An Informationalist's Perspective

2008-09-28T22:03:00.002-05:00

The Duhem-Quine Thesis and Underdetermination

It has been a little while since my last post. However, my readers can rest assured that I have not simply been loafing about. I have, as always, been attempting to learn. Before I launch back into my thoughts about Informationalism, I think it is appropriate to share some of my knowledge that I have acquired as of late. Perhaps it will reveal new biases that I might have acquired from my recent studies. Let us begin with my foray into the Philosophy of Science.

The Duhem-Quine thesis is an idea which undermines the idea of Falsificationism. This is a doctrine that I was quite fond of, I must admit, and so I was very sad to see it go.

Falsificationism

This is an ideology that was espoused by noted individuals such as Karl Popper. This is the basic premise:

1. Science works by the means of modus tollens. Scientists make statments such as "If P then Q". If we know that Q is incorrect, then we know that P is incorrect by modus tollens. This is a sample rule of logic.

For example: If I go to the store, then I will buy a carrot. If I did not buy a carrot, then we know that I did not go to the store. The fact that I go to the story is supposed to be the theory, and the fact that I bought a carrot is considered evidence for this theory. Thus, if I did not buy a carrot, the theory that I went to the store has been falsified. Science then works by getting rid of all the bad theories and sticking with the ones that don't get falsified.

Duhem-Quine Thesis

The thesis underminds falisifcationism by examining the structure of the antecedent. Which in "If P then Q" P is the antecedent and Q is the consequent. According to Duhem-Quine, a theory is much more complicated than the statement "I went to the store." A theory, such as Newtonian physics, has perhaps thousands of axioms and interpreatations of empirical observations. Thus, a better way to represent this statment would be "If P, R, S, T.....n then Q". Consequently, if it turns out that Q is incorrect, then ANY ONE OF THE ANTECEDENT STATMENTS COULD BE WRONG!. P, R, S, T...n could be incorrect in many ways. In fact, one could measure it mathematically by using combinations assuming there weren't an infinite number of antecedent statements. The more complicated the theory, the larger the number of combinations that could make the theory wrong.

Here is the kicker. If it turns out that Q, which is the consequent, is incorrect then it is equally valid for the researcher to assume that any of these combinations which falisfy the theory is correct. For example, if a planet is not where it is supposed to be in the Newtonian framework, a scientists could reject one part of Newtonian physics or just throw out the entire framework. This means that the theory has been underdetermined.

How in the face of such an observation is normal science to survive? The answer will be found in Kuhn's idea of normal science, which I will elaborate upon later.

Informationalism

What can Duhem-Quine and Underdetermination tell us about Informationalism? One must first determine how to categorize Informationalism. Is Informationalism a scientific theory?

This is difficult for me to answer at this point. I would prefer to say that Informationalism is a value-based method. A method that values science highly nonetheless. However, Informationalism is scientific in the sense that it is not afraid to be tested. If we do our best to increase both the amount and velocity of data in a society, the hypothesis is that this society will blossom with creativity. This creativity will manifest itsself in the increased ability of the society to manipulate its environment to attain ever higher concentrations and velocities of data. That is the theory, one must then determine the best ways to accomplish this, and perhaps debate philosopically whether that is actually the highest goal of humanity or not.

Informationalism takes this as a given. The production, accumulation, and distribution of Information is the highest goal of humanity.

How do we accomplish this?

1. The reduction of the terms of copyright laws and the extent of rights to intellectual property.
2. We continue to broaden the reach of the internet and teach people how to use it.
3. We invest in scientific research and development and ensure public education.
4. We pursue common forms of metrics and communication so that language and measuring barriers are reduced (while of course respecting the potential benefits of diversity locally).
5. By enforcing the concept of transparency in national and international politics, and between businesses and governments of the people.
6. Eroding national barriers to make capital, labor, and data more mobile.
7. Investing in infrastructure to increase the volume and speed of data, capital, and labor that can be transported and the distances that they can be transported.
8. By realizing and balancing the benefits of centralization with the benefits of diversity from decentralization. A kind of separation of powers.

That is all for now.

Alpha Centauri Secret Project: The Planetary Datalinks

2008-03-24T16:30:00.001-05:00

"As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master."
-- Commissioner Pravin Lal, "U.N. Declaration of Rights"

I stress this lines and this short video quite often. Though they are the products of mere play and imagination, they are of grave importance to Informationalism.

2008-03-17T21:26:00.003-05:00

Creative Response

In the spirit of my new blog, I thought I might discuss how the economic concept of creative response relates to Informationalism.

Creative Response is basically when the rules have been changed to create inefficiencies in a market. For example, an industry is excessively regulated to the point that it cannot supply the demand for its good. The response: black markets!

Take the War on Drugs for another example. Creative response is a perfect reason for the failure of the war on drugs. There is, of course, a demand for drugs. Our harsh drug laws have not eliminated the demand for drugs, they have only restricted the supply. When you restrict the supply, the prices increase! Thus, by not addressing the problem of the demand for drugs and trying to destroy the supply, our government has fostered the black market creative response that has made drugs a billion dollar black market.

You may ask, how on earth does this relate to Informationalism?

As I've stated earlier, the free flow of information is a prerequisite for the establishment of perfect competition and the resulting pareto efficiency. Without Informationalism, we cannot have perfect competition and thus inefficient markets become the rule and not the exception. If we wish to remove the need for creative response which yields billion dollar black markets that cost lives and money, then Informationalism must prevail.

2008-03-13T15:25:00.003-05:00

Fundamental Investment Launched!

Hello everyone! I hope that you have all been well in my long time away. I've been doing a lot of studying and I am more convinced of the power of Informationalism than before! Things have been changing and progressing rapidly for me in my life, so much so that I haven't had much time to blog. But, here's a short update:

1. I've launched a new blog called fundamental investment. Why? Because the free flow of information is crucial to economics. The only way we can ever hope to reach pareto efficiency is if Informationalism is fully realized! If you don't know what pareto efficiency is, I'm sure I'll talk about it in due course. As long as we keep secrets such as: patents, government contracts, high transactions cost on certain kinds of information, and insider information, our economy will continue to function at levels below the optimum. I am not saying Informationalism will solve all of our economic woes, but it will certainly make things better!

2. I've finished one short story and began a second that have Informationalism as an underlying theme. I hope to publish them someday, and perhaps I can provide links for those interested on this blog. It's science-fiction, for those of you who like the genre!

May you all be frank with your friends, enemies, and yourselves!

2007-10-16T10:10:00.001-05:00

I spend a lot of time on here talking about Informationalism, why I think it's the future. Why I think it has the power to free the minds of every human being on this planet one day. However, today I just want to offer some music. An important part of Informationalism is being able to sit back and absorb the Information. Everyone is a teacher, but likewise is everyone a student. What can you learn from this video?

Here are the Lyrics:

No Surprises: Radiohead

A heart that's full up like a landfill,
a job that slowly kills you,
bruises that won't heal.
You look so tired-unhappy,
bring down the government,
they don't, they don't speak for us.
I'll take a quiet life,
a handshake of carbon monoxide,

with no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises,
Silent silent.

This is my final fit,
my final bellyache,

with no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises please.

Such a pretty house
and such a pretty garden.

No alarms and no surprises (get me outta here),
no alarms and no surprises (get me outta here),
no alarms and no surprises, please.

2007-09-28T11:13:00.000-05:00

Informationalist Plea for Burma (Myanmar)

I will try to not make this post long-winded. However, it is something I feel quite passionately about. I wish to present the Informationalist grounds for revolution in Myanmar, and why I think they deserve their idea of freedom. First, a short history of the region, which can be found in greater detail here.

We will begin for brevity's sake with decolonization. When WWII broke out the area of Burma was under the control of the British Empire. During the war it was taken and occupied by the Japanese for a time, and then retaken by the British before the end of the War. In 1948 as part of decolonization Burma gained independence from Great Britian and a Democratic Republic was set up known as the Union of Burma. This union lasted until 1962 when a military coup placed a dictator in power who ruled under the guise of Socialism.
In 1988 due to economic hardship and frustration the people rose up in pro-democratic demonstrations. This resulted in another military coup and an organization know as The State Law and Order Restoration Council or SLORC came into power. This body renamed Burma Myanmar and promised democratic reform.
Free elections were held in 1990 with the National League for Democracy lead by Suu Kyi winning a clear majority of the vote. The elections were annulled, Suu Kyi was put in jail and thousands were killed in the suppression that followed. Kyi remains in prison and the world has been keen to let the brutal suppression continue...until this month.
Demonstrations begun by monks who practice Burma's strand a Buddhism began protests in favor of the jailed President. These demonstrations have accelerated into an all out organized movement against the SLORC. However, SLORC has one again moved to violently suppress the rebellions. In our society where Information is becoming easier to come by, they have cut Internet access and taken many unspeakable steps to make sure word of the oppression stays inside Burma.

An article on the most recent events can be found here.

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As an Informationalist, I find this completely unacceptable. The SLORC is deliberately suppressing Information by violent means in order to maintain their grip on power. It is one of the most extreme examples of how the power of free Information is a dangerous to all forms of tyranny, be it over the mind, body, or both.
Also, as an Informationalist, I feel I must act in support of these people. So I implore the readers to do all you can to support this struggle. Write to your representatives, demonstrate. Gather all the data you can to bring to bear against this violent oppression. Remember, the good of the
I will be exploring ways in which action can be taken besides mere words on a Blog. I hope that you readers will join me.

All the best in this hour of human cruelty and possibility. individual cannot be separated from the good of the group. The group for Informationalists is all of humanity regardless of genetic makeup or gender. Perhaps this even applies to every sentient being.

2007-09-20T10:20:00.000-05:00

New Addition to Theses of Informationalism

In reading the American President Woodrow Wilson's 14 points, I found the first point to be quite profound. In my opinion, it should form the basis of how Informationalism treats diplomacy. The ultimate goal of Informationalism, of course, is the end of nationalistic governments. But the establishment of an Informationalist state would likely occur in an environment of nationalist governments like our modern governments. Thus, as Informationalists, one must have a method for dealing with such entities that is consistent with Informationalism.

This thesis is my attempt:
"Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understandings of any kind but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view."

-Woodrow Wilson; Point I

Peace should always be considered the starting point for Informationalists. Only if an entity seeks to harm or destroy an Informationalist or an Informationalist state does that entity put itself at war with the Informationalist or the Informationalist state. What should follow is the peaceful dissemination of Information to Noninformationalist entities in order to change its paradigm internally.

This harks back to my post on Technique Perfection and Initiative. The action of an Informationalist entity is perfecting the technique of spreading the free flow of Information. This comes from an initiative that must arise internally. Thus while the Informationalist state seeks to perfect the Informationalist method, an individual, society, or nation must ultimately choose for itself to do the same. This is called, self determination.

2007-09-18T10:06:00.001-05:00

A Trip Through Logic (From an Informationalist's Perspective)

I learned a little bit of philosophy humor today in regards to contradictions. After thinking about it a little bit in depth, I came to conclude that perhaps what I learned could be useful in demonstrating the necessity of Informationalism. Let us begin with the simple statement: "Everything follows from a contradiction."

What is meant by this? I was exposed to this argument:

It is raining. It is not raining. Therefore, God exists.

Now, at first glance this argument appears as nothing more than nonsense. But in most sequential logic this argument is completely valid. Meaning that if the premises are true, and the conclusion follows from the premises. Then the argument is also sound! Here is the argument spelled out in sequential logic.

P= It is raining
Q= God Exists

1. Show Q Assertion
2. ~Q Assumption (Indirect Derivation)
3. P Premise
4. ~P Premise

In order to prove the validity of this argument, you need only create a contradiction that follows from the premises if we assume the conclusion is false. We have done that, thus the argument is valid. We can derive ANY conclusion from these methods. As long as we have two contradictory statements and a conclusion, the conclusion is always a valid one.

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Now, you may ask. Why on earth is this relevant? It will never been the case that at the same place and point in time it is both raining and not raining!

ABSOLUTELY! I would reply. But as an Informationalist one must look into the broader implications of this data.
What this actually says is: Someone who believes two contradictory statements at the same time must in order to be logical believe ANYTHING.

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Do people do this? I'm sure you have encountered individuals, maybe even yourself, that have believed two contradictory statements at the same time. Maybe you believe that it is wrong to steal. And then in some cases you think it was reasonable for someone to steal. Maybe you believe in only one god, but at times you think it's correct to believe in multiple gods. Inconsistency.

One of the goals of Informationalism is to explore the premises and conclusions that create the thoughts in our own minds. We try and look at what the data says and determine if the conclusions are valid. But this is very difficult if one believes two contradictory statements at the same time!

So, I ask once again. Explore your reasons for believing what you believe in your mind. Do you find contradictions? If so, remember that you now have no real grounds to dismiss the truth of any statement unless you rectify the contradiction. Choose the conclusion or premise best supported by the data, and go from there.

2007-09-15T13:32:00.000-05:00

Attack on Public Research?

I was reading this article which has to do with an attempt of private organizations blocking the ability of the findings from public research to reach a public audience. The article itself which can be found here focuses on the National Institutes of Health, which is trying to put up a government website which "has encouraged researchers to place copies of their published works at PubMed Central, and has worked with publishers to facilitate this process while avoiding copyright issues." Congress has been exploring legislation to make posting of such research papers mandatory. Stating, "the results of publicly funded research should be accessible by the public that's paid for it."
However, some publishers such as the Association of American Publishers (AAP) are lobbying against moves by the government to make posting the research mandatory. It is their assertion that mandatory posting of the research papers is "an attack on peer review itself and that government-sponsored hosting is an invitation to censorship and manipulation." Thus, they have been lobbying to block passage of the legislation.

