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From Infrastructure to Networking
Dahlbom Bo Publicerat den 2000-10-14 Publicerat i Vetenskap
I C. Ciborra (red.) From Control to Drift, Oxford University Press, 2000.
Internet is often described as an infrastructure for information society, but it is not obvious that the notion of infrastructure, once introduced to account for the foundation of industrial society, will be suitable for an analysis of the role of information technology. In this chapter we will question the idea that information technology is the stable foundation of information society. Instead, we will suggest that information technology should be understood as a flexible medium by which social structures are formed, reformed, and dissolved, in a continuous process of networking.
1 A Paradox?
The standard introduction to management literature in the early 1990s told about how things were changing. In the past, they would say, it was possible for companies to rely on a stable market with faithful customers. But all that is different now, they went on to say, with global competition on a global, deregulated, and open market, empowered customers demanding tailor made products and services of high quality, shorter life span of products, a rapidly developing information technology, more knowledge intensive work and therefore a more educated work force demanding empowerment (Drucker 1988).
In the past, the most successful organisation was the huge factory, mass producing one and the same product to the same customers year after year, but now we were entering a situation in which the only surviving companies would be the ones that were able to quickly adjust to a an increasingly changing market with changing demands for new products and services. The recommended recipe for survival always involved moving away from the industrial factory organisation towards a more loosely organised, networked enterprise with alliances, external networking, and outsourcing as major ingredients (Peters & Waterman 1983).
At the same time, in the early 1990s, the US government launched an inspiring program for a national information infrastructure which drew the attention of media to information technology: "Coming Soon to Your TV Screen: The Info Highway – Bringing a revolution in entertainment, news and communication" (TIME Magazine cover, April 12, 1993). Just like vice-president Al Gore's father once contributed to taking the US out of the depression by a huge infrastructure project including automobile highways, so the son would now help increase economic growth with an infrastructure project for electronic highways. A well-tested industrial society (Keynesian) method for ending economic depression was to lay the foundation for post-industrial society.
The Clinton administration program for information highways, not only created an information technological media boom, it also helped initiate a research interest in infrastructures. So, while there was a general impression, expressed in popular management literature, that industrial society with is stable infrastructures was being replaced by a panta rei society of highly flexible and mobile organisations, politicians and researchers got engaged in building and examining the infrastructure for information society. Taken jointly this venture seems paradoxical. Why build infrastructures for a society that is described as a society without infrastructure?
One reaction to this paradox is to question the entrenched notion of infrastructure in favour of a more flexible and complex notion more suitable for analysing the role of information technology in information society. This line of argument can be found in the work of Susan Leigh Star (Star & Ruhleder 1996) and Ole Hanseth (Hanseth 1996, and chapter 3 above). Here, in our closing chapter, a slightly more radical remedy will be suggested. There is nothing wrong (or not very much wrong) with the received view of infrastructure as applied to a typical mid-20th century industrial society, we will argue. So, let us keep the notion of infrastructure more or less as it is, but instead realise that the new society we are now entering, is different enough from the industrial society we are leaving, to be best characterized as a society with no infrastructure.
Thus, in this chapter, the notion of infrastructure and its role in our understanding of society will be analyzed, comparing and contrasting the society we are leaving, dominated by machine technology, with the society we are entering, built by information technology. It will be argued that the notion of infrastructure, obviously useful as it is in theorising about industrial society, can be very misleading when used in theories about information society. In particular, we will concentrate on, what seems to be, the four central ingredients in the notion of infrastructure, together giving us an illuminating analysis of modern, industrial society: (a) the idea of infrastructure as a foundation underlying society, (b) the idea of infrastructure as a stable structure, (c) the idea of infrastructure as a common resource, and (d) the idea of infrastructure as a common standard.
It will be argued that these four ingredients, when used to understand the role of information technology in information society will lead us seriously astray. We will try to show that information technology, rather than being a productive foundation for information society, is a flexible means of communication, by which social structures are formed, reformed, and dissolved, in a continuous process of networking. Information technology is characterised by its lightness rather than by its weight and inertia. It is relatively inexpensive so that we can afford to compete rather than share, and it is an adapter technology that invites us to experiment with several standards at the same time. Rather than forming a stable infrastructure for information and service production, information technology introduces a more flexible and lightweight, networking, society without infrastructure. We will end by saying something about that society, about its networking, nomadic, enterprises, and about the nomadic philosophy and social science that will be adequate for its analysis.
2 A Foundation
Infrastructure was introduced during the industrial revolution in the 19th century as a military term to designate railroads, industries, and other resources, behind the actual front, necessary to wage war. Today, the term is normally used for the stable structure – roads, harbours, railroads, airports, energy systems and telephone networks – underlying production and distribution of goods and services in a society. It is common to distinguish three major types of systems within the infrastructure: the system of transportation, the energy system, and the system of communication.
If the term was new a hundred years ago, the concept had a long history in our culture. When Western philosophy began, it was with a quest for foundations. Natural philosophers from Thales to Empedokles asked for the arché of the world, for its ground, its foundations. Most of them ended up in one or another version of the four elements – earth, water, air, and fire – as the foundation of everything else.
Cultural historians have argued that this interest in foundations is typical of a young agricultural culture, trying to come up with an ideology legitimising a life style of staying on the farm rather than roaming the world. Farms are built on foundations, and the whole agricultural society is solidly planted in the ground. So, we get a philosophy concentrating on building stable foundations, sometimes worried by movement and change, but never really taking them seriously, except as aberrations or accidents against a background of stable foundations.
