Utopias & the Information Society (FK13 | HM)

Informationsphilosophie. Information und urbanes Systeme 1

Utopias andthe Information Society

Philosophy of Information (Course in English)Fakultät 13, Hochschule München, Winter Semester 2016-2017

José María Díaz Nafría (Universidad de León, Spain)

Utopias and the Information Society

I. An amalgamation of Utopias from long ago (the project of modernity)1. Social ideal2. Abstract vs concrete utopias3. Utopias of the information society4. Past, present and future utopias

II. Designing liberty1. Information in organisms2. Cybernetics eyes3. Cybersyn: deploying democracy

III. Security vs Trust (the Island or the Globe)1. Is the solar system a secure place to live in?2. Historical remarks3. Soft/Hard Power (lyric vs. Obsession)4. Rousseau vs. Bentham5. Liberalistic Foundations6. Utopias and Globalization

Utopias and the Information Society 2

Bibliography

• MATTELART, A. (2003). The Information Society: An Introduction. Thousand Oak, CA, USA: SAGE Publications.

• HESSE, H. (1943, orig.). The Glass Bead Game (transl. from orig. Das Glasperlenspiel). Vintage. (s. documents section)

• BORGES, J.L. (1941). The Library of Babel, transl. by James E. Irby, in Labyrinths, 1962. Availableat: http://jubal.westnet.com/hyperdiscordia/library_of_babel.html

• ZAMYATIN, E. (1921). We. Englisch edition, E. P. Dutton (s. documents section)• ORWELL, G. (1949). Nineteen Eighty-Four. Penguin, London 2008 [BBC TV - George Orwell's 1984

(1954), in Internet Archive: http://www.archive.org/details/Meatpies_1984].• HUXLEY, A. (1932). Brave New World. [Other related resources in Internet Archive: David Gilbar.

SomaBNW (short Film): http://www.archive.org/details/SomaBNW; Qi Yang. Brave New World - The Hatchery].

• BRADBURY, R. (1953). Fahrenheit 451. München: Heyne-Verlag, 2000.• CHOMSKY, N. (1972). Problems of Knowledge and Freedom. Th Russel Lectures. New York,

USA: Vintage [In Internet Archive: Mark Achbar and Peter Wintonick (1993). Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media http://www.archive.org/details/manufacturing_consent]

• FUCHS, C. (2010). Critical Theory of Information. In Díaz, Pérez-Montoro, Salto. Glossarium BITri. León, Spanien: Universidad de León. [online: http://glossarium.bitrum.unileon.es]

Utopias and the Information Society 3

PRIMEREducation Programme

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Education & Research programmeInternational Summer Academies

Support: EU (under request)Period: 2015-2019Venues: Spain, Austria, Greece

I. An amalgamation of utopias (the project of modernity)1. Social Ideal/programme

“Universal History is perhaps the history of a few metaphors” (J.L. Borges)“Universal History is perhaps the history of a few UTOPIAS” (A. Mattelart)

Utopia as a kind of social programme (social ideal) | Plato, The Republic“You are quite right, he replied, in maintaining the general inferiority of the female sex: although many women are in many things superior to many men, yet on the whole what you say is true. And if so, my friend, I said, there is no special faculty of administration in a state which a woman has because she is a woman, or which a man has by virtue of his sex, but the gifts of nature are alike diffused in both… Isn’t it the best for the republic counting with the best men and the best women?...”