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I am of the opinion that blocking such a move is fundamentally wrong. Even from our current Uninformationalist system, research done with public money should be used for public benefit without incurring further costs. If a company wishes to produce a new technology that was discovered through publicly funded research; they should be able to charge the consumer for their production costs; but they SHOULD NOT be allowed to collect royalty charges for the technology itself.

That being said, I am still of the opinion that all research is fundamentally public property. I would prefer to see the day when there are no patents or copyrights. But that is going to require a fundamental change in how we view information. Until then, I will settle with protecting the freedom of Information that we have.

Carl Sagan Speaks

2007-09-13T10:11:00.001-05:00

Carl Sagan is, in my humble opinion, one of the greatest men in the history of the world. In all my readings rarely do I encounter an individual with such a passion for possibility. The possibility of a better life and a better world for everyone. He challenges our nationalism, our religious fervor, our own ethnocentrism in ways that to me make them seem indefensible.
When I hear him speak I a almost feel compelled to stand up and shout at that very moment: Do you not see, we are all one!
I am a firm believer in the technological ability and power of the human species to create a bright future for everyone who would embrace it. I hope those of you who read this feel the same.

2007-09-11T10:26:00.001-05:00

I think this video provides a good example about how one should consider events from different perspectives. Informationalism is about trying to rationally and empirically explore all assumptions, especially our presuppositions. This man has obviously put a lot of thought into his opinions, and feels very strongly about them. While I prefer a little more open-mindedness even in the face of rational and empirical certainty, it is certainly preferable to unexplored assumptions.
We all possess ideas be they religion or just every day assumptions that are untrue. They might not be untrue, they might just be ambiguous, but we still view them as true. This is because we've never taken the time to sit down and explore exactly why we think the way that we do.
So, my challenge to you readers is this: Whatever it is you feel is true with passion-stop- analyze why you feel this way. Try to imagine the world if it were false. Does it being false cause the world to make more sense or create contradictions. If so, are these contradictions real, or are they again something you have imagined to be true? It is an iterative method that I feel might clean up some of the misconceptions we all have and maybe lead us to more exciting possibilities.
I like to think we make many of our assumptions as if we were operating in a dream. There are glaring contradictions in our thoughts all around us, yet we do not notice them. Thus I implore you to stop for a few moments and consider your thoughts. Notice.

2007-09-10T14:54:00.001-05:00

I think this video speaks to some of the founding principles behind Informationalism. It took quite a bit of introspection and rational inquiry before I came to what I like to call the root cause. The root cause is my idea that all activity is ultimately for the purpose of the survival of the species. Every thought, every action, stems from a basic biological drive to proceed into the future. It is by acquiring more and more Information that we better our pursuit of this root cause.
This drive can be manipulated, redirected, or perhaps fooled by outside forces. But the drive remains, and its primary purpose is written in all of us. Informationalism is attempting to take this root cause to its logical conclusion. Through the free acquisition and distribution of Information we are able to explore which of our actions serve the root cause. Often, we may find that many things, even things like religion which we hold precious, are and have been used as tools to manipulate and deceive this primary drive.
But, as this song tries to reach out and tell us: we must explore ourselves from the inside. That is where real change begins. In my case, as my theory has led me to believe, we discover the paradox of our own simultaneous insignificance and indespensibility. Every human being is different. We all have different ways of processing information which allow all of us to contribute something new. Remember this.

2007-09-08T23:11:00.001-05:00

Technique Perfection(An Example)

I made a post not too long ago about Technique perfection and Informationalism. The idea stemmed from some thoughts that I had while swimming laps. I was using my body to swim, a technique I've tried to refine, and at the same time working on mathematical calculations in my head whilst keeping up with my laps. It was a very trying experience, but I was successful, and here is why:

I devoted a great deal of time to refining my swimming technique. So much so that doing the activity no longer required much effort from my conscious mind. My conscious mind was free to practice other things.

So the conclusion that I drew was that it was good to focus on practicing some kind of technique until the delay between thought and action is erased. Then to build and refine other techniques while doing that activity. Building one technique upon another is, in my opinion, a great way to increase the flow of information.

So, without further ado, here is my real world example of absolute technique perfection. As well as a word of warning. Jimi Hendrix was without doubt the quintessential master of the electric guitar. Listening to what he created is a marvelous thing in my opinion. But it's also a reminder than singular obsession with an art has its dangers. While striving to become a "master" at something is good, it should not be the only goal of the individual. The goal is to try and "master" as many arts as possible. It is only then that we can explore the connections between the mind and the body in ways our current vocabulary cannot express.

2007-09-07T11:20:00.001-05:00

Informationalism: What should supporters do?

Many of you have followed my posts over the past year or so. It's been an intellectual experimental journey that continues. I hope to be able to offer more of my thoughts, opinions, and possible solutions in the future as always. However, despite my hesitance, I would like to extend the experiment by thesis three of the current theses of Informationalism which states:

"3. "The question whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking is not a question of theory but is a practical question. Man must prove the truth — i.e. the reality and power, the this-sidedness of his thinking in practice. The dispute over the reality or non-reality of thinking that is isolated from practice is a purely scholastic question."

-Marx; Theses on Feuerbach II

Thought is very important. But action is the most important part of a paradigm or philosophy. How well does it work in action.

So, what actions might the budding philosophy of Informationalism be able to take in order to demonstrate success, in practice?

I would like to begin the phase of discussion. As I stated in earlier posts, the beginnings of Informationalism arise when groups of people(or just an individual) are compelled to form a kind of free thought society or community. A group that serves as a temporary meeting place where ideas can be shared, conclusions drawn or explored, and overall knowledge increased. An individual can do this simply by engaging another group or individual in a conversation of these means.

Keep in mind, however, as always. That the telos of these actions and conversations is to gather information for the purpose of improving yourself, and your society. All this to the end of ensuring the survival of greater humanity. In an Informationalist conversation, never lose site of its purpose.

Therefore: those of you who are interested in Informationalism might consider forming a group with others that might feel the same way. Or simply engage others by yourselves. Ask them if they feel that the perpetual survival and development of the species is important. Ask them how this might be done. Exchange ideas, form new ones, and think of ways to put them into practice. And remember always that this hinges ultimately on the freedom of information. You must be frank, you must be open, you must truly be free.

**As always, these are my opinions regarding the philosophy of Informationalism. I feel that they show promise, and I desire to expand them into real world experimentation. For those of you who might desire to help me and others by doing this, I would be pleased. For those of you who feel differently, I respect your difference. And for any who might be hostile to what I have said here, know that I harbor no ill will towards any sentient creature.

2007-08-24T18:09:00.002-05:00

INITIATIVE AND TECHNIQUE PERFECTION

It's been a while since my last posting. Safe to say I've been doing a lot of thinking about Informationalist philosophy of the past months. First I'd like to encourage you to check out a BLOG one of my friends made. It's an interesting idea that I think merits a little publicity.

There are two new concepts I wish to integrate into the Informationalist philosophy. The first is initiative.

Initiative in the Informationalist sense acknowledges the need of the shift of an equilibrium for an organism to adapt. It CANNOT be taught, but it MUST be learned. Central to the philosophy of Informationalism is the desire of the individual organism to survive. I have spoken in the past about the deep connection between the perpetuation of the individual and the perpetuation of the species, and how it is all wrapped up within the free flow of Information.

Thus, initiative becomes important to Informationalism. One must use information to change their surroundings in order to better meet their require equilibrium for their own survival. However, without ALL DATA the equilibrium constantly shifts due to unforeseen interactions in the universe. It is here that initiative becomes important. It is the initiative to master one's environment once again that makes the data and thus Informationalism perpetually important.

Technique Perfection in the Informationalist sense is something I discovered within the philosophy of Zhuangzi. It is the continual practice of an art so that the boundary between the conscious and unconscious mind is obliterated. For example, the simple action of typing on the keyboard. I am quite adept at my usage of "home row". So adept that I no longer have to think about the position of the letters that I am about to type. As I type this post, I can simply let my thoughts flow onto the screen via the keyboard. Due to my mastery of the skill, there is no visible delay between the processing power of my mind due to locating the letters on the keyboard. I simply know where they are.

Technique perfection is important because of its ability to allow individuals to successfully multitask. Being able to do this makes it possible to produce and acquire more information. It also gives the individual a greater power and understanding of the self and the environment. All of these things are crucial to Informationalism.

Another example of practicing technique perfection I found took place while I swam laps. As I swam I calculated the distance I planned to swim, and adjusted those numbers numbers into other units. I did all this while swimming and keeping up with the current amount of distance I had already covered. It was exhausting, but rewarding.

I would encourage those who read this to attempt to practice technique perfection. Even if you are not an Informationalist. Learn a skill so well you don't have to think about it when you peform it, and then master other tasks while performing that skill. This obviously has its limits, you cannot use a keyboard and weave something at the same time. But activities that do not seriously overlap could be mastered at the same time, increasing one's ability to multi-task and acquire new Information. I hope this has been helpful.

Carl Sagan - Pale Blue Dot

2007-04-27T13:48:00.001-05:00

I think this right here pretty much says it all when it comes to the significance of humanity. We are wrapped in such a paradox. The earth is everything and yet it is just a pale blue dot. Humanity is everything and yet it is nothing. I use this for Informationalism because I think it shares the spirit of wonder that Informationalism tries to capture. It is with the knowledge that we are this "pale blue dot" that we should feel compelled to drop our petty stereotypes and strive to uncover the vast mystery of the universe in which we live.

2007-03-01T14:46:00.000-05:00

Theses of Informationalism

Here I am going to attempt to outline the basic theses of Informationalism to better clarify the direction of my thought as I approach an issue. I hope you readers will find this helpful, as it may be my most important document thus far.

Term: Information- knowledge gained through study, communication, research, instruction, etc.; factual data.

1. The fundamental problem with materialism is that it does not take into account the influence of information. It is in the ability to record, pass on, and understand information that the advanced manipulation of material circumstances becomes possible.

2. The only way to value a species is by its ability to expand and perpetuate the information it acquires over time. A species that cannot do this must in time be overcome and eliminated by their material circumstances.

3. "The question whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking is not a question of theory but is a practical question. Man must prove the truth — i.e. the reality and power, the this-sidedness of his thinking in practice. The dispute over the reality or non-reality of thinking that is isolated from practice is a purely scholastic question."

-Marx; Theses on Feuerbach II

4. Asymmetric Information leads to social distinction, especially within humanity. Oligopolies of materials and Information are inefficient. Thus a species with asymmetric information is not maximizing its value and risking its existence.

5. Ensuring free distribution and acquisition of Information is the only way to maximize the value of a society. Therefore the goal of a human society must be the freedom of information and the subsidizing of its acquisition in all fields.

6. The laws and structure of society must be formulated and adapted to the practical judgement of acquired Information. Society should be based on conclusions stemming from the best tested Information, and adapt to reflect the consensus of the Information.

7. "The free communication of ideas and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of man; every citizen can then freely speak, write, and print, subject to responsibility for the abuse of this freedom in the cases is determined by law".

-11th Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen (August 1789)

Richard Dawkins - "There is no such thing as a Christian Child"

2007-02-24T00:10:00.001-05:00

I thought you all might find this interesting and insightful. I know that Informationalism is not explicitly atheist; my closest examination has led me to conclude that Spinoza-like Pantheism or weak Atheism are probably the best approaches to Informationalism. I posit a simple redefinition of the terms so that Atheism and Pantheism become one.

I feel this movie links up my last post, because it shows the harm that can come from forcing unfounded dogma onto children. I would not even condone labeling a child as a Informationalist child. It is a matter of choice that must be made at an age of consent.

I'm showing this in the hopes that all of you will take an opportunity to take another look at your own faiths; to try and discover where you may be dogmatic. I'm asking, as always, that you consider the benefits of the possibilities that come with Informationalism. Finally, it is my hope that some of you might decide to help pick up the cause, and embrace this progressive philosophy.

2007-02-18T22:59:00.000-05:00

Why Our Country Needs Informationalism

I think this article says it all my friends:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070218/ap_on_re_us/evolution_jews

Here is the website: http://www.fixedearth.com/

State Rep. Ben Bridges of Georgia has been affiliated with a memo passed around the political scene which decries Science and attempts to replace it with the Pseudoscience of a man named Marshall Hall. Hall is the President of the "Fair Education Foundation". The name of the organization itself is an example of the disinformation that those frightened of the freedom of information will promote. There is no fair education for this man, there is only the age old attempt of those who fear the future and wish to silence it in the name of piety.
To sum up this ridiculous website promoted by a ridiculous excuse for a representative. It attempts to show the public how the modern model of the universe and evolution are mere products of a "zionist agenda". Of course, one wonders why they chose to lump these two areas of study together specifically. It is because they are both threats to Christianity.
Informationalism wishes to promote the freedom of information. There is no problem with the creation of such information, the problem is that this website parades incorrect information as correct information. By doing this it also engages in disinformation. The result? A deliberate misleading of the public. This website is fraud; it is an example of all that a society without freedom of information can be subjected to.
A final thought. Imagine if a child who knew little about the subject were to stumble upon this website. The influence that it could have upon their ability to think critically would be catastrophic. For the sake of free information and free society we must let it be known that fraud and disinformation cannot be tolerated.

2007-02-13T14:02:00.000-05:00

Katrina Summary

The seminar on the situation in New Orleans, especially in the 9^th Ward in Eastern New Orleans, focused on the historical development of the flooding problem and the various paradoxes that contributed to the disaster. The speaker commented on the past makeup in the city, which was more in line with the natural makeup of the land. He then went on to discuss the changes, especially in the last century that led up to the paradox of attempting to safely develop unsafe lands. In the end it was shown that the government played an active role in promoting the unsafe policy, and the lack of communication and planning on the local and national level played a large role in the ensuing disaster.

