Information overload, information underuse
Ashok Khosla

Information overload now seriously threatens our ability to make rational- i.e., well-informed, meaningful - decisions.  As the quantity of information coming at us rises, and these days it rises exponentially, the general background noise is inexorably swamping out the singals we need to pick up to design a more sustainable future.

It is not the information technology revolution that is the cause of this overload.  It is, rather, the common and widespread desire to publish and broadcast everything one knows, no matter how trivial or irrelevant it might be to others.  But the new information technologies are unquestionably helping to accelerate the process.

Today’s word processors, modelling programmes, MIDI synthesizers and computerised pallets with millions of colours certainly open opportunities for self-expression in a variety of ways to the average person that were never dreamt of before by any but the most wealthy or the most talented.  Yet, the number of truly outstanding products remains the same as it always did.  Indeed, in genuine creativity, at least outside science, today’s output may well be less than that of many other periods, such as those of Athens twenty five hundred years ago or of England a hundred and fifty years back.

Access to all this information has, also, never been greater.  New printing technologies, photocopying machines, global postal systems, telephone and fax services, internet and the worldwide web all serve to connect more and more people to each other and to the growing number of information sources.  This is all to the good, since only a better informed citizenry can help society choose paths of development that are genunienly in their interst and truly sustainable.

But in this jungle of computer chips, telephone wires and printed paper, it is going to be more difficult to find the Leonardos, Shakespeares, Mozarts, Newtons and the Mahatma Gandhis of today.  Without their insights and influence, it is difficult to see how societal choices can make the quantum jumps in understanding needed to improve the lot of present as well as future generations.  Fortunately, history shows that at least some of the truly great ones survive to create and communicate inspite of all the barriers society places before them.

But much progress in the arts, humanities, science and technology can also be made by the cumulative effort of ordinary mortals not endowed with the insights of such geniuses.  And today, more than ever, such progress needs team work that brings workers form different fields together to create something new.  The high level of connectivity and information exchange made possible by the new technologies is the first major signal of hope for bringing back a more holistic view of the world, lost for the past two hundred years of Cartesian science.

Yet, information by itself is not enough.  What we need is knowledge, and even more fundamentally, wisdom.  Our current systems of information exchange need to be vastly improved to provide the knowledge and wisdom without which the future of humankind on this planet can only bleak.

The work of Development Alternatives has always aimed at discovering development paths that work, for the poor as much as for the rich, for nature as well as for future generations.  It has been a fundamental part of our effort to learn from others and actively to share the information we generate, driven not so much by generosity as by self-interest.  After all, with love, information is one of the few things in the world that is negentropic: the more you give, the more you get.  All else in the universe, as shown by the Second Las of Thermodynamics, is running down.

DAINET, our information network designed to improve exchange information and knowledge on issues of sustainable development is now increasingly used by practitioners and researchers working in such areas as regional planning, rural technology and transparency in governance.  Designed on the basis of careful studies of how users actually search for and acquire information, DAINET has already been able rapidly to build up a strong network of partners.

With this issue, our journal enters its seventh year of publication.  We are proud to have been able to maintain a regular schedule of mailings, and with the feedback received from our readers, gradually to improve its contents and presentation.  During 1997, it will be our attempt to put this publication on a more secure financial footing, and to build up a much larger base of paid Donationrs.  We hope that you, as one of its readers, will also find it worthwhile enough to contribute towards the costs of getting it to you.   q

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