Archaeological excavations in the Mediterranean area typically show layers of buildings on top of each other. New civilisations are built on the old; progress is moving upwards from the ground. This whole idea of having something to build on becomes one of the fundamental philosophical ideas of our culture, from the axiom systems of Euclid and classification schemes of Aristotle to the methods of Descartes and Spinoza. The world, and our knowledge of it, is organised in levels, and the philosopher is moving, like an archaeologist at work, up and down these levels: analysing, reducing, deducing, and explaining. Classical philosophy is a philosophy for farmers.
Modern philosophy remained, from Descartes to Kant, a quest for foundations. An industrial society needs stable foundations, even more than an agricultural one. But there are important differences. With its huge and complex, distributed production system, an industrialised society needs a well functioning and reliable distribution system. It becomes natural for such a society to think of the distribution system – ports, railroads, highways, and airports – as a foundation for all of society. And thus the notion of infrastructure is formed.
The interest in foundations and levels really increases with the modernisation of philosophy. This is especially so in the philosophy that more than anyone else showed an explicit interest in industrialisation. We are thinking of course of Marx and Marxism.
In their theory of historical materialism, Marx and Engels distinguished between the basis and the superstructure of a society. In the basis were the material conditions: productive forces and relations of production. In the superstructure were political, legal, and ideological institutions as well as the ideas dominating them. This way of thinking of society, with a material basis of production, and different institutional levels building on that basis, was to become the de facto standard in modern sociological thought.
Marxism is modern in the way it reckons with historical change. The material foundations of societies evolve and sometimes this evolution results in a major social change, a revolution. The so-called industrial revolution is such a revolution in Marx's sense. When the tools of traditional societies finally evolve into machines, and the productive forces thus make a leap forward, they will break through the agricultural ways of organising work and a revolution takes place changing the very foundations of society. And when the ways of production change, everything else will have to change as well: everyday life, politics, the judicial system, institutions of education, healthcare, art, ideologies, and so on.
Marx's theory is a descendant of the Romantic Movement that around 1800 began to play around with the idea of foundations. Poets and artists began to think of the infrastructure as something underlying the visible social systems and activities – the mysterious sewage systems, water pipes, and so on, are the hidden blood and nervous system of society. The infrastructure, when it really is an infra-structure, is subterranean and out of sight, and preferably not only below but also beyond our consciousness. When you are reminded of the infrastructure it tends to make you nervous: there is something down there making everyday activities possible, but you don't really know what it is, where it is, or how it works, and what will happen, come to think of it, if it breaks down. In the early 19th century people began to hesitate to look down into the entrails and subconscious of society for fear of vertigo and unease.
Historical materialism is a useful tool for understanding the changes from agricultural to industrial to information societies. But one has to be aware of the fact that it relies on an understanding of technology that is very much "historical" in the sense of being based on the technology dominating industrial society, machine technology. Properties of other sorts of technology are not so well accounted for in historical materialism.
There are things we know about technology, which a theory of technology must account for: (I) Technology is artificial, that is, designed, constructed, made by people. Thus, the modern world is an artificial world. (ii) Technology plays important roles in our lives, determining our space of possibilities, giving us our identity. With glasses I can see, without computers I could not dream of a job as a programmer. (iii) Technology comes in many varieties, as tools, machines, media, and complex systems. New varieties will continue to appear.
Theories of technology typically use one or more root metaphors and expand on its theme. These root metaphors will get their inspiration from one or another preconceived understanding of technology. In the industrial age it is tools and machines that dominate our thinking. Tools, when we look back to the craftsmanship that we fear is disappearing as the machines take over. Machines, when we look into the future and applaud the automation of labour.
When we think of technology as a social construction (Bijker, Hughes, Pinch 1987, Dahlbom 1992) we have a romantic notion of technology as tools, made by us, for us to use at our leisure. Technology is an extension of our mind, a prosthetic device, with which we can conquer the world. When we think of technology as a machine, it becomes a form for our life (Winner 1986), an infrastructure for society (Hanseth 1996).
Marx called his theory "historical" materialism, but of course he used the conceptions of his time to interpret history. That is, he used the notion of technology as a machine in his theory of technology. So, society is organised by forces and relations of production making up a material basis for the rest. But the very notions of force and production are industrial age notions. In agricultural societies, tools are used to cultivate the land. To think of tools as forces of production is to stretch the imagination. Similarly, in information society the focus of attention will be on transactions (on communication, sales, services) rather than on production. And, information technology is no productive force, it is a medium or an intermediary in a communication network.
We are still waiting for the Marx of information society. The first pretender to this epithet, Manuel Castells, is still stuck in traditional Marxism, defining the information economy in terms of information production (1996, p. 67). Castells relies on Marx's notion of mode of production to define information society, and fails to see that information society is not really a production oriented or production based society at all. If we want to understand the role of technology in information society, we have to break out of industrial age thinking. We can continue to use Marx as an inspiration, but we have to be careful not to use his machine metaphors (like infrastructure) to force information society into an industrial mold. We can continue to be historical materialists, but we have to be careful how we understand the role of the material in a nomadic society, and refrain from thinking of it as a "basis." And we have to be careful in our understanding of materialism itself when we go from agricultural and industrial societies creating wealth by moving and transforming matter to information and media societies in which fortunes are made by exploring and exploiting virtual worlds.
3 A Stable Structure
An infrastructure can be thought of as a platform for implementation that, without interfering with the details, offers the foundation and service needed by the various applications for production, distribution, consumption and recreation. But an infrastructure can also be a regulating skeleton, providing framework and guidelines for the activity. The infrastructure provides stability and security rather than liberty of action. A rudimentary infrastructure will be a liberating platform, but it will leave a lot of work for you to do. A more developed infrastructure will restrict your choices while at the same time doing most of the work.