The city of New Orleans in the 18^th and early 19^th century was centered largely on the banks of the Mississippi river. This is because, when the river floods, the heavier material falls first onto the banks and creates natural dunes. The rest of the area was a naturally bounded by Lake Pontchartrain to the North and Lake Borgne to the East. The area that became East New Orleans was also swampland, so for a time, the city’s growth was checked.

However, the city obviously had planned to grow, and so decided expansion and drainage of the swampland in coordination with development would be the best strategy to take. They undertook the paradox that the speaker referred to as making unsafe land safe. The swamp land was drained, causing the dried up soil to compress and sink below sea level. It was then placed behind levees for protection that were only designed to withstand category 3 Hurricanes.

The danger was realized, and the city was sued for failing to adequately maintain the pump systems to keep the water out. However, the development of East New Orleans continued until an economic slump brought it to a standstill. The city sat relatively silently on the national scene until Hurricane Katrina.

The area that had been swamp land which was developed quickly flooded as it was already under sea level. It should be noted that the area built on the natural dunes was spared a large amount of the destruction. The levees could not withstand a category 4 Hurricane, and so they broke. Since the levees were made in one large wall, a single breech caused the water to pool in the area below sea level and then become stuck, prolonging the flooding. This was also combined with failure to communication between the national and local level of government.

The results were that thousands were killed, billions of dollars in damage was suffered, and thousands of people were left homeless and forced to move outside of the city. All of this could have been avoided with proper planning. New Orleans had planned for growth but had not taken into account the natural limits of the growth of the city. Also, the failure in communication on the national and local level led to confusion in the area of exactly what needed or should be done to keep the residents safe in and unsafe area. The disaster was foreseeable and yet was ignored due to a one track focus on growth, which in the end was thwarted by inadequate plan for disaster. The speaker then suggested some ideas to prevent this in the future such as: not resettling Eastern New Orleans, putting up levees with multiple walls, and making the levees capable of withstanding category 5 Hurricanes. It is overall an example of the dangers that come with asymmetric information.

2007-01-30T14:57:00.000-05:00

Sprawl and Sustainability

This post is dedicated to the ideology behind a favorite blog of mine called, A Green Earth. In this post I will talk about Urban Sprawl and environmental sustainability, it will be connected with Informationalism by its focus upon teachers. Most everyone is aware of the critical role that teachers play in the realm of information. Here I will show how helping them advances informationalism, improves urban life, and helps the environment.

It has been incorporated into common knowledge for quite some time that a large pool of labor is critical to a wealthy society. It provides the basis for competitive industry and is the powerhouse behind a market economy. City, State, and National governments recognize this in the United States and claim to make the welfare of the labor force a primary concern. At the same time on the city level, where most city planning takes place, the planners vow to fight sprawl and some pledge to advance the concept of sustainable planning.

However, it appears at all levels the externalities of these workers’ wages are not taken into account. Failing to pay a wage that makes it viable to live comfortably in the city has many negative consequences. If the wages are extremely low, the workers must live in slums with high crime rates and health issues. Also, if the wages are raised but not adequately enough for all, then there is greater incentive for the workers to reside outside the city. This situation contributes to sprawl, which results in a longer commute and greater energy consumption. Also, if the residence is outside the city or county, revenue paid out to the workers is lost on the local economy. So, despite the universal acknowledgement of the value of workers, their low wages make fighting sprawl more difficult and detract from the local economy. Yet it does not seem to be a factor in planning.

Many city planners in the 21^st century have come to regard the idea of sustainability as essentially good. As always, since humans are so fond of dualisms, the “good” of sustainability finds its antithesis in sprawl. Both of these are fairly loaded terms, and so it is essential to provide a clear and concise definition of the two in order to avoid conceptual ambiguity and understand the nature of the labor paradox.

Sprawl can best be understood as the result of the expansion of an urban area into the less developed countryside having little or no controlled land use policy. Inadequate pay for workers contributes to sprawl by creating car dependent communities due to distance from any industrial or business zone, low-density housing communities, as well as the presence of many strip mall areas. Sprawl causes inefficiency in resource allocation in the urban area and makes city more difficult for planners or organize once the pattern has been set. Sprawl not only leads to inefficiency, but over time the marginal cost of living in the area so exceeds the marginal benefit that the city runs a high risk of having market failure due to an exodus from the area, thus putting these workers out of the job.

Sustainability, on the other side of the duality, is the product of careful planning. However, the concept itself is separated by schools such as new urbanism, which also seeks to fight sprawl, by its incorporation of ecological systems in the planning calculations. Sustainable planning seeks to take into account the amount of human population an area can hold while maintaining adequate resources for the planned future. This means not only reversing the tendencies of sprawl, but also managing resource allocations of goods such as: water, petroleum, electricity, food, and land. The goal of sustainability is to ensure that the resources are allocated efficiently enough in the present so they are not completely consumed or unequally diminished for future generations.

From these definitions it is clear that not addressing the issue of the labor force is contradictory to good planning and to sustainability, as it promotes sprawl and inefficient utilization of natural resources. For example, in one of the areas known for the worst sprawl, Charlotte North Carolina, a first year teacher with a bachelor degree is paid $28,510 by the state (Salary, 2007). It is difficult for the teachers, since it takes an average of $35,000 dollars to meet the basic needs of a family of four (Glasmeier, 2008). Common sense would lead one to deduce that the teacher would not locate themselves in a city with a higher cost of living.

The negative affects of this policy are also supported in a paper published by Rèmy Prud’homme and Chang-Woon Lee where they defined the efficiency of cities based upon labor productivity. In their study of 23 French cities they found that the success of the city was defined by the relative size of its labor market, which was determined by, “…the size of the city; the average potential job-home distance (sprawl); and the average speed at which journey to work takes place” (Prud’homme and Chang-Woon Lee, 1998 ). These last two are specifically the problems that face the city as a result of their inadequate payment of the labor force. The paper concludes specifically that, the city’s productivity is determined by the aforementioned factors, and that this labor pool is determined by, “…its sprawl and of the speed at which trips to the cities are made”, (Prud’homme and Chang-Woon Lee, 1998 ).

It should also be noted that the increased distance from the job denotes a greater reliability on automobiles. These automobiles add further crowding to the already busy city streets and have spiraling negative consequences for the city system. Thus, it is clear that it is not possible to confront sprawl or sustainable planning without addressing the wages of workers. The wages must be raised to a level that makes it possible and then beneficial for workers to live in areas relatively close to their schools. The economic loss incurred by keeping the wages of the labor force low ultimately outweighs the state funds saved in the process.

References

Glasmeier, Amy K (2006), An Atlas of Poverty in America: One Nation, Pulling Apart, 1960-2003, Routledge, 2006.

Beatly; Manning (1997), The Ecology of Place, Washington DC: Island Press, 1997.

“Charlotte-Mecklenburgh Schools 2006-2007 Salary Schedule for Teachers” (2006), http://www.cms.k12.nc.us/departments/HR/compensation.asp, accessed February 2, 2007.

Rèmy Prud’homme and Chang-Woon Lee (1998), “Sprawl, Speed, and the Efficiency of Cities”, Paris, France: Obervatoire de l’Economic et des Institution Locals.

2007-01-21T22:57:00.000-05:00

Why We've Been Failing in Iraq "A Final Informationalist's Word for the time before I Move onto More Pressing Issues e.g. the Environment"

The critics of the Iraq war have become far more numerous than the supporters that were present in March of 2003. The current discontent among the public and on Capitol Hill are at levels not seen since Vietnam. The President's new plan to send more troops has been met with huge amounts of resistance, and his decision to accelerate the plan can be viewed as a complete disregard for legislative authority. In short, Bush has become almost autocratic towards Iraq because it is his last option. Failure in Iraq would be a disaster for the United States, however, it would be an even greater disaster for George W. Bush.

So after tens of thousands of lives and a trillion dollars, why haven't things come together?

I've already outlined a plan to get us out of Iraq if we wish to stay inside. However, I fear that the American public no longer wants to dedicate the manpower or the money to try and fix the situation in Iraq. What's worse, despite the extreme weath of the builders of this war based on disinformation, their wealth is certainly not enough to bring stability to the country.

Why has Bush's vision failed?

The Bush Administration has suffered from ethnocentrism in the Iraq disaster. The toll of this ethnocentrism has been catastrophic. They are laboring under the ethnocentric assumption that every knows of and wants representative democracy. They feel that once people are allowed this "freedom" then little Americas will pop up everywhere, and they'll all be greatful that we showed them the light.

The truth, however, is more sobering. People have to be educated to live in a representative democracy. Tolerance and equality and representation are far from instincts, they are acquired disciplines. This is what makes Informationalism so important. The sharing of Information is the only way we can discover the things that work towards the progress of our species; it is the only thing that can keep us from giving into our infantile impulses and eventually destroying ourselves and those around us.

The Bush Administration has thrust democracy on Iraq without the education. Representative Democracy in a culture that has not yet accepted the tolerance of different opinions and the stipulations of majority rule as well as fear of the tyranny of that majority is useless. It is doomed to failure. It is the same mistake made in post-colonial Africa.

What must be done?

The people must be empowered. However, you cannot empower them with the vote if you do not first empower their mind. To empower their mind you must ensure that their mind and body are sound, which means they must not be wanting for food or water or the various basic resources that humans in chaotic situations must struggle in terror to acquire.

This returns us to Informationalism. Education. The Iraqi people cannot be "forced to be free" in the words of Rousseau. They must be taught to be free. In order to be taught to be free they must have a time and a place to learn. We are not providing that, and all the prime minister wants is the guns to settle the dispute once and for all.

The dispute will never be settled with guns. Force does not make right. Perhaps blood must be spilled to begin the process, but it can never be completed with blood. It must be completed with minds.

I would encourage all of you who read this blog to tell all those that you know that education is the way out of Iraq. Write your congressperson or letters to your newspaper editor and let the voice of reason be heard. Somebody has to speak for these people, for today they cannot speak for themselves. They are hungry, they are thirsty, they are afraid, and our country has helped to create this situation. If it is as Lao Tzu said, and the way for a large nation to master a small one is to be humble, then let us be humble to the people of Iraq. Let us lift them up and not trample them down with our forced government. Let us build schools and not close them, let us open minds and not shut them. We are in a race against time! Information is the way out of Iraq. Before you can free a body, you must free the mind.

2007-01-17T00:09:00.000-05:00

Parts of Informatonalist Plan Informally Considered

I outlined in an earlier post my plan for getting out of Iraq if we were not going to begin an immediate phased withdrawal. It is pleasing to me to notice that some of the international figures of political authority are considering elements from the plan I presented.

1. I commented on the first, which was that unrestricted warfare against the militias was needed. The Bush Administration and the Iraqi prime minister have set out to do just that. However, I do not believe the commitment of the prime minister is genuine, as he appears to just be using this operation as an excuse for an ethnic cleansing of the Sunni. If that part of my plan is to be adopted, the United States must take a more independent approach of dealing with the Shi'a death squads. They are the power base of the Shi'a Prime Minister, and he will not undermine his own power base.

Now, however a more recent development has taken place involving the government of Saudi Arabia. Here is the link http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16656642/

The Saudi government is talking about sending troops into Iraq, because like I said, the Shi'a dominated government is not going to be able to quell the violence, as its supporters are instigators of the violence. This begins to follow the part of my plan that calls for the phased withdrawal of US troops and their replacement with UN peacekeepers and help from the Arab League.

This is for any of you that are skeptical, as you should be, of the benefits of Informationalism. From this basic paradigm I have derived systems for solutions that even world leaders are only beginning to grasp. This is because the former systems of reasoning that these men use are pragmatic only within their own ideological realm. As I have shown earlier, many of the men making this policy don't even know the history of the region. They are a product of education systems that have rendered them almost incapable of reasoning beyond axioms that Informationalism shows to be ineffective and counterproductive to the continuation of the species.

The combinaton of the Historicism of Informationalism, its Holistic approach, and the primacy of Information within the paradigm appear to me to offer results where others cannot. If we work to free the Information, we can work our way out of many a mishap.

I will not attempt to hold secrets, my intent here is to persuade the reader to begin to adopt the perspective and the paradigm of Informationalism. Unlike many causes however, I will allow the results of this perspective to speak for themselves.

2007-01-12T14:28:00.000-05:00

President Bush's New Plan and Informationalism

Here's an article I've been reading about the situation.

I have been perusing several articles dealing with George Bush's new plan for stability in Iraq. First of all I would like to say that I watched the speech, though not when he originally gave it, and I felt a degree of hopelessness in the air that I felt was unnecessary. President Bush has seen his doctrines fail to the point that his party has lost power, and his "new" strategy appears not new at all. Let me point out some of the key features, then I shall comment on their relationship to Informationalism and the plan I outlined only two posts ago.

1. The increase of troops by 21, 500 mostly in the Baghdad area.

2. A set of benchmarks for the Iraqis to achieve soverign security by November 2007.

3. Unrestricted warfare against the militias.

So what are we Informationalists to make of this plan?
I will first focus on what I feel is good in the plan. I have said earlier that unless we withdraw completely we must be willing to commence unrestricted warfare against the militias. I only suggested we needed an increase in troops, or the devotion of our current troops to special operations and border security.

That about does it for the good, now for the ineffective.

The benchmarks for the government do not seem to be a good idea. The government has failed to meet benchmarks in the past. The Iraqi government is headed by a man whose power base is in the Shi'a militas. He is currently using this position to commence unrestricted warfare only upon the Sunnis, and this amounts to ethnic cleansing.

I said we needed a troop increase, or we had to devote the other troops to special operations against militia leaders. This plan does not offer enough troops and does not seek special operations or swift operations. History teaches us that such an operation would need to be only days in length, with troops then securing the freed areas. This operation is planned to be long and drawn out, thus it will only generate resentment and fail.

