Francis
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Ivan M. Havel
Charles University in Prague
Director of the Center for Theoretical Study (CTS) in Prague
Longing for Unified Knowledge
Half a century ago, Erwin Schroedinger, one of the main contributors to
modern physics, made a remark that is even more valid now than it was in
his time. It aptly characterizes the inherent epistemological dilemma of
contemporary science. Nothing that we have "inherited from our forefathers
the keen longing for unified, all-embracing knowledge", Schroedinger
continues: "But the spread, both in width and depth, of the multifarious
branches of knowledge during the last hundred odd years has confronted us
with a queer dilemma. We feel clearly that we are only now beginning to
acquire reliable material for welding together the sum total of all that is
known into a whole; but, on the other hand, it has become next to
impossible for a single mind fully to command more than a small specialized
portion of it." Indeed, trends towards unification have a complex history
of waxing and waning and of partial victories over the inherent tendency of
sciences to hyper-specialize and diverge from each other.
In the last decades we have witnessed a revival of attempts at
universality, or at least efforts to weld together several disciplines. The
well-known examples are cybernetics, structuralism, general system theory,
chaos theory, fractal geometry, cognitive sciences. However, in each case
only a few different disciplines, mostly natural and exact sciences, openly
joined the effort. There are several sources of failure of most of such
attempts. The researches are always inclined to duly delineate their
subject of study. This is understandable but often leads to separation from
the original disciplines. Contrary to the original motives, it results in
establishing just another specialized discipline, with its own technical
jargon, university departments, study programs, research projects,
conferences, journals and learned societies.
Another obstacle was mentioned in the above quotation from Schroedinger.
How could we possibly engage in a unification when "it has become next to
impossible for a single mind to command fully more than a small specialized
portion" of the whole? The more devoted a specialist is to one discipline
the less willing he is to study another discipline; simply because of his
doubts that he would ever manage to become more than a dilettante in it.
The idea of "interdisciplinarity" in its traditional sense requires from a
researcher to acquire expertise in several disciplines at the same time -
precisely something that is nowadays almost impossible (except for a few
geniuses). This requirement was often taken rather lightly in practice
which earned, among some, a certain disrespect for the very concept of
interdisciplinarity.
Let us propose, therefore, two further variants of the concept, one based
more on mutual trust among scholars of different disciplines and the other
trying to develop a new common language. I shall call them
"multidisciplinarity" and "transdisciplinarity", respectively. It is
essential that both treat scientific research as a joint collective
endeavor rather than just a sum of activities of individual scientists.
Multidisciplinary study is typically concerned with a problem or theme that
requires cooperation between several different disciplines; these, however,
do not have to mingle or even fuse together. What is only needed is that
representatives of different disciplines working on the same project, trust
each other's results. Examples of big multidisciplinary themes: earth,
health, nature, society, mind.
On the other hand, transdisciplinary study tries to expose and explore
particular ideas, motives, themes, principles, or concepts, each occuring
again and again in several (typically in many) disciplines, repeatedly, in
various forms, shapes and disguises. Examples of transdisciplinary
concepts: feedback, information, complexity, hierarchy, complementarity,
evolution, stability, fluctuation, collective behavior, chaos, fractals,
emergence, self-organization, order. I believe that the transdisciplinary
approach may be a good start for attempts at universality, if properly
carried out. Learning from the mistakes of our predecessors, we should not,
for instance, give absolute priority to one particular universal language
(as in the Vienna Circle program) and we should avoid ending in a new
esoteric discipline. How to begin? I propose to lock up a few leading
representatives of different disciplines in an isolated tower for a certain
time where they could freely think and talk among themselves. I bet they
would soon develop a common language and soon achieve a resonance of shared
ideas, motives, themes, principles, and concepts. Perhaps the story of the
tower of Babel could be rewound in reverse.
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Ivan Havel:
He graduated in 1966 from the Czech Technical University in Prague. During
1969-71 he attended the University of California at Berkeley, earning a
doctorate in Computer Science. For several years he worked as a research
scientist with the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences. His fields of interest
include theoretical computer science, artificial intelligence, and
cognitive science. Before the Communist regime collapsed in 1989, besides
his semi-official scientific work, he hosted discussion groups in his
apartment in Prague and cooperated with samizdat editions. After November
1989, for several months he took part in the activities of Civic Forum. He
now directs the Center for Theoretical Study, a newly formed international
cross-disciplinary institution affiliated with Charles University in Prague
and the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic. He also has teaching
responsibilities at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics.
Since 1990 he has been the editor-in-chief of the Czechoslovak scientific
journal Vesmir (The Universe). He is a board member of several academic
institutions and educational foundations and a member of Academia Europea
and the New York Academy of Sciences.
________________________________________________________________________
Dr. Francis Heylighen, Systems Researcher fheyligh@vnet3.vub.ac.be
PESP, Free University of Brussels, Pleinlaan 2, B-1050 Brussels, Belgium
Tel +32-2-6292525; Fax +32-2-6292489; http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/HEYL.html