The infrastructure of modern industrial society is made up of systems. Thus, if you say "roads" you will have to add automobiles, gas stations, auto dealers, garages, rules of traffic, and a lot more that is necessary for roads to be functional. It is important to see that these systems are not just technical systems, but rather sociotechnical. If one takes the notion of infrastructure seriously enough, one must therefore add a number of less material systems, social institutions, such as educational systems, monetary systems, and languages necessary to make the technical systems operational. In addition to the systems of transportation, energy, and communication, one had better include in the infrastructure those basic industries on which the majority of enterprises in a society depend, such as banking, steel mills, chemical industry, and food industry. Once, we begin to slide down this slope, we will see more and more examples of things to include in the infrastructure. Isn't the fact that there is a market for its products as vital to a company as the necessary means of production?
All this makes infrastructure a somewhat slippery notion. Perhaps we should only use it in a relative sense: X is an infrastructure relative to Y, meaning that Y depends for its operation on X, and X is somehow more stable and basic than Y. And yet, the notion of infrastructure works well in industrial society with its predilection for levels: base  super structure, basic research  applied research, basic knowledge, basic technologies, and so on. In comparison, information society seems at first to lack an infrastructure of its own (much of the old infrastructure will still remain, of course), or, perhaps rather, to lack a material infrastructure. The rapid changes characterising that society and the immaterial nature of information, as well as the very idea of networks, seem incompatible with ontological levels, stable foundations, and infrastructures.
A complex industrial society is impossible without a well functioning infrastructure of energy, transport, and communication systems. Like the productive forces in Marx's theory, the infrastructure is a stable, inert material foundation for production, social life and organisation. These are illuminating theories of the way a modern, industrial, society works, but when the distance from natural resource to final product increases, when focus shifts from products to services, when all labour is well educated, and when technology becomes more knowledge intensive, then that society is turned on its head. The nearest we come to a stable foundation of information society – is its ideas, its educational institutions, its research organisations, its political and legal system, the software, the habits and values of its citizens.
This change is similar to the change experienced when moving from an agricultural to an industrial society. In agricultural society it is food production that is the basis of society. Farmers used to warn their sons not to leave the farm to go to the cities, "because in the cities there is nothing to eat." To a farmer, the cities depend on the farms for their survival, but with industrialisation of agriculture this dependence relation changes. Modern agricultural production units depend on the factories in the cities – on roads, machines, fertilisers, and electricity – for their survival. Similarly, factory thinkers continue to believe that the infrastructure of industrial society will remain the infrastructure of information society.
4 A Common Resource
The notion of infrastructure is rich in content. Infrastructures are stable foundations for organisations and activities. We have argued above that we should be careful in extending these ideas of infrastructure to information technology. But infrastructures are also shared, common resources, and that idea may, on the other hand, be quite valuable to retain in our understanding of information technology.
Modern organisation theory treats the division and co-ordination of labour as the two fundamental aspects of organisations (Mintzberg 1983). Management information systems, office automation, groupware and workflow management is all about controlling these internal aspects of the organisation. Infrastructure, in comparison, can be viewed as a public commodity external to the organisation. In that sense, it is a shared resource, a stable, long term investment, preferably paid for by taxes rather than by users, so that it will be used freely without constraints by companies and individuals to increase the wealth of nations.
The infrastructure is what you need to build an organisation. In the infrastructure is included technology, personnel with their basic education and competence, buildings, systems of transport, finance, laws, a market, and so on. Organisations are, of course, vitally dependent on such an infrastructure. As they grow in power, they will try to control it, to ensure its well functioning. They will incorporate aspects of the infrastructure within the organisation, or build their own alternative infrastructure, rather than having to depend on public resources partly beyond their control.
When Internet is being introduced to the general public in the Clinton-Gore initiative, it is described as an infrastructure, a shared resource, extending beyond and between companies. But when companies reluctantly begin to use Internet, they soon find ways to turn it into an internal, proprietary infrastructure. When you decide to use Internet technology internally, enclosed within firewalls, in an organisation, it is used as an infrastructure for the organisation. If the company has several profit centres with independent economic responsibilities, and it uses an Intranet as a shared resource, then this infrastructure can be said to be internally public.
Today, when companies are trying to keep up with the revolution brought on by Internet, when they are "globalising" in response to the global market made possible by information technology, there is much talk about "global infrastructures." So far, this has mostly been a misnomer, however, since what companies do to become global is not to begin to use the Internet as infrastructure, but to introduce global information systems. Just like traditional management information systems were used to support control and standardised conduct in the organisations of the 1970s, so today's "global infrastructures" are really global information systems for standardisation and co-ordination of labour.
Large companies today hesitate about how to deal with Internet as an infrastructure. Should they invest in electronic commerce with Internet as the market place, or should they not? In many ways this can be a much more important decision than might first seem. By choosing to use information technology as a public infrastructure, in this case Internet, the company will open its boundaries to the surrounding world. Instead of using information technology to build information systems to sharpen company boundaries, a process will begin that eventually can turn the old factory companies of industrial society into more distributed, customer oriented, sales organisations. If the old industrial companies don't do this, there will be other companies who will do so at their expense.