Bush is now in such disfavor that he cannot address the main problem. Iraq's infrastructure is still devistated. People without jobs, food, water, or money will turn to anyone that will give it to them. This just happens to be the militias. They are suspicious of occupying forces and the Iraqi government, and they have right to be. If we launch another destructive operation that is sure to harm innocent civilians, we will only generate more hate.

Since it seems Bush is only barely going to get enough money to fund the operation, it is ludacris to think that congress will give him the money to go towards such a massive reconstruction effort.

In short, my Informationalist friends, this plan will only destroy more infrastructure and harm more civilians. It will increase violence in the short term, and then lessen it until we decide to abate, then it will return again. This plan, thus, is more of the same.

2006-12-27T01:25:00.000-05:00

The End or the Means?

I have started to read a book called "The Conquest of Happiness" by the famous 20th century British philosopher Bertrand Russell. With the first few pages I have obtained some bits of Information that my readers might find useful. The reading has also left me with some interesting questions I must ask myself.

I seek here to talk about Ends and Means in Informationalism. It is a long standing popular debate within philosophy about the importance of Ends and Means. I am sure you are all familiar with the famous quote by the Italian political theorist Machiavelli who said that, "The ends justify the means". There have been some claims that this was a mistranslation, but the overall idea is still spelled out in his work "The Prince".

The famous German metaphysicist Immanuel Kant believed that individuals should treat other human beings as ends in themselves and not just means to an end. Philosophy has long troubled itself over what ends should be chosen and what the best means are to those ends. In fact, that is the central theme in philosophy. This skepticism about ends and means is what separates it from the modern day business mentality, which knows the ends, and simply debates the means.

I shall discuss a bit about what Bertrand Russell has said, and then give some of my own thoughts on its relationship to Informationalism.

Russell says in the opening of his book that, "The typical unhappy man is one who, having been deprived in youth of some normal satisfaction, has come to value this one kind of satisfaction more than any other, and has therefore given to his life a one-sided direction, together with a quite undo emphasis upon the achievement as opposed to the activities connected with it" (Russell 22). To simplify, it seems that people of living circumstances that are not unusually psychologically agitating at a glance, have been exposed over time in their past to unnatural circumstances which have twisted their mental health.

This does not seem surprising, as the simple construction of modern civilization seems well beyond the state humans have lived in throughout most of their existence. Adaptation to this new environment on a biological level is bound to have its drawbacks; this idea is similar to the idea of "The Shadow" advanced by the psychoanalyst Carl Jung.

Russell speaks primarily about 4 kinds of character stereotypes: The guilty sinner, the narcissist, the megalomaniac, and the hedonist.

The guilty sinner is an individual who has been instilled with an impossible moral code, something comparable to the puritan moral code, which causes him to feel himself a lowly creature never deserving of love. It is no doubt that this morality would lead to a sense of unhappiness and perhaps nihilism.

The narcissist is an individual who wishes to be loved by all, and to be seen as charming. They are wrapped up in love with themselves. This love leads to treating people as means instead of ends, and overall unhappiness with a vanity that can never be satisfied.

The megalomaniac is similar to the narcissist, but his end is power, power for its own sake, and not for the sake of accomplishing something else. This complex simply leads to the desire for more power, an impossible amount of power, which will also ensure the individual is never happy.

Finally the hedonist chooses to indulge in simple pleasures. They escape their own discontent by indulging in quick fix habits such as drugs to forget their own displeasure. However, the displeasure returns as the drug wears off, and so it must be taken again to forget the added displeasure of the burden of this knowledge.

Perhaps some of you have noticed that all 4 of these are recursive systems? It is also not unusual to find individuals who shift between these modes of character.

So Russell seems to suggest that one should practice an activity for its own sake. One should treat the activity as an end in itself. For example, one should play basketball not to win the NBA championship, but because they enjoy playing basketball. We practice martial arts not for the belt, but for the sake of the art and its enjoyment. Russell suggests that this is the only way to ensure happiness.

How does this relate to Informationalism?

We've been discussing means and ends. So how does this concept apply to Informationalism?

Informationalism is a means, and not an end. I have stated that we should acquire and freely distribute Information for its own sake. It is true, perhaps and end could be to ensure the survival of the species. It is also true that I think that Informationalism is the best way to ensure that this end is met. However, this is not necessarily the "end" of Informationalism.

Regardless of whether or not we are Informationalists, we could still be wiped out at any time. As I just stated, Informationalism just ensures we are doing all we can to make sure that this does not happen. It is also, therefore, the only way to ensure that we continue to have any means or ends to explore at all. It thus appears, as I have said before, that the preservation of the species is the ultimate end if there could ever be such a thing.

Informationalism itself, once again, is a means, it is an activity. Acquiring more knowledge about the world is an art that can be practiced, the same as basketball or martial arts. As one practices, one can become more adept at this art. We do it, however, not as an obsession with the ultimate end that we may never reach, but for the activity itself. Informationalism gives the individual the opportunity to grow outside the confines of systems that narcissistically claim to be able to explain everything. To join it is, as always, a choice.

Take yourself all the way back to Socrates: What do you really think that you know?

2006-12-22T19:43:00.000-05:00

Informationalism and Iraq

If there is one subject that a modern American citizen cannot escape if they wish to be a player in the discussion of our future, it is Iraq. Thus, I will attempt to deal with the situation in Iraq as an Informationalist. Perhaps viewing the situation from an Informationalist's perspective will shed some light on the problems and possible solutions.

As an Informationalist, historicism is very important as one begins to approach a problem. If we do not understand the events leading up to the current situation, it is highly unlikely that we are going to find a way to resolve the problem. I would cite politicians such as Rep. Silvestre Reyes of Texas who had no idea the distinction between Shi'a and Sunni factions overall, much less in Iraq. We cannot expect our politicians to pursue strategies that will actually solve these problems unless they actually understand what the problems are.

So first I will refer you to some links that can provide you with a comparative history of the situation in Iraq, and then give you a brief summary if you choose not to explore them, which I highly recommend that you do. I would also recommend you read the Wikipedia on each, however, due to the prejudice against Wikipedia, I will attempt to utilize more verifiable sources.

Links:

Shi'a

Sunnis

Kurds

Iraq

So, for those of you who do not want to make use of the links I have provided, here is a short history of the conflict:

The split of the Roman Empire into two provinces, combined with the later collapse of the western half in 450 AD and the weakening of the eastern half left a power vacuum in the middle east. It is natural that some force would come to fill this vacuum.

As many of you know, a man named Mohammed founded Islam in the 7th century AD. His successors took the title of Caliph, a role that can be equated roughly with the medieval Pope. However, unlike the Pope, the Caliphate became a post ruled in dynastic fashion, as opposed to election. The dispute over dynastic succession is the origin of the Sunni and Shi'a split.
The Shi'a believe that the 4th Caliph who was a relative of Mohammed should have had his offspring continue the dynastic rule of the Caliphate. However, a close associate clan took the power of the Caliphate and established the Umayyad dynasty.

The Shi'a split off from the main current of Islam and became an oppressed minority. This minority located itself mainly in the former area of Persia (Iran) and established itself as a separate sect of Islam with a similar belief structure.

The Umayyad dynasty flourished during the early 8th century. It relocated the capital of the Caliphate from Medina to Damascus in Syria. It came into conflict with the remaining Eastern part of the Roman Empire, or the Byzantine Empire. They lost favor in the heartland of Islam as another clan known as the Abbasids rose to power with the support of the Shi'a. They destroyed Umayyad rule in the mid 8th century everywhere except near the area of Spain, where the Umayyad Caliphate remained for some time.

The Abbasid Dynasty moved the capital of the Caliphate from Damascus to Baghdad. They continued the struggle against the Byzantine Empire, and struggled with the risen west which had now been somewhat unified by the authority of the Catholic Church. Their rule, like many, was marred with massive infighting during times of war and peace. They at first had the support of the Shi'a, as they did appear to have some blood linkage to Mohammed. However, they quickly turned to Sunni support and lost the favor of the Shi'a. In the late 13th century the Abbasid dynasty was all but overthrown by the rising Ottoman Turks.

In the early 14th century the Ottoman Empire under the rule of the Turkish Sultan became the primary force behind Islam. It would remain so until its destruction at the end of the First World War in the 1920's.

The Ottoman Empire was based out of Turkey. In the early 15th century they took over the capital of the Byzantine Empire known as Constantinople, formally bringing the eastern half of the Roman Empire to an end. It is this event which many argued had a primary affect on waking Western Europe from its slumber and bringing it into the Renaissance.

The Ottoman Empire began to decline as the powers of Europe began to expand in the early 16th century. Colonization of the new world and the coming Industrial revolution left the Ottoman Empire behind as a real world power. It attempted to assert its influence one last time in allying itself with the central powers in the First World War. However, it was defeated, and its defeat ended the Ottoman Empire.

The British and the French occupied most of the middle-east in the wake of the First World War, and the center of the Ottoman Empire shortly after became the Republic of Turkey. The British and the French partitioned their new middle-eastern provinces. They set up the area which would become Iraq under a king who needed their support to rule the area.

The outbreak of the Second World War and its disastrous effect on Britain and France forced them to give up their colonial possessions in the Middle East. Iraq was put under the rule of the king which could not stand without their support, and thus he was almost immediately overthrown.

From the 1940's onward Iraq was ruled by one military dictatorship after another until the Ba'ath party came to power. The Ba'ath party operated under a political platform of Arab Socialism. It is different from the usual association of socialism with secularism, but is overall left in its leaning.

Saddam Hussein came to power using the mechanisms of the Ba'ath party and established a form of military dictatorship over the country. Early into his rule he began a War with Iran, which was one of the most deadly non-nuclear wars ever fought in history. The United States initially supported Saddam because of his stance against Iran. It must be noted that this was during the Cold War, and hard-line military dictatorships were often favored by the US or USSR in order to further their broader agendas against one another.

Iran is primarily a Shi'a nation in the area where Persia was once dominant centuries ago. It was ruled by an American installed dictator until the 1970's when a coup brought to power an Islamic republic that has had bad relations with western powers such as the United States since its foundation.

Much bad blood was created from Saddam's War with Iran. This is because Saddam brutally oppressed the Shi'a majority in Iraq, as Iran is also Shi'a and many of the Shi'a in Iraq did not support the Sunni minority government. Saddam also brutally oppressed the Kurds in the Northern Portion of Iraq, because of their association with Iran to overthrow Saddam's government in hopes of creating a Kurdish state in return. This oppression took the form of deadly chemical attacks, which lead to the accusations that Iraq continued to possess chemical weapons, and that Saddam was a war criminal for using them.

It should be noted that a little history of the Kurds is necessary here. They are an ethnic people who live in Northern Iraq and Southern Turkey. These people have been brutally oppressed over the centuries for their more secular stance as well as their desire for a national homeland known as Kurdistan.

The War against Iran was a disaster, and it left Iraq so far in debt that Saddam attempted to invade the wealthy state of Kuwait in the early 1990's. This Endeavour was thwarted by a Coalition including the United States in what would be called the First Gulf War.

After Saddam's defeat in the first Gulf War, his dictatorship limped along under constant bombardment from United States forces and constant accusation of the possession of unlawful chemical weapons.

After the attacks on the World Trade Center Buildings in American on September 11th, the Bush Administration began to pursue Saddam with renewed vigor on his WMD program and his funding of Terrorism in Palestine. This culminated in a Second Invasion of Iraq in 2003. An invasion that was successful in immediately ending Saddam's fragile regime, but has been plagued with problems stemming from the Sunni, Kurdish, and Shi'a division, as well as divisive influence from Syria and Iran.

This brings us to today:

Nearly 3000 American troops have been killed and many more wounded. The Iraqi parliament is split between the factions of Shi'a, Sunni, and Kurd.

The Shi'a, especially under the influence of Shi'a cleric Al-Sadr are accused of supporting Shi'a death squads. The Kurds want great autonomy in the northern part of Iraq as part of their dream of establishing Kurdistan, Al-Qaeda is using Iraq as a base of operations against the United states, and the Sunnis who were in power under the rule of Saddam are conducting an Insurgency against the American backed and Shi'a dominated government. It should also be noted that the original Iraqi military was disbanded by the Coalition Provisional Authority, and this fatal mistake is one that must be delt with so that order can be regained.

The Iraq Study Group Report states that violence is rising and that that the country will slide into complete chaos if something is not done soon.

So now that we as Informationalists have explored the history, what can we do?

So, the situation in Iraq boils down to this:

The Shi'a are the majority population in Iraq, and thus they have been swept into power by the recent Iraqi elections. Many of them have been using their newfound power to exact revenge for decades of Sunni oppression. These Shi'a are supported on a basic level by Iran, as their Shi'a dominated republic is an outcast like the Shi'a in Iraq from the majority of the Muslim world. As has been shown, the Shi'a and Sunni conflict goes back centuries, and the blood spilled between the two in Iraq has only deepend the divide.

The Kurds in the north still dream of their homeland of Kurdistan. They are a more secular bunch and their lack of desire for sectarian violence has caused their area to be more prosperous than the Sunni or Shi'a dominated areas in Iraq. In the future this unbalance of wealth coupled with Shi'a rule may prove to be yet another split. However, for the time being the Kurds have a loose alliance with the Shi'a against their collective Sunni oppressors.

The Sunni are in a state of cultural shock due to their loss of power. This is also unusual given the dominance of the Sunni sect throughout the rest of the Muslim world. Not only are they more apt to support the old regime and Ba'ath party run by Saddam (a Sunni), but they are angered by the death squads supported by clerics such as Al-Sadr. This is fueling the Sunni led insurgency against the new Iraqi government.

