Imagination and aesthetics as vital resources

From Information Highways to Songlines of the Noosphere: Global configuration of hypertext pathways (Part #8)

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Living myth: Paul Wildman (1996) notes that "Civilizations that have lost a system of living myth seek to hold themselves together by means of rational planning, contrived programs and projects, and organization." In criticizing the limitations of such modern strategic planning as blinkering creativity and imagination, he argues that: "Today we use information to feed the emptiness created by the absence of imagination. The information myth is that we need information to improve our lives." He cites T S Eliotþs words: "Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?"

Symbolic space: Yi-Fu Tuan explores the way in which symbolic space is integrated into a larger and more complex whole, namely the state. Symbolic space is viewed as one of the systems of symbols, in this case territorially organized, without which society cannot function. The state is seen as an aesthetic-moral construction on a grand scale. Viewed as a serious effort to articulate excellence for society, politics is itself a moral-aesthetic aspiration, and its achievements are properly deemed artworks. (p. 182). But he demonstrates that modern democracy is antithetical to the aesthetic "because it is -- or can seem to be -- nebulous, protean, egalitarian, partial to the average and hostile to the exceptional. But although it may be disposed towards these attributes, it is not confined to them." (p. 209) Such considerations might usefully be extended to the structure of the information society and the nature of the aesthetic which sustains it.

Aesthetic configuration: How might continuing future reflection on what seems to be required be assisted by the configuration of hypertext pathways on the Web? What might this mean -- or is the question only relevant to "spiders"? It is intriguing that "thread" is an important metaphor used to identify a particular sequence of comments in a discussion -- which may also contain other discussions. This may be restricted to a thematic thread, or its meaning may be broader. How threads get interwoven, and by whom, is another matter. Where are the Internet spiders to make the new mandalas?

Any such "higher" order of understanding must necessarily be carried by structures and patterns which do not lend themselves to proprietary exploitation in the interests of the few. Preoccupation of vested interests may well be with how spheres of influence are carved out of the information society in imitation of the past. But for it to serve any function as the "pattern which connects", any new order of understanding must necessarily provide bridges between incommensurable and proprietary domains of knowledge -- whether of schools of thought, corporations, or individuals. As formulated by Lao Tse ********. For environmental architect Christopher Alexander (1979), it is the central "quality without a name".

The question is whether such insights can be embodied into any configuration of hypertext pathways on the Web. What these quotes seem to imply is that what is of greatest importance cannot be effectively articulated. It can however be partially articulated and tangentially approximated -- and creative exploration of the unknown in every domain will continue to be drawn to do just that. Configuring such tangents therefore offers a window of opportunity through which operational significance can be given to the larger pattern that connects.

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