that few “outside the world of expert librarians … Know how manageable well ordered facts can be made.” His opinion was that there would not be much requirement for “original writing” with most of the work being “in the selection, condensation, expansion or simplification” of existing work. In his Critical Introduction, Alan Mayne recommends Content Analysis, with its capability of extracting useful information from any source base and “assessing different questions and problems from different viewpoints”, as an “essential part in any future development of a World Brain / World Mind”.

Technologies – From coloured microfilm to multimedia

“complete planetary memory” is suggested in the form of Integrated Virtual Associative Network as a result of merge or interference of Personal Virtual Associative Networks - DVS

In the late 1930s, H. G. Wells was already thinking about the implications of what he called “the abolition of distance” on the relationships between populations. The technology he saw for replicating this “complete planetary memory” was coloured microfilm, radio and modern transport facilities.

POLITICS

Activism – The power of rational influence

 

H. G. Wells avowed to be, “responsible only to the hearer and my own self respect.” World Brain pioneer, Professor Abe Goodman is cited by Alan Mayne criticising Wells for making a “serious tactical error” by not being involved in “organised activity” on behalf of the World Brain because of his belief that it should emerge through “natural undirected process”.  Wells nevertheless expects the dream of the World Brain “to exert a very great influence” on future decision makers. Wells also thought English should be the “single language” for the “main text”.

Ideology – The wages of fear

“fear-saturated impatience for guidance”: see Leadership Best Practices.

People delegate responsibility for their future to leaders, in hope their life will be changed to better, being not capable of changing themselves:

Who Want Change Who Wants To Change - DVS

H. G. Wells blames people’s “fear-saturated impatience for guidance” for dictators of both the Left and the Right. Wells says these politicians are put in place by people for the purpose of protecting them from the “terrifying realisation of the limitless uncontrolled changes now in progress” which, he predicts, will happen “inexorably as though there were no Leaders on the scene at all.” In between the “Right and Left hysteria” Wells placed what he called the “do nothing democracy” which like every system of government is “made crazy” as “its struggle to survive becomes desperate.”

Self-organization – Overcoming resistance despite the odds

the World Brain to begin “at divergent points.” = Localised Singularity Regions - DVS

H. G. Wells expected the World Brain to begin “at divergent points.” This view is echoed by Manfred Kochen in his design of “a new social organ” (WISE – World Information Synthesis and Encyclopedia) which would emerge from “several semi-cooperative but semi-competitive organizations”. Against this natural evolution, Wells ranges his fear that the “change of scale….. would lead to an age of confusion and “gangster opportunity” dominated by “unscrupulous” financiers and “recalcitrant” minorities, and what was for Wells “the meanest thing in human nature”, the combination of “the fear of responsibility and the craving for leadership”. Kochen is also cited asking whether the “current global ecological crisis” might provide the necessary “powerful motivation” to overcome resistance.

 NOW ….in the  1990s

THEORY

Artful science

 

Mirroring H. G. Wells’ expectation of a new science of Constructive Sociology, Peter Russell calls for a new discipline, Psychotechnology, arising from the “marriage” of Eastern and Western ways of thinking. He says it would consist of “more than just the study of the mind or psyche, it will be the application of techniques to improve the functioning of the mind and to increase the quality of experience and the level of consciousness.”
The evolutionary path to the World Brain predicted by H. G. Wells is well represented in the 1990s sources. Hans Swegen writes of a new stage of complexity in neural development. He says, “So far, it has reached a complexity at the micro level, where human beings are creating a socio-cultural development.” Peter Russell observes that the number of people on the planet is fast approaching 10 billion which happens to be the number of neurones in the brain cortex and the number of atoms in a single cell, suggesting “this figure may represent the approximate number of elements needed for a new level of evolution to occur”.

TECHNIQUES

Atoms versus digits

We should consider "competing" points of view, highlighted, as complementary to each other.

Both, reuse of known patterns and generation of new knowledge, are parts of the same process of Systems-Thought-Action. - DVS

There is a sharp disagreement between James Lovelock and the widely held 1990s view that the World Encyclopedia will be based on an electronic infrastructure of telecommunications and computer equipment acting, in Hans Swegen’s terms, “as a global middle term memory of hundreds up to thousands of years”. Lovelock is even more traditional that H. G. Wells when he talked of colour microfilm as being the distribution technology of choice. According to Lovelock, “It is no use even thinking of presenting such a book on magnetic or optical media, or indeed any kind of medium that needs a computer and electricity to read it… What we need is a book written on durable paper with long-lasting print.”
In the 1990s sources, there is little discussion of the information management techniques which H. G. Wells believed were the most important practical necessity in implementing a world knowledge source. Hans Swegen does suggest that it would be “worthwhile looking into the past when you try to orient yourself into the future”, while Peter Russell puts his faith in human beings “continually discovering new relationships” and “increasingly organizing their information about the world”.

POLITICS

More needed

According to Hans Swegen, a combination of status symbolisation and the market powers are more likely to bring about the global brain, than politics. In the 1990s, ideology and activism are not considered as important in implementing the world brain as is self-organization.

 

Examples: (Academic and Commercial examples of a World Mind constructions.)

-EXAMPLES-

Starting up again

"to see if the process works" -

  • where is this process running,
  • how it is registered / measured
  • criteria for the process "working", going in the "right" / expected direction - DVS

These pages are the first stage in trying to constitute a sustainable manifestation of an organised global thinking apparatus (also using the World Wide Web), as originally envisaged by H. G.   Wells in the 1930s. We are here trying to create a world intelligence gathering, analysis, synthesis and dissemination process, as an enfolded example of itself. As such, it is neither academic, nor commercial. It aims to create a marketplace dedicated to the exchange of knowledge for the purpose of learning and an economy based solely on the value of knowledge.  It seems reasonable that this first step is focused on the conception of the World Brain, itself — evoking its “self consciousness.” The intention is to invite participants in these pages to respond to the syntheses of the points made by Wells on the subject. Your opinion will be conjoined with the views of leading thinkers and visionaries, so you individually can think recursively about what you thought collectively, then feed your reflection back into the collective view … ad infinitum. The idea is not just to gather knowledge, but to see if the process works.

THEN ….from the 1930s

ACADEMIC

Still DIY research initiatives.

References to the projects highlighted, please? Daniel Durrant?

H. G. Wells reports having spent “a few score thousand hours” writing his own prototype version of a World Encyclopedia. Despite admitting to “profound and conspicuous faults and weaknesses,” Wells insists that “somebody had to try out such summaries on the general mind” and challenges his critics, “Damn you, do it better.” (Wells’ italics). He also bows to the “very considerable amount of such harvesting and storage” already accomplished by librarians and scientists. In his Critical Introduction, Alan Mayne cites three current examples of World Brain type projects:

  1. The Intelligent World Encyclopedia Project (CYC) using expert systems which aims “to link its knowledge base into an evolving global model of the real world”
  2. the Senior Scholars State-of-the-Art Statement System described as “a method of scholarly collaboration to integrate all knowledge and place it online”; and
  3. Professor Abe Goodman “computerized self-instructional mediagraphic system” using “hypermedia and hypertext features”. Projects cited, based around existing

COMMERCIAL

The struggles of pioneering enterprises

NOW ….in the  1990s

Constructing the World Mind

 

 

 

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