5Utopias and the Information Society

I.2 Abstract vs concrete utopias

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Ideas

Form AppearanceI

Observer

Decontextualizing: Die existing Forms belong

to the otherworldliness (a-spatial, a-temporal)


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I.2 Abstract vs concrete utopiasThe platonic model encapsulated in the

utopic understanding of information


• From the viewpoint of the modern signal theory (Digital Transmission): Ideal of transparence

Si{S1, S2,… SN}

Noise

Si’ Compared with{S1, S2,… SN}

Si

I.3 Utopias of the information society


Utopicbackground

Supporters Utopias of the Information Society

Supporters Dystopia

Perfect Language Lull, Wilkins Computable Language Turing, Chomsky

Borges: „The analytic language of John Wilkins“

Perfect thought Lull, Leibniz Computable Thought Babbage, Hollerith, Turing

Hesse: „The Glass Bed Game“

Perfect wisdom Bacon, Encyclopedist,Comte

Unlimited Availability of Knowledge

Outlet, La Fontaine

Borges: „The library of Babel“, „Funes the Memorius“

Perfect social order Nicholas of Cusa, Encyclopedist (Turgot)

Computable Social Order (Normalization)

Saint Simon, Comte, Babbage

Huxley: “Brave New World”Deleuze: „Control society“

Transparent society Rousseau, Bentham, Emerson, Chevalier

Communication without borders

Mumford, Shannon, McLuhan

Orwell: “1984”Wachowski bros.: “Matrix”

Trustful society Bentham, Tarde Security vs Trust of the Information Society

J. Nye Orwell: “1984”

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I.3 Perfect Language / PastRamon Llull (1232-1315 AC)


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I.3 Perfect Language / I.S.Noam Chomsky (1928-)


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I.3 Perfect Language / DystopicBorges (1899-1986): The analytic language of J. Wilkins


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I.3 Perfect Thinking / PastGottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716)


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I.3 Perfect Thinking / I.S.C. Babbage (1791-1871) | A. Turing (1912-1954)


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I.3 Perfect Thinking / DystopicH. Hesse: The Glass Bead Game (1877-1962)



I.3 Perfect Wisdom / PastR. Llull | Francis Bacon (1561-1626) | W. Leibniz

Leibniz scholar's cabinet of quotes and references


I.3 Perfect Wisdom / I.S.Paul Outlet (1868-1944) | La Fountaine (1854-1943)

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I.3 Perfect Wisdom / DystopicBorges – Funes the memorius (1899-1986)


Ireneo Funes, who, after falling off his horse and receiving a bad head injury, acquired the amazing talent — or curse — of remembering absolutely everything. “He knew the forms of the clouds in the southern sky on the morning of April 30, 1882, and he could compare them in his memory with the veins in the marbled binding of a book he had seen only once,” Borges relates.

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I.4 Perfect Social Order / PastNicolas of Cusa (1401-1464) | A. Quetelet (1796–1874)


Cusa: Earthly order as an image of heavenly order

Quetelet: Moral science as a physics of average man

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I.4 Perfect Social Order / I.S.Herman Hollerith (1860-1929)


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I.4 Perfect Social Order / DystopicAldous Huxley (1894-1963)


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I.4 Transparent Society / PastJean-J. Rousseau (1712-1778) | J. Bentham (1748-1832)


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I.4 Transparent Society / I.S.Claude Shannon (1916-2001)


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I.4 Transparent Society / DystopicG. Orwell (1903-1950): “1984”


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I.4 Trustful Society / PastJohn Locke (1632-1704) | Gabriel Tarde (1843-1904)


“All mankind… being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty or possessions.” J. Locke

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I.4 Trustful Society / I.S.Joseph Nye (1937-)


“As we think of power in the 21st century, we want to get away from the idea that power’s always zero sum –my gain is your loss and vice versa. Power can also be positive sum, where your gain can be my gain.”

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I.4 Trustful Society / DystopicAldous Huxley (1894-1963)


From tree-like structures to Complex Networks| Systems vs Networks

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Complex Networks (species, language, science…)

The tree of encyclopedic knowledge

The tree of species (evolutionism)

Again: What is the Information Society?Trees vs Networks (commentary on “The Power of Networks”)






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D’Alambert & Diderot’s Encyclopedia(XVIII century)





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2.1 Los tres grandes momentos históricos de búsqueda de la verdad:

antigüedad, modernidad, post-modernidad

The actual structure of the Networks


I.4 Past, present and future utopias

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Mythologised citiesImagined territoriesDystopiasCinematographic utopiasUrban utopiasCommunitarian utopias

Green: oldYellow: XVI-XVIII C.Orange: XIX C.Red: XX-XXI C.