Al-Qaeda is also in Iraq. It has a loose affiliation with the Sunni insurgency, but its overall goal is simply to fight the Coalition forces.

Now, the Sunni overall dislike the coalition forces. The Shi'a as a majority feel that the coalition forces should leave the country. The only thing close to support that the coalition has comes from the Kurds. Other than that, the United States as picked western friendly individuals and helped to elevate them into prominant status within the government. This has generated much resentment towards the current government, which is at the same time powerless to rebel too far against its Shi'a support block.

Syria and Iran are also working to undermine coalition support within the region, and to establish an Iraqi government that is supportive of the regimes in Iran and Syria.

So, how does one solve all these complicated blood spilling conflicts when the only thing most seem to have in common is disgust with the coalition?

I would encourage all of you to read the Iraq study group report cited earlier, as it offers many potential solutions. However, I also attempt to offer mine using the perspective of Informationalism.

1. We have to be agressive about controlling the ability of the Iraqis to obtain weapons for the time being. A close crackdown on the boarder and a massive weapons exchange program should be initiated where guns would be exchanged for some other useful good.

2. This will bring the coalition into conflict with the Shi'a militias as well as insurgents. These people must be forced to give up their weapons. They have already shown they are willing to brutally murder innocent people for nothing more than revenge. The coalition military must engage the militias and disarm them as effectively as possible.

3. This will be met with outrage from most of the Iraqi government. So the coalition must do some deal making. Greater autonomy must be allowed for the Kurdish and Sunni dominated areas of Iraq, in exchange for the giving up of militias. A system must also be set up for the sharing of country oil revenues.

4. With the destruction of the militias the Iraqi army and police force must be allowed to patrol the country in greater numbers. The coalition forces will take on more of an advisory role as they begin their withdrawl. The Iraqi government should be provided with UN and Arab League support to the fullest extent possible. This includes aid to the Iraqi people and the creation of large government works programs to bring the basic industrial structures of Iraq back online.

5. Massive amounts of aid must be given to the people of Iraq. In order to gain their support, the coalition must ensure that their basic needs are being met by their government. Currently, this is not being done effectively.

6. The coalition must build schools, as well as set up student exchange programs where Iraqi children can be taken to Western countries to be educated. I am aware this appears ethnocentric on the surface, but the western education system is far closer to Informationalism than Islamic education. Prisoners must also be offered a kind of education to make it more likely that they will not return to negative activity upon their release.

7. The coalition must hold talks with Iraq, Syria, and Iran with a moderator in order to come to border and trade decisions, as well as moderate the influence each power has upon the new Iraqi government.

Notes: The crackdown on the militas must be done within a 72 hour period. The military operation must be swift in order to ensure its effectiveness. After the deal of regional independence is reached under the table, the coalition must isolate as many insurgent and militia targets as possible, and eliminate them. This must be done with the help of the Iraqi army and police. Also, in order to do this, many more troops will be required. We currently have close to 150k troops in the country of Iraq. We must increase this number to at least 300k if we hope to establish any kind of peace.

What if we simply leave?

Then the country will descend into chaos.

What if we just keep the forces that we have?

This might be possible, but we will have to conduct many swift special operations in order to eliminate troublesome militia leaders. It will be a long arduous task and success is not nearly as likely.

One thing is for sure, what we are currently doing is not working. Any better ideas?

Bad Religion - Cease

2006-12-10T12:30:00.001-05:00

This is a song called "Cease" by Greg Graffin, the lead singer of Bad Religion. I chose it not only for the genius of the lyrics, but also for the beauty of its style. The concepts portray some of the philosophy of Informationalism through the eternal art of music.

2006-12-07T13:01:00.000-05:00

"The Gist" of Informationalism

I received a comment on my last entry that my thoughts were fascinating, however, the reader was still trying to understand "the gist" of my thinking. So, my hope here is to clarify the basics of the perspective of Informationalism.

Informationalism has its foundation on this positive judgment. It is Positive in that the truth of this statement can be tested scientifically. This first part is about pure informationalism.

The free distribution and acquisition of Information is the only way to ultimately ensure the survival of humanity.

This is not only testable, it is quite obvious. For example, not all that long ago in human history it was the consensus of the "scientific" community that Malaria was caused by "bad air". As we acquired new information from observation through the scientific method, we discovered the actual cause of Malaria. We have thus been far more effective in dealing with the disease, and sparing ourselves from it.

Some might retort that there might be instances where it is to our advantage not to know the truth of what is taking place, or that there are things which we can never know.

To the first I would respond that in order to know this, we would first have to acquire more information.

To the second, I would make a similar reply, and state that asserting that there are things we can never know is a complete illusion. To say that something always or never occurs is based on knowledge which we do not yet have, therefore we can only say what is and what is not likely. However, one must not make the mistake of thinking this means things like creationism are on par with sciences like evolution. Some things have evidence and others do not, and if you choose to ignore the evidence, it is highly likely natural selection is going to be very unkind to you.

What if Information is simply an Illusion?

Again, we would need more information to know this. Also, those who choose not to explore this "illusion" (and it is a choice) are once again highly likely to be naturally selected out of existence.

Couldn't we still be destroyed with Informationalism? And why should it matter?

Yes, to the first question. Our complete demise could come at any moment. But it is highly likely that with Informationalism we are giving ourselves our best chance at survival. Once again, I cannot think of a situation where it wouldn't be beneficial to have more information. The only way to know it wouldn't be more beneficial is to have more information, unless one knew everything.

To the last question, it matters because only things that are the best at surviving make it in the end. Informationalism is the ultimate survival strategy. If you don't want to survive, that's fine, but that line of thought is only possible if there is a drive around you to survive, otherwise the entire race would perish.

Is extinction a bad thing?

Once again, that's up for the reader to decide. Pure Informationalism does not tell you what is good or bad, it simply tells you what happens. This is because pure Informationalism is scientific.

Practical Informationalism

Obviously we cannot always have all of the Information. It's also not always possible to make judgments on immediately testable hypotheses.

This is where practical Informationalism comes into play. This is what I have been outlining throughout most of the last part of my blog.

I've been asking myself the question: How can we create an environment that moves closer to pure informationalism, because pure informationalism gives us our best chance at survival.

This is where species-useful and individual-useful information came into play. I suggested that if Informationalism is true then one cannot separate the good of the individual from the good of the group. If the group is not acting in the interests of the individual, it is not informationalist, and if the individual is not acting in the interests of the group, then it is not being informationalist.

This means the group respects the privacy of individual-useful information and the individual understands the necessity of providing species-useful information.

Why are the group and the individual afraid of one another in modern society?

Since they understand the power of Information, people are afraid of others knowing their secrets. This is because of the power it gives others over them. Knowledge is power, and the one who has the knowledge and refuses to share it is in a position of power.

What the individual who does not share information does not realize, is that this individual is ultimately damaging themselves and others in the future. It is not always for sure in an uninformationalist society who will have the power of Information.

So, in an Informationalist society, this fear of secrets ceases to have its power. Power through Information is collective, as it should be, since it is the only real source of power.

-----------------

I divided the progression of Practical Informationalism towards a kind of Pure Informationalism into stages.

1. Discourse Informationalism- Where Informationalists strive to create an environment that promotes Informationalism.

2. Revolutionary Informationalism- This occurs ostensibly when Informationalists are the ones that wield the power in a nation or world political entity. Then one can use the mechanisms of the state to speed the transformation towards Informationalism.

3. Traditional Informationalism- This takes place when Informationalism has become the established norm in the society. From this point onward it will be up to a new generation of individuals with a completely evolved worldview from our own to decide the future.

Once again, Informationalism is a choice. But it seems highly likely that those who do not choose Informationalism will eventually not be around to tell their tales.

Those of you, who choose to survive, choose to be Informationalists. Those who do not choose to be Informationalists, choose not to survive.

Are there things more important than the survival of the species?

I haven't come across any testable Information to the contrary.

2006-12-03T21:43:00.001-05:00

I was having dinner at a McDonald's last night when a thought came to me: Are abortion and suicide in coherence with the perspective of Informationalism?

Why was this important?

Informationalism cannot condone murder. Since the freedom of acquisition and distribution of Information are its foundations, one cannot kill another human being unless that human being is trying to kill the other individual. This is because people are the ultimate storage and generation areas of Information. Information is only significant if it is being applied to the individual, idle information is wasted information. Thus, if an individual tries to kill another for no reason other than desire, then they desire the destruction of a place where information is generated and stored. This is why only you, yourself are allowed to kill in defense of yourself.

Before I begin this discussion, let me state that the first and most important premise in these areas is to acquire information so that the destruction of Information is not necessary. Any destruction of Information is not desired. However, what must be done if the Informationalist is forced to act without the Information?

This is my opinion, and may not be shared by all Informationalists. What we agree on is the former statement in bold.

What about killing for a cause? If an individual isn't trying to kill you directly, but they are trying to destroy Informationalism, are you obliged to kill them?

No.

Killing is only justified when another party desires to destroy the individual. If they are attempting to destroy another person, then they must simply be restrained by force.

What if they cannot be restrained by force?

If the individual wishes to destroy the Information with such conviction that they cannot be restrained, then as I have said in another post: biology will take over and informationalism need not say anymore about the outcome.

Is this outcome good?

Beyond Informationalism, good and bad are subjective. As we acquire more information, the things that "work" will become more apparent. As the journey continues, we must regard this outcome as favorable, because biology has prevailed, and the Informationalist has survived. However, the death of any human being is always cause for remorse. Even if this human being seeks to destroy Information, it is regrettable that their desires were set up such that there was no way to coexist. As always, the ultimate goal is to acquire such Information as to make this occurrence unnecessary.

What about in War?

If Informationalists wage war, it must come with provocation. In a state of war, each armed party is trying to destroy each other armed party. Killing in this sense is the same as defending oneself. War does not seem favorable, however, because of the torrential loss of potential Information.

What about all the technological progress War has brought?

It cannot be denied that war drives invention. However, this inventive drive is a dangerous one. The stakes are very high. Also, while there is an increase in the sophistication of technology, there is a general degradation of the living standard. This type of activity cannot be continued indefinitely. Ultimately, the species cannot be sustained under a state of technological warfare.

How does this system work towards people who are not Informationalists?

For example, if we have information that another force Informationalist or Noninformationalist is going to attack us, should we strike first?

It seems highly unlikely that Informationalists would wage war against one another. It is antithetical to their goals. If Informationalists were to wage war, it would be because information suggested that one party was about to strike first. In this case the first strike party would no longer be Informationalist. This could possibly occur with a misunderstanding, but with the free distribution and acquisition of Information, there is little Informationalist incentive to wage war against other Informationalists.

For those who are not Informationalists, Informationalists must first to attempt to restrain the attacking party by no lethal means. If they persist, once again, biology will take over.

Suicide

Should individuals be allowed to kill themselves?

If an individual chooses to kill him or herself, they are destroying a place where information is acquired and created. But Informationalism makes way for a private sphere, does this fall within the public or private sphere?

If an individual wishes to kill his or herself it is not an Informationalist desire. If it takes place, another individual may desire to stop them. This is not Uninformationalist. However, if the individual rejects Informationalism on these person grounds, it is their choice and if they persist nothing Informationalist can stop them. It would be more advantageous to use Informationalism to understand this desire and learn how to alleviate it.

What about the terminally ill wishing to be killed?

The same with suicide.

How should this be legislated?

Both might initially be restrained by Informationalists, this is not required, it is a choice. This is a desire that does not fall within Informationalism, and if they choose this Uninformationalist approach, it is their choice.

Abortion

When a fetus is not yet an independent entity capable of acquiring and producing Information without the existence of its mother, it and the mother are essentially the same thing. Therefore the laws of suicide apply.

The current state is regrettable. As with Informationalism, the goal is to better understand why this detrimental state occurs by acquiring Information and working to alleviate the problem of this destroyed potential Information.

Conclusion

Suicide and Abortion cannot be outlawed. There simply is not justification to invade the private sphere without the proper information. The goal is to acquire such information as to make these personal acts of destruction unnecessary.

2006-12-01T20:20:00.000-05:00

Types of Informationalism

It is all well to do that the philosophy of Informationalism places the pursuit of, specifically, species-useful information above all. However, we do not live in a world that is in concordance with Informationalism. It is also not practical to assume that Informationalism will magically enter the minds of the populace and that the whole world will be changed forever and indefinitely. Where does this leave us?

First of all, it must be admitted that it is very difficult to change a traditional system. By this I mean a society of established social structures, values, and mores, which for the time are not causing immediate recognizable harm to a majority or violent minority of the populace. There is a threshold which must be reached.

A traditional system can only be changed if it has been shown that it works so ineffectively, that continuing to cling to this system will result in the destruction of the individual. I will deal here primarily with American society.

It is not yet obvious to the majority of the population that not valuing the pursuit of species-useful information will be ultimately detrimental to themselves and their posterity. In fact, the Christian faith professes that the world is going to end, and that this is the best thing that can happen for mankind. This kind of ideology is in direct conflict with Informationalism's normative judgment that it is better to work towards the survival of the species.

So what do Informationalists do about the majority of the population that either does not care about the destruction of the species, actually desires it, or does not see that this is likely to happen with the current system of social mores? It is here that I introduce the first type, or stage of Informationalism.

1. Discourse Informationalism

This is the earliest stage of Informationalism. The basic idea is to make society aware of the ideas behind Informationalism and to gather individuals who are early on willing to accept that the acquisition and free distribution of species-useful Information is the only way to ensure our survival.