A production-oriented company will focus on its production and distribution infrastructure, while a sales-oriented company will focus on external communication. So far, the public globalisation process has been moving much quicker than companies normally have expected, and so they have wasted money on internal infrastructure rather than using what has quickly become publicly available. Why build your own roads, when you can use the public roads? Why develop EDI when there is Internet? A high and reliable quality in production and distribution may demand an internal infrastructure that is yours to own and control. But a powerful sales organisation needs to meet the customers where they are, and therefore has to operate on the public infrastructure.
Industrial companies rely on a well functioning infrastructure for supply and delivery. So dependent are they on such an infrastructure that they try hard to control it, preferably turning it into a company owned system. Sales oriented companies in information society rely on a well functioning electronic market for selling their services. It does not make sense to turn this into a proprietary system, since the very idea of a market is for it to be a shared resource in the sense of being open and accessible to everyone (with enough money).
The conclusion, then, is that the common resource aspect of the notion of infrastructure remains important as we move into an information society. Information technology is inexpensive enough for big companies to invest in their own infrastructures. They don't need to depend on information technology as a public resource paid by tax money. And yet, it makes good sense for them to orient their operations towards the publicly available communication network. Information technology will provide the market place for information society by providing the communication medium for a society, increasingly engaged in commerce of all sorts on a global level.
5 A Common Standard
To think of an infrastructure as a stable foundation, a common resource, to operate upon, is to think of it as a material structure. But one of the more important aspects of an infrastructure is immaterial. To build a national, or international railway system, one has to agree on how wide the rails should be. And the trains need time tables, which presuppose a standard time. An industrial society needs numerous standards for interfaces connecting the modules making up machines. Nuts, bolts, screws, nails, boards – they all need standards and all these standards rely on standard measures. A national market needs a common currency.
All the vehicles that will run on the common infrastructure will have to be adapted to the properties of that structure. So, all the owners, producers, users of vehicles will have to agree on how to design the infrastructure, what standard to choose (cf. Hanseth 1996).
Information technology too has its standards, of course. Operating systems, protocols, cables, interfaces of all sorts, characterise this technology. To us they may seem stable and impossibly inert in a world of otherwise flexible technology. And yet we are speaking about standards that rarely survive for more than two decades. More important than this is of course the nature of information technology which makes the relation between vehicles and infrastructure importantly different.
Industrial society solves its problems of incompatibility between flexible vehicle technology and inert infrastructure by means of gateways. The very same gateways can also be used, of course, as means to combine infrastructures with different standards. When the trains cross the border their wheel width will have to change. But to machine technology, gateways is a problem. They are expensive and cumbersome. They are awkward and inelegant, and something to be avoided as much as possible. Information technology is very different.
Information technology is a gateway, or adapter, technology. Compilers and interpreters are the very essence of information technology. So, the reason for standards is different. Partly, there are hardware reasons, but with increasing softening of the technology, the reasons are more pragmatic than necessary. Why have different operating systems, programming languages, or communication protocols, when they are equal in capacity, and when gateways have to be installed and, of course, draw a bit on time and space resources?
Only gradually are we beginning to understand this new won freedom from standardisation. With information technology we get gateways and don't have to standardise any longer. Why introduce a global currency when all it takes is software gateways in all systems of exchange? When there is no need for standards, then standards will no longer slow down the development of new technology. And, the tempo and flexibility of society will increase.
6 A Nomadic Society
Information technology develops and changes quickly compared to machine technology. Investments in industrial society infrastructures – ports, railroads, highways, airports, traditional telecommunications – are large and typically paid for by taxpayers. Investments in information society infrastructures – fibre nets, routers, servers, and software – are comparatively small scale, and commercially interesting with many competing alternatives. Even if they continue to be a common resource, it is not because of their monopoly or that they are so expensive, but because the very idea of a public communications network as a global market is commercially appealing. Indeed, even from a security point of view, it makes more sense that we do our transactions on the same communications network than that we drive on the same roads.
In major cities around the world you can buy Gant shirts, jackets, pants, sweaters. Perhaps you have seen one of their catalogues, made in a truly American style, with colourful pictures in New England settings on nice, thick paper. When the Gant shirts were becoming popular in Sweden in the early 1980s, Swedes used to look for Gant stores when visiting the US. They never found any. No wonder, since Gant was not a US shirt maker. Gant was what Hedberg (1991) calls an "imaginary organisation." In the 1980s they were a team made up of a few clothes designers, a couple of business people, a copywriter, and some assistants. Altogether they were about a dozen people, operating out of Stockholm.
When they decided to go into the fashion business on their own, they chose not to invest in textile factories, but decided to stick to doing what they knew: designing clothes. So, once they have designed a new collection, they have some textile factory sew up a few exemplars. They bring them to the US and hire photographers and whatever it takes to make the catalogue, and then they return to Sweden. In the beginning, Gant shirts were sold in various high quality clothes stores, but now there are specific Gant stores only selling Gant. These stores are not owned by the company, of course. They operate on independent contracts. Now, there are even Gant stores in the US.
Companies like Gant are like the hordes of pre-agricultural, nomadic, societies, as described by Emile Durkheim. According to Durkheim, people then lived in small groups of about twenty-five members (the size of a modern school class), roaming around in the fields and forests, gathering roots and nuts or hunting for small animals. Such a group is a horde. They live off the land, but they never stay very long in one place, nor do they sow to harvest.
If by infrastructure, we mean the platform or framework, the foundations, making nomadic life possible, we would perhaps find the infrastructure of the hordes in their kinship system, their marital habits and customs. But that would be silly. We would transport a notion that is really useful in industrial societies (and to a lesser extent in agricultural societies) and use it on a society to which it does not apply. The very idea of nomadic societies is not to rely on infrastructures. If there is anything like an infrastructure in nomadic societies it is nature itself.
