Tuesday, November 23, 2004

Is knowledge finite or expanding?

I was at a trail race this past weekend running with some friends and the question came up, "Is knowledge finite?" Don't ask me why such a philosophical a question was raised as we bounded through the redwoods of the Santa Cruz Mountains in about 45 degree weather, but it did.

Anyone in academia should answer this question two ways - 1) well no, it is expanding as we discover new knowledge through emperical examination and science. And 2) Well, now wait a minute, isn't knowledge already there and finite, but that what we are doing is simply gropping around trying to find the real truths?

There in lies the conundrum.

The academics are getting into the discourse justifying web logs. But, the power of this speach is best listened to rather than sniped and pasted elswhere. The information tech/library science folks are actually thinking. David Wienberger gave a talk recently to the Library of Congress folks.

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