The basic idea is to win over followers through argument. Individuals cannot be forced to choose Informationalism as their only perspective. Simply making Informationalism known and creating an environment where free discourse can be practiced is acting within the philosophy of Informationalism. It is my normative judgment that if we can create this environment of free discourse that Informationalism must win in the end. Informationalists hold the pursuit and free distribution of knowledge above all else; thus we can demonstrate our arguments in ways which dogmatic authors are hopelessly unable to replicate.

2. Revolutionary Informationalism

This stage will come ostensibly when the majority or a power wielding minority have accepted the perspective of Informationalism. Plans might in my opinion be made to accomplish the following:

Consolidation of all students under a national school system. The school system should have greater division of specialization at the culmination of the modern high school junior and senior years. The schools should be primarily run by a regional body that composes the national education body. Exceptions should be made for categorically exceptional students to receive further and more in depth education based on abnormal ability. The school system is to place equal emphasis on both the arts and sciences, so that students will graduate with a basic knowledge of the foundation and current theory of all modern arts and sciences. The college system is to remain private; however, a system of national colleges should be established to ensure all willing students an entry into higher education.

Greater funding directed toward the sciences, especially education along with research and development.

Funding to expand the current network speed and expanse of the national network of computers.

Automation of basic industry to be kept up and modified by a workforce of engineers.

A gradual narrowing and reduction of the duration of patents.

Funding towards the space program; especially the building of new and better space stations, crafts, systems of propulsion, colonization, manned and unmanned missions.

Implementation of mass transportation capable programs such as magnetic trains and light rail.

Establishment of a system of Universal Health Insurance, with greater focus on R & D in the medical field.

Move toward the declassification of government documents to be made available to the public.

A system of technological goals and mechanisms to achieve those goals at or by a certain deadline to be evaluated annually.

It should be noted that there is no clear boundary between discourse informationalism and revolutionary informationalism. Informationalists still actively seek to promote technologies and activities that further the acquisition and development of information.

The establishment and promotion of Informationalist groups outside of the nation.

Traditional Informationalism

This is the point when the vast majority of a society be it global or national, has decided to accept the perspective of Informationalism. The eleven points mentioned in revolutionary informationalism have been achieved nearly completely. From this point onward new goals must be established and perhaps new philosophies created for where the old has been found lacking. I am not claiming Informationalism is the eternal answer to everything. It is merely a different method to ensure that we are still here to keep solving problems.

** This is my aim for Informationalism and need not be mimicked exactly by all individuals. Again, the key here is diversity. But it is diversity within a frame that respects diversity as an advantage and not an obstacle to overcome. The diversity that views other diversity with hostility and does not seek to learn from it is not diverse; it is a self destructive philosophy.

As long as it can be agreed that the pursuit of species-useful information, the betterment of the individual and the species, and the free distribution of information are the key foundations then progress should be unavoidable. Once Informationalism has been established, those who would say they do not desire Informationalism will ultimately destroy themselves in the prejudice, or will be driven to hostile extremes by their lack of understanding from which they cannot recover.

2006-11-25T15:11:00.000-05:00

The Individual

Before I go into the final outlines of Informationalism, I thought it would be best to write something solely concerning the individual. One must not forget what has been said earlier, that you cannot separate the good of the individual from the good of the species, they are one and the same.

But, as always with Informationalism, it is important to define what it is exactly that I mean by this. My statement, while sounding high and mighty, can be used to defend the police state and the libertarian state alike.

So, what do I mean?

Individuals must deal with each other as just that, individuals. It is very easy to treat another human being as if he were something other than a fellow human being. Differences of opinion, sex, race, or nation can make another human being seem alien.

It is natural for human beings to feel a certain amount of discomfort to the alien. The fear can transform the mind and cause it to act in ways that we would find discomforting in a so-called sound state of mind.

As an Informationalist we must strive to never forget that the people we are dealing with are people just like us. They may not be Informationalists, they may believe that a super natural god controls their lives. They may not feel that Informationalism or the survival of the species is something vitally important. As human beings we make our own choices, because we are individuals.

So when you interact with your fellow human beings, remember that they feel and want just the way that you do. Their pain is pain that you can feel, their joy is joy that you can share. As Informationalists we feel that Information and its freedom are of vital importance to our joy and our happiness, but this does not give us the right to inflict pain onto those who do not share our feelings.

We will do battle with them in the arena of free discourse. We will fight them with tools of science, logic, and good will. A man who will blow himself up in the name of his god is not an evil man, he is a man who has had his mind corrupted. The people who would stop the free flow of Information are not bad people, they have simply been lost in visions of their own grandeur. They have been the victims of the misdirection of natural feelings from within their own bodies.

As children they may be dealt with as a parent deals with a child who misunderstands, as adults we must deal with them as fellow citizens of the world. We must be confident that in the end they will agree with what can be demonstrated before their very eyes over and over again.

If they chose not to, then this is their choice, and we cannot stop them from making their own choices. It is not our business to invade the private sphere. They must be allowed to live their lives, though we will not shrink from the challenge of showing them the results of how we feel.

Should they chose to try and silence the free flow of Information, then we must react. If they chose to try and silence it with violence, eventually we must answer it with violence if we wish to maintain our way of life.

But this is not a good thing, victory by violence is never a good thing, for it means that Information has been destroyed. An individual destroyed by violence is a tragedy; it does not matter if the individual was an informationalist or not.

We want to preserve and expand ourselves. There is no final end, there is only the will of the individual and the collective will of the species to continue onward. Embracing this will means embracing the value of the lives of every individual.

If my point sounds familiar to you, I would not be surprised. Countless movements have embraced this altruism for the moment that it suited their best interest. However, one by one, they gave into the idea that by force they can eventually make an adult human being "better". Learning and the changing of the mind of an individual with decades of experience shaped within a psychological framework is not something that can be changed forever by force. It will only breed resentment.

2006-11-21T14:31:00.000-05:00

Types and Kinds of Information

In my previous post on Capitalism and The Free Market I realized I must expound on the types of information. Two which I identified are individual-useful and species-useful information.

Individual-Useful Information

Individual useful information is information that is useful to the individual, but not useful to the species. An example of this might be, for example, what the individual had for breakfast the previous morning. Or, how the individual feels about socialism or capitalism. Or, who the parents of the individual are. This information is not immediately useful as species-information.

However, individual information may become species information under certain circumstances. For example, if what you had for breakfast could hold the key to a plague that has been sweeping the planet. The reader might have noticed that this situation is exaggerated and highly unlikely.

So, what can we infer from individual-useful information? The individual useful information is made up of the experiences and current personal feelings and activities of the individual. This inhabits to social world, and has little to do with scientific knowledge at the outset. Attempting to ascertain individual useful information without first proving that it is actually species useful information is bound to cause trouble, and is furthermore completely useless. Hence, the need for privacy.

Species-useful information

Species useful information can be best stated as discoveries of so-called scientific fact. What is the strength of gravity on earth? What exactly is time? How much money did a certain company make in the 4th quarter?

In case the reader hadn't noticed. Species-useful and individual useful information bear a resemblance to the idea of positive and normative statements which I expounded upon earlier. Positive statements being statements of fact, and normative statements being those of opinion. Opinion is the realm of the individual and individual-useful information. While species-useful information inhabits the realm of the positive world.

It is true that these two forms of information can transform into one another. The individual can use species-useful information to support his opinion, and the collective can require individual useful information to ascertain species useful-information.

The point here is that, for the most part, these two kinds of information are distinct. Also, for reasons I outlined in the need for a private sphere in an earlier post, it is to the advantage of Informationalists that the private sphere exist and be left to cultivate the individual. Abuse of individual-useful information can corrupt or stagnate species-useful information, and so should be approached with extreme caution.

2006-11-19T23:01:00.000-05:00

Informationalism: Capitalism and the Free Market

Here are the definitions of Capitalism and Free Market from www.dictionary.com

Capitalism: "an economic system in which investment in and ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange of wealth is made and maintained chiefly by private individuals or corporations, esp. as contrasted to cooperatively or state-owned means of wealth."

Free Market: "A market economy based on supply and demand with little or no government control. A completely free market is an idealized form of a market economy where buyers and sells are allowed to transact freely (i.e. buy/sell/trade) based on a mutual agreement on price without state intervention in the form of taxes, subsidies or regulation."

How does Informationalism react to the system of Capitalism? The goal of Informationalism is to create an environment where the ability to acquire new information and distribute it freely is maximized. Acquisition of Information and its efficient distribution has a tone that is similar is structure to Capitalist Ideology.

It is here that we come to a unique situation. Capitalism and Economics in general deal with the scarcity if materials. These materials are generally real in the concrete sense, whereas Information is something immaterial. It is possible to transfer ideas through language and other media in many formats. But, the ideas themselves are of immaterial form.

For all intensive purposes it is not possible to exchange one person’s idea to another in its complete sense. The differences between each individual mean that they interpret Information in ways that are personal. Perhaps the understanding of the meaning and laws behind the falling of a rock are almost the same for me as they are for somebody else. However, without actually being the other person, one can never understand with exact precision the ideas within the mind of another.

This is how we bring Information into the material world. It's not that another realm like our own exists, and for that reason we cannot perfectly acquire the information. It is the high probability that we are part of this world. Therefore, we must use symbols to interpret the interactions within our mind, which cannot currently be perfectly understood because of the lack of technology to do so. Even so, I think it is highly improbably that we can ever know the mind of another without being their mind. To evaluate the mind of another, even with highly advanced instruments, still leads to our own bias, because we are our own individual.

So when we talk about the acquisition and distribution of Information, we are actually talking about two things.

The first is creating an environment where new ideas can manifest within individuals. The second, to ensure that the symbolic approximated medium of transfer for the Information can be readily accessed and freely distributed.

It is here that the conflict with Capitalism appears. Ideal Capitalism involves the private ownership of the means of production. In a Capitalist system, it appears not to be wise to share your information. It encourages innovation initially by rewarding those with unique ideas which allow for the better production of desired goods.

The first assumption here relies on the desires of the individual. Capitalism wishes to meet the desires of the individual as long as that desire does not conflict with Capitalist ideology. What does this lead to?

First, Capitalism does not take into account that individuals are not always rational. If individuals wish to engage in activities that are species destructive, but not immediately destructive to Capitalism. Capitalism is focused upon the individual. It neglects that fact that the individual dies.

Capitalism promotes holding information private that could be to the benefit of the species. This is because it is driven by profit, and not by the desire to acquire and freely distribute information.

It deals in the free market, where supply and demand are supposed to be met efficiently. But it assumes the irrationality or the greed of the individual will be held at bay so that a diplomatic pricing scheme can be established. It also fails to address the question as to whether or not the product in question is of any use.

With Capitalism it is possible for a population to become fixated on material goods that are actually destructive in nature. The Free Market and Capitalism have no remedy for this. For example, here in America the current working and economic standards are forced upon the businesses by our government. What results is a futile power struggle between the abuses of two greed based systems.

How can Informationalism help?

By opening up the mediums of Information, it removes the corrupting nature of the capitalist system. The informatialist system is also not fixed on individual profit, it is focused upon gathering important information that will improve and ensure the continuation of the species.

It does not ignore the self-interest of the individual. Informationalism encourages competing with ideas. It makes the assumption that individuals alone cannot win in the discourse of ideas.

If a man discovers a wonderful technology, but hides it’s from the world, what good is it really? Perhaps he can acquire wealth?

Wealth is only important to individuals. If there are no individuals, then there is no wealth. Therefore, the only way to maintain wealth is to maintain individuals.

So, it would appear that the only way to maintain any form of Capitalism is through Informationalism.

Competition is important for the survival of the species. The cultivation of the individual is also important for the survival of the species. But Capitalism assumes that competition and the individual are more important than the species.

I believe I have shown that you cannot separate them. To talk about competition or individuality without the species is simply fallacious.

So should competition and the individual be less important than the species?

Again I say that they cannot be separated. We cannot choose one over the other. If one is not allowing the individual to produce ideas, then they are not acting in the interest of the species. If the individual desires to stop the flow and acquisition of information, which is not in the private sphere, then he is not acting in the interest of himself or the species.

What about this private sphere?

I spoke not long ago about the need for a private sphere for the creation of Information. This private sphere is crucial. I will go into it further when I talk about the symbolic human world in conjunction with species-useful and individual-useful information.

2006-11-13T19:58:00.000-05:00

The Link Between Religion and Violence

This is a commentary on Religious certainty by Sam Harris. While I wouldn't isolate the problem to just religion, I would broaden it to any doctrine that requires you to believe in it unconditionally and based off of no real evidence.

2006-11-13T18:45:00.000-05:00

My Bias

In order to begin a clear and candid discussion of Information, I think it is pertinent to talk about what my personal preferences are. Too often people present ideas as if they were true, when in reality they are entirely subjective matters of personal preference. We must distinguish between the normative and positive statements.

Normative statements are judgments of value.

Positive statements are statements of fact that can be used to support normative statements.

Informationalism relies heavily on the positive, but it does take a normative stance. Namely, that the goal of humanity is the continuity of the species, and that this can best be achieved by acquiring and distributing information as avidly and freely as possible.

This is where the first conflict arises. Religions, such as Islam and Christianity, propose that humans have an immortal soul that can go to heaven or hell based on following or not following their canon of scripture. Here the goal is not the continuation of human existence, it is entry into heaven. They also do not value the pursuit of Information, only the observation of the tenets of their Canon of scriptures. Hence, my commentary earlier on the definitions that must be met for religion to be in harmony with Informationalism.

Informationalism seeks all positive statements with this in mind. It is the normative judgment of the Informationalist that the more positive information he possess, the greater the chance of the survival of the Informationalist and the species.

Before I go further into my bias, I would like to say that it is possible that positive statements could disprove Informationalism. Perhaps we could come across information that proves the survival of the species is not important, or that the free acquisition and distribution of Information does not help the species survive. If this be the case, the perspective of Informationalism stands debunked. However, this Information has yet to surface, and it is my normative suggestion that it is highly unlikely that it ever will. Let me also say that freely pursuing Information to find out that the information debunks this free flow seems somewhat contradictory in nature.