Companies like Gant rely on industrial society like the hordes rely on nature as a common resource. The society formed by such "imaginary" or networking organisations does not have an infrastructure in anything like the sense characteristic of industrial society. What they rely on for their operations are, first and foremost, good communications and the possibility to change communicative partners without delay. Such companies don't want information highways in any way like the highways or railroads of industrial society.
What we see around us today is the dawn of a nomadic society that, at least to begin with, draws on industrial and agricultural society for its operations, in a way reminding of how the nomadic hordes lived off nature. In a world dominated by such networking, nomadic organisations, there will still be room for industrial type organisations providing a sort of infrastructure for the networking organisations. There will still be a need for steel production, paper mills, railroads, ports, airports, airlines, and the whole system of industrial production and distribution will be necessary for the networking organisations to operate.
But the communication networks that are so vital for nomadic, networking life will not be part of that infrastructure. The optic fibres, satellites, routers and hubs necessary for communication will be much too flexible, changing, and makeshift to be anything like an infrastructure for information society. They will be like the Internet is today.
Information society hordes are small, mobile companies with good design ideas, like Gant, Benetton, Nike, or companies that simply are good at selling, like TV Shop, good at doing business on the new electronic markets and can place orders with the old industrial companies, use their resources, like the nomads used nature, and move on when opportunities are better elsewhere.
The first hordes are already here. And in some big companies, innovation projects are sometimes set up as hordes. When electronic commerce at last becomes a major factor on the business scene, we can expect to witness an interesting game with the old industrial companies and the new hordes as players. One day there may be an automotive company that is a horde! A small group of automobile designers developing a car the production of which they place on contract with different traditional companies (like some automotive companies already do). The horde has the ideas; others can do the low paid, high quality, routine work for them. Information society will be an Idea society.
7 A Nomadic Philosophy
Most of 20th century philosophy remains stuck in infrastructure thinking. This is certainly true of the phenomenological movement, as defined by Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. And it is true of Cambridge analytic philosophy with Bertrand Russell and of the Vienna circle, under the influence of Ludwig Wittgenstein in the Tractatus. But there are powerful exceptions, as well, pointing towards a break with traditional and modern quests for foundations. The most influential alternatives to infrastructure philosophy are to be found in American pragmatism, as developed by Peirce, Dewey and James around the turn of the century 1900, in the Vienna circle's development after Tractatus, with Rudolf Carnap as figurehead, in Wittgenstein's later philosophy, and in French post-structuralism.
In his early essays, From A Logical Point of View (1953), and in Word & Object (1960), W. V. O. Quine developed an influential version of a philosophy without foundations, drawing mainly on Carnap and pragmatism. Quine came to play the central role in modern analytic philosophy in the US after the 2nd world war, very much setting the agenda for philosophy there. Quine used a quote from Otto Neurath, member of the Vienna circle, as motto for his philosophy:
Wie Schiffer sind wir, die ihr Schiff auf offener See umbauen müssen, ohne es jemals in einem Dock zerlegen und aus besten Bestandteilen neu errichten zu können.
For Quine there is no such thing as a first philosophy, a foundation, or method on which to base one's quest for truth. Philosophy is not prior to science, but rather it is the other way around that philosophy emerges in the midst of the scientific project, drawing on scientific results to explain what knowledge is, what is knowable and what is not. Philosophy is not the foundation of the sciences, but instead epistemology is simply a "chapter of psychology."
Ancient and modern philosophy, as defined by Plato and Descartes, respectively, can be described as examples of "vertical thinking," trying to organise knowledge in levels or layers. The philosophical method is typically one of scepticism, of analysing knowledge claims by questioning assumptions, weeding out what is uncertain, doubtful or contingent in order to reach an unquestionable core. Quine's philosophical position and method is different and truly provisional. Philosophy grows dialectically with science, supporting itself once here, once there, advancing and retreating, building and rebuilding its vessel of knowledge, increasing its understanding by horizontal expansion rather than by vertical restriction.
While ancient and modern philosophy drives poles down into the mud to reach the hard rock underneath, Quine invites us to think horizontally and use the flimsy network of a continuously revised science to stay afloat on the mud, saying, in effect, that there is no rock beneath, that it is mud all the way down.
This is a philosophy for a society without infrastructure. It is a philosophy without foundations, a "tough minded" philosophy, to speak with William James. It is a philosophy for a society in which life has become horizontal rather than vertical, in which people engage in networking rather than edification, establish multiple connections rather than hunt for Arkimedean points, and encourage diversification rather than core activity. In short, it is a philosophy for a nomadic society.
Quine is the most powerful nomadic philosopher on the American scene, but there is a whole group of sympathetic philosophers in his vicinity: Wilfrid Sellars, Nelson Goodman, Hilary Putnam, Richard Rorty, Daniel Dennett. In their different ways they all make their contributions to a philosophy for information society – beginning their work when that society is barely discernible at the horizon.
There are extensive similarities between Quine's philosophy and that of the late Wittgenstein, even if there also are major differences. Instead of science, Wittgenstein relies on everyday experience as his background for philosophical therapy. But the message is very much the same: mistrust in foundations, and in the traditional (and modern) ambitions of philosophy to find an infrastructure on which to place everything else. In practice, Wittgenstein is more of a nomadic philosopher than Quine, roaming from subject matter to subject matter in his attempts to make his point, while Quine has a more restricted view, tending to repeat the same argument, the same illustrations, again and again.