I.4 Idealised Cities

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Babylon

I.4 The Cristian utopia of equality and fraternity

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I.4 Utopias at the beginning of Modernity

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- Thomas More- Francis Bacon: New Atlantis

I.4 North American utopia: the conquest of liberty

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I.4 Utopias of Enlightenment

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SalineHouse of director control and surveillanceInhabitants perfect semicircle: equidistanceGardens

Bentham’s panoptic: inspired Orwell’s “Big Brother”

Saline d’Arc-et-Senans:Industrial architecture and integrated society (1774)

I.4 The advent of citizenship

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Pragmatic approach: approved by the constitutive assembly of 1989

• 83 departments• Department size: half day of horse riding

distance until the administrative centre

Territorial search of equalityGeometrical approach (1780): R. de Hesseln, proposed by Abad Sieyès in the constitutive assembly of 1989.

• 1 department = 9 canton• 1 canton = 9 communities• Side of department: 72 Km

I.4 Schooling: a global challenge

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Late alphabetisation of the South (XVII-XX C.)

I.4 The anarchist utopia: The dream of a society without lords and states

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Theoretical precursors

Press experiences

Rotary board of European anarchist

Will of developing an anarchist international:

London1864Geneva1866Congr. Brussels 1868Congr. Bâle 1869Saint-Imier (Suiza) 1872Amsterdam 1904International Anarchist

Congress of Amsterdam 1907

I.4 The great bifurcationFrom social to communication utopias

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Making something together… Too much? Perfect communication

In mid 19th Century the social utopias are

abandoned (rift between Saint-Simon

school)

I.4 Esperanto: the linguistic utopia

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Members of national esperantist associations

European Esperantist Democracy Movement (EDE): in the European elections 2009

I.4 The utopia of the species improvement

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Birth selection: from utopia to taboo

EE.UU. and national-socialism: developments of the eugenesic project

I.4 The creative utopia (Bauhaus)

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Global vision of the artistic disciplines

International influences through its scholars

I.4 The Panarab Utopia

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The cultural community keep on being a warranty of continuity

I.4 The tragic universe of utopias

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“1984” world according to G. Orwell

DisputedFluctuating alliances (unfounded character of warfare)

Final victory of Oceania which ensures its dominancy

I.4 The end of waste: recycling, recovering

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Improvement of the Industrial scheme for a radical change of the flow of materials:

I.4 Save the planet: biospherical limits

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The elusive global governability of environment

Expression of the relations of geopolitical forces:

AdversariesSupportersUndecided

Three pillars of the lasting development:

I.4 A world without growth

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De-growth becomes a concrete utopia in the face of the natural resources depletion :

creditor state: bio-capacity > ecological footprint

Indebted state: ecological footprint > bio-capacity

I.4 Nature is reasserted in the city

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Habitable-tree: organic structure self-conditioned(Belgian architect and designer Luc Schuiten)

SeaOrbiter: floatting lab, 51 m. height(French architect Jacques Rougerie)

I.4. 100% renewable (Green energy)

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Global awareness raising: sceneries for a more prosperous future

Initiatives at urban scale, aiming at:- CO2 reduction- Renewal energy- Efficiency

Ongoing politics: - Public financing- Urban planning- Building regulations- Infrastructures and

public transport

Renewable energy rate in the final energy per country

I.4 Utopic Communities – 20th Century

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I.4 Eco-utopias

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Longo-Maï NetworkSelf-managed (alternative, laic, self-managed rural and anti-capitalist ideology)

Self-sufficientSolidary-pacifistMedia MobilisationCommodity and Ideas exchange

rol

I.4 The new interactive and free world

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Digital paradise? The new space keep on being strongly unequal

Part of thepopulation withInternet Access (2011)

- Cyber-attackgovernmentalprivate

- Liberty under control- States which are enemy

of Internet (according to Journalist without Borders)

I.4 Other world is possible

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Alter-globalisation movement and Indignants Movement reject neoliberalism

Mediatic birth of the alter-globalisation movement

World Social Summits

Peasant Movement, debt cancellation, against financial specualtion

Manifestations (18/11/2011 & 13/05/2012)National claims (unemployment, austerity, education…)

I.4 Rights and Dignity: an step towards democracy

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Squares, symbol of a democratic wind?Confrontation among peoples and real powers. (squares represented by its surface)

I.4 The end of the north-south divide?

