A Commonplace Book

All knowledge, without exception, is instrumental. In the scientific terms of information theory: information is everywhere, but knowledge can only occur within the ecosystemic context of a goal seeking adaptive system. If this is the case, then we are *required* to ask what the knowledge is being used for and by whom.

...the supreme value of remaining silent when you have nothing to say is not a recognized academic virtue.

The so-called knowledge explosion of the past thirty years or so has little to do with knowledge. It has primarily to do with knowledge as a commodity produced by the knowledge industry (Clark Kerr). And like every other form of industrial production in American today, its most significant side-effect is pollution: the pollution of minds. This explosion is an information explosion in the sense that the contemporary organization of the academic establishment depends upon everyone finding something to exchange and communicate in order to obtain funds and to maintain the system.

All dissent must be of a higher logical type than that to which it is opposed.

In open systems, the position of higher logical type is simply that which is most capable of dealing with the most context...