Bias-

1. I believe in the Democratic Republican form of government. I believe in the separation of Powers into the legislative, executive and judicial. I feel that the legislative body would be best if it were one body instead of two as it is in my country of America. I also feel that another governmental body should be established to evaluate the other three branches in terms of the efficiency and promotion of free Information.

2. I believe in Natural Social Capitalism. A system of Economics of (to my knowledge), my own invention. I suggest that we should structure out society to provide a minimum standard of living to all who live in it. When individuals are allowed free (free in the sense that they pay for it with their taxes) access to healthcare and education, they can then be encourages to compete from there. No one has to go hungry, nobody has to die due to starvation of lack of medical care, and the people who want to keep to themselves can keep to themselves. I think there will always be plenty of ambitious people, even more when no one has to worry about a full stomach.

3. I believe our ultimate governmental goal should be a world government structure around the first two principles I have just laid out.

4. I believe humanity's ultimate goal is to develope technology sufficient enough to explore the stars and the rest of our universe first hand.

** I have many other normative opinions that I will attempt to keep out of my Informationalist analysis. There are some conclusions that naturally follow embracing the normative foundation of Informationalism, the rest are constructed by the individual. Informationalism encourages a variety of opinions, especially in areas where the degree of uncertainty is especially large. It is still important, however, to be skeptical in areas of extreme certainty. But, as I said, we might want to avoid putting faith in the flying pig.

As an Informationalist one is allowed to have normative opinions that one can support with Informationalism. I will do my best to inform you when I notice I am making a conjecture that is entirely of my own judgment, and not based on enough positive Information to be considered a nearly definite conjecture.

2006-11-09T17:11:00.000-05:00

I wanted to get a feel for the online climate towards Informationalism. So I have been participating in some online discussions on forums. I've found that the people I have been engaged in discussion with seem to be driven very powerfully by personal bias. This is not surprising; it is common human nature to act in our own interest. We perceive our own interest to be the things that we want.
However, Informationalism suggests that perhaps it is in our own interest to gather information and interpret it in an empirical and objective way as closely as possible. It think it is probably true that it is highly unlikely that one can overcome all bias, or consider a subject from a totally objective point of view. But, does this mean we should allow ourselves to be possessed by bias. Our bias, which has been instilled by our parents and our society, and is upon close examination not really our personal feeling at all.
My debates have been closed almost entirely too political issues, and I've found that it is difficult for one to garner attention unless one makes outlandish statements. Bold proclamations.
Does this call attention to why those who follow doctrines without evidence in complete certainty are so vocal about their claims? Could individuals perhaps want to believe outlandish claims on some level because it makes them feel important? I will deal with this later when I attempt to explore the relationship of Informationalism and Psychology from an Informationalist's perspective.

Informationalism as a perspective system tries to avoid proclamations of absolute certainty. It is, after all, impossible to prove completely that pigs cannot fly. However, if one chose to embrace this as absolutely true because it cannot be proven false; it is very likely that they would quickly find themselves most unfortunate if they were to jump from a building waiting on a flying pig to catch them.

We can discuss what is likely given the evidence. We can also discuss what the relationships between the information we receive seem to suggest. What we cannot do is make with complete certainty absolute generalizations about this information without all of the information. Once again, we can only say what is likely and go from there. One could use this to deny everything likely and chose to take the side of the unlikely; that is a fair choice. It is my hope that the flying pig catches you.

It is sometimes true that what has been discounted at one time has later turned out to be true in another. This is why we do not dismiss improbability entirely. If our data leads us away from what is highly likely, that means it wasn't really highly likely after all.

Soon I will attempt to strengthen the layouts of the perspective of Informationalism. Then I will attempt to analyze data from an Informationalist's perspective. This is not the same as a so-called Freudian psychoanalysis. Nor is it as simple as making a hypothesis and testing it as is the case in the scientific method. It is examining the information, whatever for it may come in, and determining what we can learn from it. What does this information suggest?
If this sounds fairly scientific, that is because it is so. But science itself is a tool. Informationalism is a way to use the tool.

2006-11-05T23:21:00.000-05:00

Bertrand Russell on clarity and exact thinking

This is the only clip I could find of Bertrand Russell. Perhaps one of the most famous thinkers in the history of the world. The way he speaks of clarity and exact thinking are very important I feel. Though it might never be possible to be totally rid of your bias, one should at least try to be aware that it exists. One should always be on the lookout for where it might spring up, because it can distort your information. I also believe he might have been correct in asserting that the autobiolgraphical philosophy of old, while having value, might interfere with progress in the modern world.

2006-11-03T17:03:00.000-05:00

Wittgenstein

Ludwig Wittgenstein was perhaps one of the most influential philosophers of the 20th century. His contributions to analytical philosophy and the philosophy of mind constitute a real break from philosophy in the classical sense. A short description of his life and contributions can be found here on Wikipedia.

Nietzsche believed philosophy to be a sort of autobiography of the philosopher; a dissertation on their own mind. Wittgenstein broke with this tradition in a way that, while certainly not a complete objectification, called into question the whole focus and purpose of philosophy. It is due to him, in part, that I place such emphasis on the clarity of words in informationalism. It is very easy for one to become lost in one's own words. One advances a sublime and beautiful rhetoric, as in the case of Rousseau, and in this "beauty" one loses the desire to understand exactly what it is that they are advancing. This is a tragedy that has befallen many great men.

So here I will present and then comment on some of his basic postulates in his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus:

1. The World is everything that is the case.

2. What is the case, the fact, is the existence of atomic facts.

3. The Logical picture of the facts is the thought.

4. The thought is the significant proposition.

5. Propositions are truth-functions of elementary propositions.

6. The general form of truth-function is the general form of proposition.

7. Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.

What is the the basis of this philosophy?

Wittgenstein suggests here that "reality" is the collection of atomic facts. These atomic facts are statements that in themselves are true. We arrange these atomic facts in our mind to form propositions. If atomic facts cannot be found to be in concordance with the proposition, one cannot speak of whatever thought the mind has formed.

The point behind this is not Wittgenstein's overall philosophy. Nor is it even the existence of the atomic facts. What I suggest here is that in the realm of seeking information, it is important not to blindly accept statements as true because of the way they sound or appeal to us. Despite the emotions we may feel, we must break down even the most beautiful aphorisms, because beauty itself is a human construction.

2006-11-03T00:21:00.000-05:00

Richard Dawkins - 2005 - Cali Lecture

This is the famous evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins speaking at a lecture in 2005.

I find this an excellent example of why informationalism is so important. The reaches of the human mind are currently unknown to us. This is why it is very arrogant to propose that we know things "without a doubt".

At the same time, we must make some assumptions in order to live in the world which we find ourselves. But, to make assumptions about the world that do not apply to our survival and label them "incontrovertable" is arrogance.

2006-11-02T20:25:00.000-05:00

Informationalism and Government

So, I have suggested where the Informationalist might stand on politics; so what about government?

As I stated earlier, one of the goals of the Informationalist is to shape society so that information flows freely and as quickly as possible. However, as I have attempted to clarify elsewhere, in order to maintain a situation where variation can take place, some isolation is necessary. Where is the line drawn? I have already attempted to deal with this earlier, and am sure to continue to explore in the time ahead.

As far as governmental types, I shall lay out the accepted archetypal forms:

Oligarchy- government of the few
Monarchy- government of the one
Democracy- government of all

the most commonly excepted form of government is a so-called mixture of these forms of government into what is called a "Republic".

To attempt to simplify, most western governments are organized into a republic with a separation of governmental powers into the judicial, executive, and legislative authorities. There are checks and balances to make sure the powers remain separated. Also, the base of the government is a form of representational democracy.

This is a highly complex organization of ideas that has evolved over millennia.

So, where do the Informationalists stand?

Let us begin, as many so-called good things seem to, in the city of Athens. The burst of Greek creativity was connected with a kind of direct democracy. Not in the modern sense, in this case, a sizeable citizen minority governed the city-state. It alternated between a Tyranny, not in the negative sense, and direct democracy.

Let us also consider Rome. The Romans threw off their kings and established the Roman republic. By raising a national army which grew as their empire expanded, they built what was perhaps the largest empire in historical proportions that the world had ever seen. It's only rival is the British empire of the 18th century, and the contemporary American military monopoly.

Rome's republic ultimately degenerated into a Tyranny. But one that nonetheless, often pretend to respect the republican tradition.

Other societies of note that have particular explosions of information are Enlightenment France, The transitional Prussian-German State, Victorian Britain, Ming China, Post-Civil War America, Babylon, and Egypt and the Minoan civilization on the Island of Crete.

One thing that many of these civilizations have in common is that they reach their cultural explosions in the wake of a violent social upheaval.

Victorian Britain does not match this standard. But Greece blossomed when the Persian Empire drove Greeks from Asia Minor. Enlightenment France began in the wake of defeat at the hands of the Germans, and Germany after the defeat of Napoleon.

So, obviously Informationalists don't desire the massive deaths that accompanied these drastic social upheavals. So we must look to what they have in common with Victorian Britain and the Minoans.

The Victorians are our closest example. The Victorian society was not convinced that the traditional system of thought was the best. They began to question long held social conventions. The state, allowed this expression to degrees not often equaled before.

In the wake of the violent military revolutions, governments were weak. For a brief period people had the opportunity to question their government and surroundings before the yoke of a new power was put around their necks. In the case of Victorian Britain, the yoke was returned by the First World War.

So, it is most likely not a simple War that is the consequence of these bursts of creativity. A war destroyed Victorian Britain. A natural disaster destroyed the Minoans. Most of the other cultures destroyed themselves.

This might lead one to ask if it is even possible to create a society with a prolonged explosion of information. Is it?

I do not know. Obviously not, since we do not have the advantage of being able to look at time through the eyes of the infinite.

My conclusion is that one must have a government that allows the individual to express and critique the epitomes of the time period. No argument, no matter how sound or logical should be held up as beyond contestation. However, if one wishes to contest something, they should always offer evidence as to how and why they would do so.

Therefore, the government should support an environment where epitomes and mores can be questioned with sufficient evidence. But then one might ask: How is the government to retain power if the power is questionable?

If we are speaking of a government of informationalists, it is obvious that this power would be seen as not legitimate if it were obstructing the free flow of information. I speak hear of what would be an ideal final form of government run entirely by informationalists. This is, of course, a fantasy. But only slightly more of a fantasy than the government under which any of you live.

In the contemporary political situation I shall focus on America. This is only in this instance, because it is what pertains closest to me. I will not attempt to make hasty generalizations about governments with completely different political histories.

The American government is obviously committed, in certain instances, to the obstruction of information. Certain forces exist inside the government which are supportive of the sciences, and supportive of the practice of evidential dialogue. However, this can not be found as a primary force in either of the two political parties. My suggestion then is that the informationalist focus on amplifying the forces within the government that promote these values. Overall success in this would ultimately be beneficial to everyone, if our goal is to survive of course.

The idea of representative democracy and the separation of power all have legitimate benefits. But as long as their exists a greed for power over others and for material gain the system will never remain perfectly stable or promoting of information.
The best form of government would be one dedicated to the promotion of acquiring and distributing information, founded on laws that would make obstructing this practice difficult and highly improbable. If the government can adhere to this, it will be egalitarian in standards and whatever political form it may take will not regress to the dark side of greed. If it does not adhere to these laws it will eventually fail, and precedent is not yet on the side of its success.

2006-11-02T17:11:00.000-05:00

Naturalism, evolution & religion talk

This is an interview with Greg Graffin, a Doctor of Zoology. I found his PHD thesis to be a good example of the problems with informationalism and a personal god.

2006-10-31T16:35:00.000-05:00

"The main things which seem to me important on their own account, and not merely as means to other things, are knowledge, art, instinctive happiness, and relations of friendship or affection."

-Bertrand Russell

2006-10-31T16:08:00.000-05:00

Informationalism and Politics?

So, one will invariably ask: Is Informationalism liberal or conservative?

I would first like to point out that the platforms of liberalism and conservatism vary from party to party and from nation to nation. One must also define the type of liberalism or conservatism that they are using as their standard. I will be using America as the primary example, since it is my home. Classical liberal principles have achieved an almost total victory in Western Europe and America. In America, the two party system is not a clash between liberals and conservatives in the traditional sense. The clash is between two strains of liberalism. The "conservative" strain favors classical economics, with some departures, and practices a distinct American protestant morality.
The "liberal" strain of America favors a Keynesian economic approach, begun by the Democrat Franklin Roosevelt during the Great Depression. They tend to practice a secular morality, with some exceptions. Both are capitalist.

So who does the informationalist vote for?

In case you have not noticed, a great deal of these platforms and ideals from both parties are simply not the highest priority to the informationalist. An informationalist is interested in the pursuit of information.

The informationalist does not support one party of non informationalists against another at the expense of their own principles. Both parties make convicted judgments about their doctrines and about one another that are uninformationalist. One needs to only browse a few campaign adds to see that the interest of these two parties is actually disinformation.

So should we side with the lesser of the two evils? If there is one?

As always, the vote is personal and confidential. Informationalism does not support a party that does not support informationalism because it is at its own expense. When an informationalist votes, they should act as they always do, treating informationalism as a perspective which they take into account when they make their decisions.

In my opinion, it is far better to attempt to shape the political landscape so that we are dealing with fellow informationalists, as opposed to making the difficult decision as to who will impede information more than the other.

2006-10-31T00:50:00.000-05:00

The Purpose of Informationalism

In a radically polarized and evenly divided society ruled by a minority, the often unknown but very real fear of all cultures comes into play. Stagnation.

