Text 2. Some Dimensions of Information Ecology.

A Theory of Information Ecology.

The dissolution of the unity of knowledge and its becoming an exchange value are ecological dangers if we react by trying to impose a pure political control or by regarding passively their marketing process. In both cases we are loosing the chance of potential pluralism which this technology offers. This pluralism does not imply that with the electronic shaping of communication all other formal (for instance printing) and informal ways of human interaction are surmounted or obsolete. This is indeed one kind of pluralism to be ecologically protected and promoted. An information ecology does not have the easy task of saying: information technologies are per se of a uniform nature. Let us save the traditional value of, for instance, books. This kind of oppositions (books vs. information technology) fails to see the complexity and potential plurality within the technological shaping of knowledge representation and diffusion. But, on the other side, there is the open question, of how an interaction between different ways of communication can be organized, in order to be aware not only of the opportunities but also of the limitations inherent in each possibility, be it a technological one or not. If we do not pose this question, then we will have sooner or later, as in the case of non-responsible action towards nature, huge problems of information pollution. Some characters or dimensions can be attributed to the information phenomenon.

The social dimension. We have been used to considering information as something that just exists in our lives, as the atmosphere of a democratic society. But information is not a triviality. It has taken three hundred years to open written knowledge to vast sectors of society. This was not only a technical but also an educational as well as a socio-political process. We need, as at the time of the Enlightenment, a creative educational and cultural policy in our field. As with other fundamental human rights it is not enough to develop an ecological or even an ethical theory on them (or to put them in a declaration) but it is necessary to cultivate practical judgement concerning possible alternatives of action.

The linguistic dimension. The social character of information implies, secondly, the linguistic dimension. Language is not something added to society, but it is its very essence, i.e. our way of being. Some characteristics of linguistic information are: a) its criticability, b) its tacit dimension, and c) its partiality.

a) There is no pure information (as there are no pure facts) but information is always relative to a theoretical and/or practical pre-understanding. It remains always something we can criticize (and not just retrieve) - if we have learned (individually and socially) how to do it. We are responsible for this awareness.

b) Information is necessarily blind, i.e., we are responsible for the information we produce and use. This tacit dimension cannot be objectivised. This is particularly important in the case of expert systems.

c) Whereas modernity aimed at a systematic view of knowledge, we, at the end of modernity, are aware of its partial character. In other words, we are responsible for an open or fragile unity, taking into account the plurality of languages (cultural plurality, plurality of points of view etc.).

The historical dimension. Information as a social phenomenon implies, thirdly, the awareness of its historical dimension. The electronic revolution is neither the beginning of a paperless society nor it is a necessary historical step to be fulfilled by all countries and in the same way in the future. It is just a possibility, to be responsibly inserted within the richness of the past and the constraints of the present. The alternative is not between rejection or information colonialism but between different kinds of cultural and technical information mixtures – information is half-breed.

A Pragmatics of Information Ecology.

On the basis of these categorial analysis it is possible to define the concept of information pollution, as a basic pragmatic concept of an information ecology. It is considered at the two levels: within information rich societies and with regard to global interactions.

Towards an information ecology within information-rich societies.

The key ecological issue concerning the production, storage, accessibility, selection and use of all kinds of knowledge is then, the preservation and increase of its social character. Responsibility towards this character is one ecological measure, one measure for the ecological quality of our field. From this perspective we have to afford two kinds of ecological problems: first, a monolithic control of the state upon the information technologies and/or upon the contents of the messages, and secondly, the unbounded transformation of information into an exchange value. In other words, we should strive to see and establish differences between the necessary role of the state in preserving the right of general access to information, whereas on the other side we must preserve our rights as individuals from centralised political and/or market control.

This is a crucial ecological point, for instance, in the case of the German ISDN-Net (a step-by-step integration of different transmission networks for text, speech and images) one crucial ecological point, as it is being highlighted by Kubicek. According to Kubicek, the immanent ecological dangers of such a centralized system are: the possibility of a total breakdown; the weakness of the system against physical violence; the possibility of software manipulation.

Kubicek suggests the creation telecommunication systems with a limited range of options and possibilities. We should be careful not only with regard to the problems of data protection but also with the transformation of our homes into parts of the electronic marketplace. We must put limits to the expansion of non-controllable technical systems, for instance through decentralisation, through a differentiation of interest (or user) groups, as well as through the creation of specific legal norms. In other words, we must afford the ecological problems of uniformation which reduces the chances of plurality inherent to this technology. We can call this kind of information pollution, as it depends on the power or control on information, the power pollution.