There are relevant similarities, as well, between Quine's philosophy and that of French post-structuralism, especially as expounded by Jacques Derrida in the late 1960s and early 70s. Derrida's criticism of Husserl's foundationalism and his break with the closed systems of Lévi-Strauss structuralism, in favour of an open ended, continuously changing networking, have close parallels in Quine's philosophy (Carlshamre 1986). We are not saying that these three philosophers, Quine, Wittgenstein, Derrida, coming out of very different traditions, and with very different agendas, have so much in common that it warrants close comparisons. What we are saying is only that against a background of traditional and modern infrastructure philosophy, they all share a more horizontal way of thinking, giving, each in his own particular way, a powerful exposition of an alternative, nomadic philosophy.
In the last decades, there have been backlashes against the very radical philosophies of Wittgenstein, Quine, and Derrida, backlashes with a more traditional (or modern) approach to philosophy. But it is a safe bet that, when in the next century, the origins of information society philosophy are traced, these are the three major contributors that will be singled out.
The social sciences, too, will have to change, of course, as we leave modern industrialised society behind, entering post-industrial, networking, nomadic, information society. The process of modernisation, the industrial revolution taking us from a traditional, rural, agricultural society into a modern, urban, industrial world, can no longer continue to set the agenda for the social sciences. Marxism, structuralism, Weberian rational organisation theory, Parson's universals, systems thinking, GesellschaftGemeinschaft, can no longer provide the conceptual framework for social theorising. They all obviously suffer from industrial age, infrastructural thinking.
We have to realise that the social sciences were established, in the midst of the industrial revolution, to explain that revolution, as theories of modernisation and industrialisation. As we leave industrial society behind, there will be need for a more fundamental rethinking of the conceptual and theoretical frameworks of the social sciences. In my own discipline, informatics, we have to get rid of systems thinking, and we have to develop new ways of thinking about technology. And, we should be very careful when importing such politically loaded, industrial age, concepts as that of infrastructure to analyse the social role of technology.
With this warning in mind, here are some examples of metaphors for technology, which go beyond the tool-machine discussion typical of industrial age social science: Technology as medium posits technology as a place for us to meet and interact in. It is an attractive metaphor, but we have to realise that we are yet a long way away from that situation. Today, the way we use information technology rather involves a lot of interaction with the technology itself. Here are some metaphors that try to capture this: Technology as stranger (Ciborra 1996); Technology as intermediary (Latour 1992); Technology as organism (Dahlbom & Mathiassen 1993).
These theories break away from the two layered theory of society, at least when it comes to understanding technology, and Latour is quite explicit in this respect. These theories all stress the interactive aspect, technology as something people interact with.
It has often been observed that our Western culture has a penchant for nouns. Farmers and factory owners are people of substance, and processes and change are always secondary to substance. Infrastructure is a very powerful expression of substance thinking. A networking, nomadic society may perhaps be better described with verbs than with nouns. It is a networking society, not a network society. It is activities and actions rather than organisations and agents that make up that society. (Even when we want to use verbs, we find only nouns.) So, we should follow Weick (1976) and study organising rather than organisations, and Czarniawska (1997) and speak of "action-nets" rather than "actor-networks."
Barbara Czarniawska has been a long time proponent of an ethnographic approach to the study of organising (Czarniawska 1997, 1998). Ethnography is, of course, the approach to use when meeting with foreign cultures and social practices. And, ethnography therefore is the most suitable approach to our own organisations and social practices, when these undergo revolutionary change. We who grew up in industrial society were of course experts on that society, being shaped by it and being responsible for shaping it. But growing up in industrial society we are obviously uncomprehending when confronted with the society coming out of the information technology revolution. Our conceptual frameworks only hinder. We have become foreigners in our own society, and we have to approach our own society as foreigners.
Eventually there will come a new Marx, Durkheim, Weber, Pareto, and Tönnies, and they will provide the conceptual frameworks needed to understand the information technology revolution and the new society growing out of it. They will of course build on the nomadic philosophy already outlined and on all the ethnographic research going on today as the revolution is unfolding. The general character of their analysis will be to show how information technology takes us out of a vertical society with levels and layers, infrastructures and super structures, into a horizontal society of networking nomads, a society without foundations.
The modern organisation is a creation of the industrial revolution. Systems thinking is the adequate foundation for theorising about that organisation. If information technology is really changing the focus of business from production to sales, by automating industrial production on the one hand and creating a global market on the other, then those organisations will have to change too. The opaque factories at the outskirts of society, so typical of industrial society, will change into mobile, distributed sales companies with no clear boundaries to their environment. Rather than using information technology to control their internal organisation, they will prefer to use information technology as a public communication medium to participate in the world.
An infrastructure is a stable foundation, a common resource, a standard for business activities. But if you think of IT in this way, you will soon find yourself in trouble. Here we have argued that IT is characterised by its lightness rather than by its weight and inertia. IT is no productive foundation; it is a flexible means of communication. It is relatively inexpensive so that we can afford to compete rather than share. It is an adapter technology that invites us to experiment with several standards at the same time.
The infrastructure of information society is not Internet, or information technology more generally. If there is an infrastructure of information society at all, it is the old industrial society with its industrial production factories and distribution systems. But this is a misleading way of thinking. The lightness and flexibility of information society, made possible by its light, flexible and inexpensive technology, will spread to the old industrial structures too. They will not serve as an inert foundation for information society. Instead, they will be transformed by the new social organisations in order to meet new demands for flexibility and change.
Information technology is no infrastructure issue to decide upon and then lay aside in order to attend to business. Information technology is what we make business with. Electronic commerce is not a question of finding a standard for payments on Internet. It is instead, as the name indicates, the nature of commerce, the market, of electronic society. And it is on this market we must compete, by experimenting with new technology, new ways of organising, moving quickly, like nomads.
