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European Visions for the Knowledge Age |
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European Visions for the Knowledge Age
A Quest for New Horizons in
the Information Society
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- Paul T Kidd (Ed)
- ISBN 978-1-901864-08-3 (Paperback)
- Price: See buy
on-line link
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- Chapter 16
- Restarting the Evolutionary
Drive
- Roman Galar
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- Introduction
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- History almost always follows
trends. Sometimes old trends vanish and new ones emerge. And
the shape of history is decided in these rare and relatively
short periods. When envisioning the next 20 years, will there
be a continuation of existing trends, or is one of these crucial
periods of change looming ahead?
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- The latter option should be
seriously considered. The sudden and unexpected demise of the
Soviet Union brought about a uni-polar power structure, something
that many find unbearably offensive, and dispelled the most obvious
reason for international co-operation. The emergence of large-scale
suicidal terrorism fundamentally challenges the logic of the
consumer society, which assumes that there is nothing worth dying
for. A number of trends that people have taken for granted, are
dissipating in absurdity.
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- As anthropologists maintain,
it was in Neolithic times when the important change in the direction
of human progress occurred. The shift was from self-perfecting
to face the challenges of the natural world, toward erecting
barriers separating humankind from the external. As everybody
realises, this way of development has proved to be extremely
successful and amazing achievements accumulated in the process.
Yet, the resulting bliss produced some nasty side effects. It
is dangerous that modern society acts like a sanctuary, where
punishment for stupidity is suspended. Amassed wealth is used
to cushion people from consequences of irresponsible behaviour
and reckless lifestyles. Alas, these consequences are not so
much dealt with, as delayed and appear in the form of environmental
issues, degradation of social capital, etc. It is also dangerous
that many decisions on everyday issues get transferred to contexts
so huge and complex that human intelligence cannot cope with
them any longer, and has to be replaced by relatively crude procedures.
As a result, the regulatory feedback between individual choices
and their longer term effects, which was the dominant element
of progress, barely works.
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- The hopeful expectation is
that a relatively mild correction to the way society functions
is still possible, and in effect the evolutionary drive of civilisation
will be restored. It is argued that the development and spread
of information and communication technologies may be the enabling
circumstance.
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