With regard to the linguistic dimension, the problem is called message pollution. Information technologies are able to disseminate an incredible abundance of messages, without making explicit the contexts they arise from (there are no pure facts), the blindness of their own limitations, and the specific kind of partiality they are supposed to have. Human beings are more and more the victims or targets of a superabundance of messages (this is also the case within information-poor countries with regard to mass media). Umberto Eco has already pointed out, that the battle to be undertaken in this field should be considered primarily not as a strategic affair but as a matter of tactics. We can indeed try to rule the communication process at the level of the source or of the channel. But in neither one case nor in the other would we be influencing the message, i.e., the linguistic dimension. This happens only in the light of the codes at the destination. In other words, messages change their meaning according to the presuppositions of the interpreter, to his preunderstanding. Here, in the chairs in front of our TV sets and in front of every terminal, is where the linguistic battle takes place. This battle has not the scope as Eco rightly remarks, for leaving the information circle in which we are embedded. It is a question of how we prepare ourselves to cope with this situation, in order to control plurality through qualified interpretation. Eco suggests something that he calls the "cultural guerrilla", and he means, for instance, the possibility of using one medium to criticize another one. This is something we are already doing: newspaper articles criticize TV programmes, TV discussions criticize books, and so on. Other possibilities are those of "mass dissent": that is a field, where we could be more creative, organizing alternative networks and services, particularly for helping marginal groups inside or outside our societies, by offering international aid, by supporting peace and solidarity movements, etc. It is believed, that the field of scientific and technical information would also profit from this view: the artificial alternative between state support and/or private industry is only one segment of a plurality of alternative possibilities for different kinds of user groups. The currently one-sided view towards industry as the main user of electronic information is monomanic and distorts the potentialities of information technology. This is also the reason for a distortion of the question of the economic value of information, where this value is primarily measured from the viewpoint of industrial users.

The last point concerns so called historical dimension. Our field is full of futurological ideas, some of them planning the next millenium. We can pollute ourselves with all kinds of utopias, which lead us nowhere, or, more precisely, to abandon the responsibility for evaluating risks and chances of coordinating different possibilities for designing our knowledge universe and its channels, taking into account their specific quality. The slogan of a paperless society is an expression of historical pollution in our field. It is time to abandon the mode of technological grandiloquence and to look for more humble, i.e.. more specific ways of establishing the limits of this expanding technology, and to act responsible, conforming to the possibilities these limits offer! To see limits not as something negative but as the condition for plurality and interaction is a key point for the future of a technological society, i.e., for the insertion of technology within the complex of other traditions. This is of course not a plea for neo-conservativism. As it is an illusion to think of a pure technological society, it is also an illusion to believe that there is something like pure nature or an ideal communication we should conform to (or we could create artificially).

A more realistic view takes into account that there is no ideal harmony between human beings, no possibility of a perfect language for understanding and action, and that we are always confronted with misunderstanding and non-communication. Human communication is not just an object for technical manipulation nor it is something mystical. Information technology is not necessarily a pollution instrument nor it is an ideal artificial limb. We can profit from its own potentialities if we are able to integrate it within the complexity of human communication. If we develop one-sided media, then we should not forget, that human communication is double-tracked. If we isolate pieces of knowledge, then we should not forget that they get their meaning from specific situations and particularly from the receiver's code. If we distribute knowledge through different technical channels, then we should not forget the right to a general participation in societal knowledge. If we handle knowledge with machines, then we should not forget that human beings are not robots or flesh machines.

To close one's eyes to these (and other) ecological questions of the information society means to forget our responsibility in designing tools - the responsibility that, in designing tools we are designing "ways of being". Information tools are, or should be, primarily people's tools. The information technology opens us its potentialities if and only if we are able to interrelate it with the whole of its social dimensions. It is indeed an opportunity, maybe the opportunity for preserving and increasing social understanding, within as well as between different countries and cultures which belong to one world.

As you read Text 3

· Choose the words from the text to complete this summary of the text.

To solve the problem of the gap between ………….. and information-poor nations it is necessary to identify the ………… rights of all nations in the sphere of ……….. along with a recognition of the international needs for the ……….., transmission, and ………… of certain categories.