Bijker, W.E., Hughes, T.P. & Pinch, T. (1987) The Social Construction of Technological Systems. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Carlshamre, S. (1986) Language and Time. Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis.
Castells, M. (1996) The Rise of the Network Society. Oxford: Blackwell.
Ciborra, C. (1996) Introduction: What Does Groupware Mean for the Organization Hosting it? In Ciborra, C. (ed.) Groupware & Teamwork. Invisible Aid or Technical Hindrance? John Wiley & Sons.
Czarniawska, B. (1997) Narrating the Organization: Dramas of Institutional Identity. Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Czarniawska, B. (1998) A Narrative Approach to Organization Studies. SAGE Publications.
Dahlbom, B. (1992) The Idea that Reality is Socially Constructed. In C. Floyd, H. Züllighoven, R. Budde & R. Keil-Slawik (eds) Software Development and Reality Construction. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.
Dahlbom, B. & Mathiassen, L. (1993) Computers in Context. Oxford: Blackwell.
Drucker, P. F. (1988) The Coming of the New Organization. Harvard Business Review, 88: 45-53.
Hanseth, O. (1996) Information Technology as Infrastructure. Gothenburg Studies in Informatics, Report 10, Department of Informatics, Göteborg University.
Hedberg, B. (1991) The Role of Information Systems in Imaginary Organizations. In R. K. Stamper, P. Kerola, R. Lee & K. Lyytinen (eds) Collaborative Work, Social Communications and Information Systems. Elsevier Science Publishers (North Holland).
Latour, B. (1992) Technology is Society Made Durable. In J. Law (ed.) A Sociology of Monsters: Essays on Power, Technology and Domination. London: Routledge.
Mintzberg, H. (1983) Structure in Fives: Designing Effective Organizations. Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall.
Palvia, S., Palvia, P. & Zigli, R. M. (1992) The Global Issues of Information Technology Management. Harrisburg, PA: Idea Group Publishing.
Peters, T. J. & Waterman Jr., R. H. (1983) In Search of Excellence. Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies. Harper and Row.
Quine, W. V. O. (1951) From A Logical Point of View. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Quine, W. V. O. (1960) Word & Object. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Star, S. L. & Ruhleder, K. (1996) Steps Toward an Ecology of Infrastructure: Design and Access for Large Information Spaces. Information Systems Research, vol. 7, no 1, pp. 111-134.
Weick, K. E. (1979) The Social Psychology of Organizing. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
Weill, P., Broadbent, M. & St. Clair, D. (1996) IT Value and the Role of IT Infrastructure. In J. Luftman (ed.) Strategic Alignment. Oxford University Press.
Winner, L. (1986) The Whale and the Reactor. Chicago University Press.
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Made by Mark Hall-Patch. Maybe some of these "musicians" would get a little more street cred with some evil band logos.
any idea what the actual band logos are?
haha i got most of them, but britney spears and spice girls, the brtney spears one could be anything!


has set a Thankfully Reading Mini-Challenge to tell what book you are most thankful for. This is a hard question because there are so many books I am thankful for.
I really can't narrow down a single book so I have gone with an entire series. The Betsy-Tacy Series are the books I am most thankful for. They have been my favorite books for years but they have become very special to me. I was laid off two years ago and it was a very difficult time for me as I had to transition from working 60 plus hours per week in my dream job to being unemployed. I began to experience anxiety and one of the few things that could help me curb this was reading the Betsy-Tacy books. They are so warm, familiar and comforting. I will always be thankful for these books for helping me get through that difficult time!


text:
NWSL Draft: Angel City makes Alyssa Thompson the 1st HS player taken No. 1 overall
Jack Baer
·Writer
Alyssa Thompson is staying in Los Angeles with Angel City, and all it took was some NWSL Draft history to make it happen.
With the first overall pick of the 2023 NWSL Draft, Angel City made the Harvard-Westlake forward the first high school athlete to hear her name called first in the league's 10-year history.
Thompson's selection was widely expected after Angel City acquired the first overall pick from NJ/NY Gotham FC last week in a deal that saw it trade its natural No. 5 pick and a second-round pick in 2024, plus $200,000 in allocation money, to Portland Thorns FC for Yazmeen Ryan, then send Ryan and $250,000 to Gotham.
That deal made the 18-year-old Thompson essentially the most expensive player in league history, as the previous most-expensive deal by allocation money was the San Diego Wave's acquisition of USWNT star Alex Morgan for $275,000, per the Los Angeles Times.
What's more, Thompson's agents told the Times' Luca Evans that she has signed a three-year deal with Angel City they say is the largest for any NWSL player under 25.
Angel City is certainly expecting the price to be worth it. Thompson, who was previously committed to play at Stanford, won the prestigious Gatorade High School Player of the Year award in 2021 after scoring 48 goals in 18 games. No, that statistic is not a typo.
Thompson is also one of the top high school sprinters in the state of California and made her USWNT senior team debut last year.
Alyssa Thompson looks like a future star for Angel City and the USWNT. (Photo by Katelyn Mulcahy/Getty Images)
Thompson won't be entirely unprecedented as a top player entering the NSWL without college experience, as Washington Spirit star Trinity Rodman joined her team in 2021 after not playing a game in her college career at Washington State. That move has more than worked out for the Spirit.