Informationalism is an attempt at avoiding cultural stagnation. It is not a religion, it is not a law. It is a philosophy; it is a perspective.

Their exists no final redemption to informationalism. An individual cannot find salvation from themselves. However, perhaps one can see themselves in another light, and learn things that they did not know before.

Their is only the choice that pursuing information is conducive to our individual and collective will to offer some degree of understanding of our circumstances in the universe. It is an attempt to seek out knowledge in places beyond the walled cells our ethnocentric culture has built around us, and yet embrace the knowledge of that cell as part of who we are.

It is a way of recognizing the potential within every human being. It is when we think that perhaps for every problem, there is a solution.

Be attached to your theories, if you have confidence in them. But don't shut out the possibility that you might not be correct, that too is information.

2006-10-31T00:49:00.000-05:00

"Man's unfailing capacity to believe what he prefers to be true rather than what the evidence shows to be likely and possible has always astounded me. We long for a caring Universe which will save us from our childish mistakes, and in the face of mountains of evidence to the contrary we will pin all our hopes on the slimmest of doubts. God has not been proven not to exist, therefore he must exist. "

-Alpha Centauri

2006-10-31T00:10:00.000-05:00

Informationalism and Privacy

One might ask, and one would not be foolish for doing so: How can the privacy of the individual be protected under Informationalism? If we value the pursuit of information above all else, how can one not allow other individuals to know the most intimate part of their lives?

This question cuts to the heart of the very nature of information. First, I will present an ideal. This is an ideal not in the sense that it is what informationalists strive for, but a fictitious creation of a society. In this ideal world all known information flows instantly from individual to individual. There is no delay beyond that of the currently accepted speed of light. In reference to the earth, it is possible to immediately know all that is know by every other fellow human being almost instantly. If this were the case, there would essentially be no individual. Thought would be the collective thought of the entire human society. In this world the nouns which we use to identify ourselves would be greatly depreciated in meaning. Is this society possible? And if it is, is it what an Informationalist would want?

Such a society is, of course, not possible with our current technological circumstances. But, if it were, would Informationalism dictate that the privacy of the individual must be eliminated?

My theory is to the contrary:

As stated earlier, the philosophy of informationalism is dedicated to the pursuit of information. The pursuit of information is a simple fact of volition and the will to power, but the choice to be an informationalist is not. It is possible to interject here the value of feeding data into as many individuals as possible.

Let us turn to the process of evolution for an example. If a species is present everywhere, such as humanity is today, it becomes difficult for variation to take place. If no community is isolated, then the processes of evolution become dubious. It is good, in the natural world, for some species to undergo isolation, as this gives birth to the different structures within the genetic code that allow for specific advantages. When suddenly combined with close cousins in cooperation, one can expect to see a burst in variation activity.

Likewise, the privacy of the individual thought could be treated this way. It is my theory that allowing the individual privacy of personal information can lead to unique points of view that might be stagnated if it is subjected to the pressing power of the whole. Intellectual variation might be destroyed if we lived in the presupposed ideal society.

But, where do we draw the line? What is private and what is public information? Where is the boundary between the private information that cultivates the individual, and the public information which betters all of humanity?

I suggest that the individual must be protected in their ideas and their identity. No one should be allowed to steal the idea or identity of another human being. A follower of informationalism seeks the information, but it cannot be forced, it must be given freely. So the informationalists themselves will respect the ideas and identities of fellow informationalists, and since their paradigm goals are the same the social harmony should suffer minimal disruption.

What about information from people who chose not to follow the philosophy of informationalism?

As has been stated before, informationalism is a choice. One cannot be forced to be an informationalist. However, in the instance that a non informationalist possesses information that is paramount to an issue such as the survival of the human community as a whole, regardless of my opinion, humans will do as nature dictates.

2006-10-30T11:01:00.000-05:00

"Technological advance is an inherently iterative process. One does not simply take sand from the beach and produce a Dataprobe. We use crude tools to fashion better tools, and then our better tools to fashion more precise tools, and so on. Each minor refinement is a step in the process, and all of the steps must be taken."

- Alpha Centauri

2006-10-29T21:31:00.000-05:00

Informationalism and God

It has been stated earlier that it is of particular difficulty for one to be considered a follower of any religion and still be an informationalist.

Informationalism regards the existence of a personal god as a highly unlikely claim. And so, it is not in the nature of informationalists to believe in claims which are highly unlikely. While not dismissing the idea completely, it is very difficult to reconcile the belief in a personal conscious god and an established religion with Informationalism. This is because religions, especially major religions, are in the habit of limiting the flow of information. This limiting of information is sanctioned by a higher power whose will we cannot ultimately know, and thus following this will is counterproductive to the informationalist.

The personal god is an anthropomorphization of the universe. The informationalist acknowledges that the primary drive of human beings is the will to control our circumstances. In such a world, it is possible to fulfill all our biological and personal desires. Since we know that this is often not the case in the actual world, we impose the structures of our imagination onto the actual world. In this sense, our interpretation of events can be used to construct a system that is not in concordance with reality. When this lack of concordance with reality interferes with our desire to pursue information, due to the fact that it may to contrary to our image of the world, it has become something that is uninformationalist.

If one, however, believes in the pantheistic version of the universe, that god is all and all is god, this can be acceptable. Such a proposition is not unlikely. Since informationalists regard the personal god as a creation of man, the impersonal god can simply be the universe itself. The blind watchmaker, which is all and all is it.

Upon close examination this view is not different from the position of atheism. This is because the definition of god can be altered because of its lack of rigid linguistic status, and has thus been rendered to be a definition that expresses the definition of the atheist or most specifically weak atheism. Take Spinoza for example; the god of Spinoza worked by natural laws and did not possess a conscious of his own. The god of Spinoza posessed the universal consciousness and did everything out of necessity. Therefore, once can see that it is possible to bring the definition of god into terms that are acceptable for an atheist. However, obviously, the simple webster's dictionary defines god as something that is highly likely to be not the case. Atheists in this sense are pantheists and pantheists are atheists. So, disbelief in god is not against informationalism, it is dependent on your definition of the god in which you believe.

Even Polytheism on the pantheistic level is acceptable. If gods are divided into blind forces which operate by certain principles. In a sense, the religious terms can be brought into concordance with the philosophy of informationalism, and thus informationalism can thrive.

However, subscribing to the personal and conscious gods of most religions does not match these criteria. Thus it is not desirable if one has decided on the philosophy of Informationalism. It is not an issue of theism and atheism; it is an issue of perspective.

2006-10-29T21:24:00.000-05:00

"If our society seems more nihilistic than that of previous eras, perhaps this is simply a sign of our maturity as a sentient species. As our collective consciousness expands beyond a crucial point, we are at last ready to accept life's fundamental truth: that life's only purpose is life itself."

Sheng-Ji Yang

2006-10-27T20:19:00.000-05:00

The Philosophy of Informationalism

What is informationalism you might ask?

Informationalism is a philosophy that is based on the assertion that the acquisition and freedom of information is important to the survival of humanity.

Throughout history there have been many factors that separate human beings into classes. Until recently these were mostly of the material sense. However, the modern world is drive mostly by the trading and acquisition of information. Informationalism maintains that the current goal of society should be to acquire as much information as possible, and to make it available to as many people as possible.

Why is this important?

This is answerable in both a social and an evolutionary way. Socially, distinctions between people these days are defined mostly by the amount of information that they possess. It is clear that a person who acquires a monopoly of information in a certain area, or overall, will unavoidably tyrannize other human beings. Those who possess information tend to see themselves as superior to those who do not have information. This is not always a correct assertion. Without the free flow of information a society can only maintain a certain size and prosperity. In order to move beyond this, information must be freely accessible to all members of the society. This will prevent its slide into despotism and eventual ruin.

Biologically it is simple. Variation is paramount to the success of a species. Introducing information into different human beings will generate different perspectives and ideas. Human beings with their different talents will use their information in different ways. We therefore maximize the potential for acquiring new information by allowing all available minds to analyze the information which we possess. This is important because, in order to survive, it is ultimately important to understand the phenomena which govern the world.

Skepticism

The acquisition and distribution of all information is very important. But an informationalist must always practice a degree of skepticism. One may possess information, but it may not be correct information. It may even for a time appear correct and later turn out to be false. The lesson to be learned from this is that it is not the information itself that is most important, but the drive to acquire it. As long as one is constantly seeking to better the information that one possesses, the more likely they are to make important contributions to themselves and to society.

Why pursue Information?

It is not imperative to pursue information. This is dependent upon one's goals. Informationalists fall in line with the evolutionary principle that the primary purpose to life in nature is survival and propagation of the species. Humans can chose not to find this important, and simply die. The choice to pursue information is just that, a choice.

Good and Evil

Informationalists do not believe in an eternal law of good and evil. Moral judgments are simply calculations made taking ones desire into account and determining how general events will affect the desired outcome. Informationalists desire the acquisition and propagation of information, and view desires to block this and evil desires. We are aware, however, that this justification is simply our own, and thus a degree of moderation will be practiced in dealing with those who do not agree. Informationalists do not seek to harm other human beings, because this will limit the amount of minds that can receive information. Forceful action can only be taken when one attempts to force the containment of information through violent means.

Religion

To be an informationalist means one must be open to all modes of information and maintain a degree of skepticism. The scientific method is regarded highly because of its success in acquiring information. Religion, while not demonized, is certainly not condoned. Many major religions regularly attempt to obstruct the free flow of information. Thus, compliance with such religious practices is not possible for an informationalist. Informationalists cannot subscribe to a religion in the sense that it believes it is the only true view of the world. An informationalist may partake in the religion in ways which further the acquisition of information.

Unskeptical certainty is not advised in any case. Especially in matters of god. Universal principles that do not interfere with Informationalism are acceptable, but a personal deity clearly crosses the boundary of skepticism and is not advised.

Goals

Informationalists seek to build a society that maximizes the acquisition and flow of information. It should be a peaceful, global society with equal access to modes of information. In the interest of humanity, it is important to make the society extra-global in order to further the acquisition of information.

2006-10-21T00:09:00.000-05:00

"The free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master."

-Alpha Centauri

2006-10-21T00:04:00.000-05:00

The Issue of Gay Marriage(This appeared as a Letter to the Editor in "The Dispatch", a newspaper in Davidson County).

This letter is written in consideration of the attempt by constituents in Thomasville to support the movement to redefine the North Carolina Constitution to define marriage as a union specifically between a woman and a man.

It is true the democracy is one of the founding principles of our collective government. When an assembly of citizens gather to vote on an issue, it is the general agreement that the majority will rule.

However, another founding principle of our government is the right of every individual to privacy and protection of property. This is to prevent the threat of the so-called "tyranny of the majority". There are certain issues and rights which are protected, and thus no legitimate vote can be made to have these rights taken away from any citizen, or in a philosophical sense, any human being.

Another principle of our government is the separation of religion from the public sphere of society, meaning the government. While religion may be the business of regimes in countries like Iran, it should be of no consequence within our government. This protects us from the tyranny of a church, no matter what creed it may follow. It also protects us from the tyranny of one church over another, so we do not have to live in a society plagued by religious wars of supremacy, such as in Iraq. The government is meant to protect the rights and property of the individual. Thus, within the private sphere, which encompasses everything else, all is permissible as long as it does not violate the right to privacy or property of another citizen. Other matters are not open to change, you cannot vote away your rights, and you cannot vote away the rights of another citizen.

Homosexual individuals who are citizens of this country have the same rights as the rest of us. This includes the right to happiness and liberty. Allowing homosexuals to marry before the state does not have a negative or legitimately unlawful effect on the property of any individual. Thus, homosexual couples have the right to have their union recognized by the state, if the state chooses to recognize as well the state of union between a man and a woman.

The churches who do not agree with this are protected by our government as well. The state cannot force these churches who do not wish to marry these couples to do so. The church has no bearing in the public sphere and the state has no business in the sphere of the church. Any individual who asserts the supremacy of their church doctrine over the state is violating the social agreement he or she consented to explicitly or tacitly, and thus is not entitled to protection of their person and property by the state. The only thing at hand is the protection of liberty and property.

Some might suggest the following: that if homosexual marriage is allowed, then there would be nothing to stop polygamy or other forms of objectionable union; that it would destroy the American family; that it goes against what is natural; that it is against the Bible.

I answer that while homosexual marriage does not violate the rights of the individual, these other forms of marriage would do so. Polygamy is known to often be a forced process, and so must be outlawed for the protection of the individual. Also, that there is no evidence suggesting that the American family would be harmed by this, if anything it would help our staggering divorce rate. Finally, evidence of homosexuality as a natural phenomena are abundant, and once again Religion has no bearing in public discourse.

It is clear then that what the constituents of Thomasville, and others throughout the country are trying to accomplish is immoral and incompatible with the founding principles of our government. Should we wish to hold to these principles, these referendums must be dismissed. It is acceptable and required that one tolerate the opinions of a fellow citizen as long as they do not violate the rights of another citizen. But, if citizens attempt to impose a morality that is clearly against what is accepted in government, then other citizens have the right to ignore the decision.

The want of Homosexuals to marry can only be defeated by force, and to use force in this case is wrong. To attempt to force these individuals to do this is clearly violating their rights. They, on the other hand, only wish for citizens to respect the rights which they are already entitled to have. The many attempts of individuals to impose this immoral morality upon our fellow citizens is, upon close inspection, unacceptable and bound to failure.

I will not include my views as to if it is right or wrong in my eyes for homosexuals to marry. I can only say that as one who respects what began in 1776, that while I may attempt to persuade others to alter their views, that I could not respect myself for denying them the freedom allowed to me.

2006-07-25T23:20:00.000-05:00

To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.

-William Blake "Auguries of Innocence"