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NGB per inhabitant in 2010:Triad (former economic dominancy, decline in growth and trust)

Post-communist countries (integrated in the market economy)

BRICS bridgehead of the emerging world

The inequality among rich and poor is globally increasing

I.4 Restorative Justice

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Alternative to the penal system:Restoring better than sanctioningThe person who has committed a crime has a debt with the victim and with the community

Dystopic justiceMinority Report

II. Designing Freedom1. Information in the organisms


II.1 Information in the organisms

61

DNA RNA

Polypeptid

Transcription

TranslationSince discovery of RetrovierenReplication








II.2 Cybernetic eyes and the Viable System Model (VSM)

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The three elements as a whole system in equilibrium

• Which is the key factor of the adaptive systems?• What is inside and outside?• What is the role of the border?• The environment is or not part of the system?• Does it need to be centralized?• The organisation must respond to the changes in the

environment


II.2 Cybernetic eyes and the VSM

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The five parts of the system (inside)



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Nested systems:

Recursion levelsAshby’s Law of required variety:Vorg > Venv, problem


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Focusing on (vertical dimension):



69

Managing complexity (horizontal):



70

Residual Variety (complexity):



71

Amplifiers and Attenuators:



72



II.3 Cybersyn Project: deploying democracy

• Recursion levels• Level 10 (State Economy)


Nationalisation and collectivisation process

of the industrial economy is started

1970: Allende win the elections through a

tight majority (margin of 1.3%)

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II.3 Cybersyn Project


Compañías nacionalizadas

75


• Changes increase of: Production | GNP | Salaries• Simultaneous increase of: Inflation | Shortage

• From a macroscopic adjustment (classic) the situation couldn’t be solved• The microeconomic adjustment came across with problems of internal organisation,

corruption, excessive management costs.• Fernando Flores plans a model of cybernetic management: calls Stafford Beer• CORFO (Corporación de Fomento de la Producción) Industry


• Cybernet: was designed to use the telex network for real-timemonitoring of each business. This control may seem contrary toAllende’s idea of individual freedom, however, this control waslimited to external observation, results per business day, whichwas framed in the idea of centralized economy.

• Cyberstride: collected the set of software used for collect, process, and distribute data to and from each of the state enterprises.

• CHECO: short for 'Chilean Economy' was never materialized, but it was a mathematical and statistical model sought to simulate the behavior of the Chilean economy as to predict it’s behavior and likewise seek solutions before problems arise.

• Opsroom: was a space aimed at control the whole system. Itconsisted of seven chairs with simple systems for any type ofworker could hold such positions. Opsroom was only materializedin a prototype.

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III. On Security and Trust

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I. Newton (1642-1727)P.S. Laplace (1749-1827)


III. Security vs Trust

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• Subjective vs. Objective Sense (certitude vs. Stability of the system)


Self-realisation necessity: to be useful to others without effort

Self-esteem necessity:community acknowledgment

Necessity of belonging-to:being part of a community

Security Necessity: by group validation

Functional Necessities: finding a place to eat, sleep, drink

III. Security vs trust (the Island and the Globe)

• 1990s: Information Society (transparent and borderless) – September 11th

• Security vs. Trust (Boundary Conditions vs. Inner Conditions)

• Contradictions in the liberalist discourses with respect to protectionism and interventionism

• Pendulum with respect to the awareness of threats.


