This is rich, philosophical, and worth taking the time to digest, especially now that Atkinson has recently passed away and will no longer be contributing to the sizable body of work he has left behind. As with all rich meals, indigestion may follow; this treatise is deep and requires time to ponder. Atkinson weaves together perspectives and vocabulary drawn from philosophy (primarily postmodernism and transversality via Welsch who partially subsumes Hegel's dialectic nature of reason), theology, and even fiction (Robert A. Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land). In this way he provides a rich tapestry that is united within Welsch's concept of transversality. [Welsch is an amazing intellect, writing lucidly in Italian, French, German, and English. The two articles quoted by Atkinson in his paper were Reason and Transition: On the Concept of Transversal Reason Rationality and Reason Today.] Reference is also made to his book Undoing Aesthetics (Theory, Culture and Society).
Within this blog I simply cannot do justice to the intellect of Atkinson, or even summarize fairly the 21-page treatise he has crafted. I can only say read it yourself; it is challenging but worthwhile. The tile of this work reveals his basic premise: the key function of a library is a transversal one that allows users to connect the dots by providing information in context. If that is the case, what role must libraries play? Atkinson’s answer is that the library must play the role of fair witness (taken from Heinlein), i.e., a trusted third-party, to provide certification regarding the metadata of the collected works. (Oh, there’s that word again! See an earlier blog for my disdain of the word metadata. By the way, Atkinson translates meta as a Greek preposition meaning “next to.” In fact, in my formal study of ancient Greek, I was taught that it is the Greek preposition para that means alongside. Meta means after, either in position or time and can, by context, be translated with. If you have a disagree, please comment.) But I digress.
Atkinson argues (convincingly in my opinion) that the library, while not perfect or without conflicts real and perceived, is the best institution to provide third-party certification.
With that said, I shall deviate from Atkinson’s main thesis and ponder his underlying presumptions, because I think they are instructive in their own right. I will conclude in a deliberately unsatisfactory manner with three questions to which and upon which I hope the reader will consider and comment.
Weltanschauung
People have worldviews, Atkinson has one. So do collections of people or societies. Atkinson says that
The library’s unique nature and responsibility—deriving from its first-order attribute of plurality—requires (at least in the modern context) that it present all alternative and opposing positions—without privileging any one position, including (above all) its own.
I don’t think many will disagree with that sentiment, but it is not a necessary one. That is, why should the responsibility of preserving pluralistic viewpoints be normative? There are many societies – especially authoritarian ones – that believe it is bad (Singapore, for example).
There is also postmodernism, which is characterized by an implicit question appended to all truth claims: “How do you feel about that?” For example, God exists: how do you feel about that? In the postmodern view, no truth is absolute; individuals are the authoritative arbiters of truth claims. With postmodernism something can be “true for you but not for me.”
This relates to the concept of reason, or more properly, reason deified: reason is the ultimate arbiter. My question is “Why?” On what basis does reason trump intuition or love?
Can you answer these questions?
Why should we preserve pluralistic views?
Can something be true for you and not for me?
Why reason?
