"The knowledge base" of social systems

[Loet Leydesdorff]

"The Construction and Globalization
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/incursion> of the Knowledge Base in
Inter-human Communication Systems",
Canadian Journal of Communication 28(3), (2003, forthcoming)

Abstract:

The relationship between the "knowledge base" and the "globalization" of
communication systems is discussed from the perspective of communication
theory. I argue that inter-human communication takes place at two
levels. At the first level information is exchanged and provided with
meaning and at the second level meaning can reflexively be communicated.
Human language can be considered as the evolutionary achievement which
enables us to use these two channels of communication simultaneously.
Providing meaning with hindsight is a recursive operation: a meaning
that makes a difference can be considered as knowledge. If the
production of knowledge is socially organized, the perspective of
hindsight can further be codified. This adds globalization to the
historically stabilized patterns of communications. Globalization can be
expected to transform the communications in an evolutionary mode.
However, the self-organization of a knowledge-based society remains an
expectation with the status of a hypothesis.



  _____

Loet Leydesdorff
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)
Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam
Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-20- 525 3681
 <mailto:loet at leydesdorff.net> loet at leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/


 <http://www.upublish.com/books/leydesdorff-sci.htm> The Challenge of
Scientometrics ;  <http://www.upublish.com/books/leydesdorff.htm> The
Self-Organization of the Knowledge-Based Society

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