III.1 Historical Notes

“It is a very common clever device that when anyone has attained the summit of greatness, he kicks away the ladder by which he has climbed up, to deprive others of the means of climbing up after him […]Any nation which by means of protective duties and restrictions on navigation has raised her manufacturing power and her navigation to such a degree of development that no other nation can sustain free competition with her, can do nothing wiser than to throw away these ladders of her greatness, to preach to other nations the benefits of free trade”

(List 1885, pp. 295-296).


III.1 Historical NotesIII.2 Soft/Hard Power (lyric vs. obsession)

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a) Beginings of freetrading | s.XXI: Famine in Ireland (1846-48) vs. Opium Wars (1842, 1858)Opium Wars (s.XIX) vs. Iraq Wars (s.XX)

i) False arguments, ii) effect of previous wariii) de facto Colonialism, iv) hindered long term development, v) Losses of historical and artistic assets, vi) separatist, ethnic and religious rebellions favoured

b) Hard Power vs. Soft Power (Joseph Nye) Global Information Dominance (Echelon, National Imagery and Mapping Agency, Future Imagery Architecture)


III.3 Rousseau vs. Bentham

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M.Foucault (The eye of the power): „Bentham was the complement to Rousseau. What in fact was the Rousseauist dream that motivated many of the revolutionaries? It was the dream of a transparent society, visible and legible in each of its parts, the dream of there no longer existing any zones of darkness [...] It was the dream that each individual, whatever portion he occupied, might be able to see the whole society…”


III.3 Rousseau vs. Bentham

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M. Foucault (The eye of the power): “[Bentham] effects the project of a universal visibility which exists to serve a rigorous, meticulous power. Thus Bentham’s obsession, the technical idea of the exercise of an ‘all-seeing’ power, is grafted on to the great Rousseauist theme which is in some sense the lyrical note of the Revolution… When the Revolution poses the question of a new justice, what does it envisage as its principle? Opinion. The new aspect of the problem of justice, for the Revolution, was not so much to punish wrongdoers as to prevent even the possibility of wrongdoing, by immersing people in a field of total visibility where the opinion, observation and discourse of others would restrain them from harmful acts”


III.3 Rousseau vs. Bentham (Soft/Hard Power)

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• G. Tarde (Sociologist and criminologist)“All the improvements of social organization… have the consequence of enabling that one meditated, coherent, individual project arrives purer, lesser polluted, deeper, and through the safer and shorter means into the minds of all the associated” (Tarde, Public opinion and the crowd. 1690, §107).

• Public Opinion (co-optionn) ~ Control Society (Deleuze) “The material and economic aspects of opinion were not acknowledged. They believed it “is fair by nature, it disseminates by itself, and it is a sort of democratic surveillance […]” (Foucault)

• Decolonisation and reaction (1950-1970s)• New International Economic Order (1974), New

World Inf. and Comm. Order (1974), C. MacBride


III.4 Liberal Foundations

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• John Locke"those, who like one another so well as to join into society, cannot but be supposed to have some acquaintance and friendship together, and some trust one in another; they could not but have greater apprehensions of others, than of one another: and therefore their first care and thought cannot but be supposed to be, how to secure themselves against foreign force. It was natural for them to put themselves under a frame of government which might best serve to that end…"

(Second Treatise on Government. 1690, §107).

• Liberal Foundations (J. Locke, A. Smith, J. Bentham, Burke)


III.4 Liberal Foundations(a new difference)

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Differences in the objective of each position:• The transparency/trustworthiness, hence the communications

without borders is at the groundings of many utopias of the Information Society (MacLuhan, Etzioni, Toffles, Barlow, etc) as well as of other technical utopias as Kropotkin’s, advocating the dissolution of (concentrated) power.

• There is a close connection with the various foundations of liberalism, in which different approaches are present:– Degree of Free-will vs Authoritarianism (Rousseau / Bentham)– Degree of Fairness/equality vs Unfairness/Unequality

(Bentham/conservative Liberals)


III.5 Utopias and Globalisation


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