2023 NWSL first-round draft picks
Angel City FC: Alyssa Thompson, F, Harvard-Westlake High School
Kansas City Current: Michelle Cooper, F, Duke
Orlando Pride: Emily Madril, D, Florida State
NJ/NY Gotham FC: Jenna Nighswonger, M, Florida State
Portland Thorns FC: Reyna Reyes, D, Alabama
North Carolina Courage: Olivia Wingate, F, Notre Dame
Chicago Red Stars: Penelope Hocking, F, Penn State
North Carolina Courage: Sydney Collins, D, University of California
North Carolina Courage: Clara Robbins, M, Florida State
Kansas City Current: Alexa Spaanstra, F, Virginia
North Carolina Courage: Haley Hopkins, F, Virginia
Portland Thorns FC: Izzy D'Aquila, F, Santa Clara
UCMed president says it has enough nurses, medical staff to accommodate patients
EDUCATOR Augusto Go announced that the University of Cebu Medical School (UCMed) has enough nurses and medical staff and is always ready to accommodate patients at all times.The 80-year-old Cebuano businessman, who is also a lawyer, told reporters on Wednesday, January 26, that many hospitals across the country have experienced shortage of nurses and medical staff because they preferred to work abroad for higher take home pay.But Go said that UCMed had overcome the challenge as it absorbed more
P13.6 million worth of drugs seized in Liloan drug bust
The Cebu Provincial Police Office (CPPO) Intelligence Unit nabbed a high-value individual in possession of P13.6 million worth of illegal drugs in Liloan town, Cebu, on Thursday evening, January 26, 2023.The suspect, identified as Lunicito Juario "Looney" Labitas, 38, was arrested around 11:35 p.m. at Sitio Upper Bagacay, Barangay Tayud, allegedly carrying 2 kilos of illegal drug substances suspected to be shabu.Labitas, who hails from Barangay Quiot Pardo in Cebu City, is considered one of the

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Modern Quilters Ireland - old: What's new, Judith?
Hi there! I'm Judith from Just Jude.
I've been invited to tell you about a WIP I'm working on at the moment.
I'm currently working on my class projects for next term, which means making class samples and writing up the patterns in advance of the classes.
The idea behind this design is to take a traditional block like Bear's Paw, and modernise it. You can see here when you put 4 Bear Paw blocks together you get a giant star! This baby quilt will be approx. 49" x 49".
I've quantified the fabric requirements and have decided to use a fq bundle of Savannah Bop which I won at FQ Retreat last June.
I'm very fortunate to be in the position of owning a Sizzix, and the 4.5" hst die has made light work of the cutting out.
Using the Sizzix means the hsts don't need to be trimmed or squared off when sewn together! How cool is that!
So that's my WIP for today! I hope to have this quilt finished and photographed soon, for the new programme of classes being released next month!


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Proposed Law Could Prohibit Candidates From Notarizing Election-Related Documents
By Kelle Clarke on January 31, 2013 in Laws & Regulations
Each new election season brings a new crop of complaints claiming notarial impropriety involving ballot petitions. Some states, like South Dakota, are currently working to clamp down on notarization issues by proposing changes that would limit a candidate's notarial abilities, and prohibit state officials from advising or assisting candidates.
The bill, pending before the South Dakota Legislature, comes after Brian Gosch, speaker of the state House of Representatives, was accused of notarizing the signature of a carrier of his own petition during last year's election. Gosch survived the challenge because the court found no specific state election code banning a candidate from notarizing the signature of a petition carrier.
Should the new law pass, it would strictly prohibit candidates from notarizing signatures of a person gathering voters' signatures on their behalf. The measure also would prohibit several political activities by the Secretary of State, Deputy Secretary of State or other official employees, including endorsing, working for, volunteering for, consulting, advising, or assisting candidates running for congressional, state or legislative office.
While election and notarial laws vary from state to state, the integrity of a notarization can ultimately make — or break — a candidate's campaign, as seen in many recent election-related cases.
Kelle Clarke is a Contributing Editor with the National Notary Association.
Michael P. Alsup, Notary
I would like to inquire as to Massachusetts and New Hampshire State law regarding this issue of forbearance* .Is there any current legislation which prohibits general Ballot issue and Candidate petitioning by a Notary?
Hello. No, there is no current legislation in either state dealing with this topic at this time.


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« Consumer Engagement Workshop Digital Workshops for Authors and Publishers »
The Writing Platform Bursary and Commissioning Programmes
"The Writing Platform Bursary is an integral programme to the ever growing writer scene in the UK, it encourages collaboration, out-of-the-box thinking and enables the writer to learn a new skill to attach to their belt. I would class myself as a digital writer; I have always thought about my projects and plays in a digital way but lacked the connection to a creative technologist or environment where I could openly experiment with the process of writing and digital. I am not alone in this and this is why it is such an important programme."
Kelly Jones, 2015 Bursary Recipient
The Writing Platform Bursary and Commissioning programmes are designed to support creative experimentation and inter-disciplinary learning between writers and technologists.
The Bursary Programme is open to UK-based writers and creative technologists. The 2013 round was supported by NALD, the 2015 round was supported by Creative Writing at Bath Spa University and Arts Council England.
The Commissioning Programme supports collaborations between Australia-based writers and interaction designers. It is led by our partners, Queensland University of Technology, and supported by Arts Queensland.
The Writing Platform Bursary Programme
The programme provides funding and support for two teams – each made up of one writer and one technologist – to work on a jointly conceived digital literature project over a period of three months.
At the end of the three months teams deliver a finished piece of work or a functioning prototype. We also ask recipients to document the evolution of their project, and their collaboration, and this is shared with our wider community of practitioners on thewritingplatform.com.
Bursary recipients are also given the opportunity to showcase their projects at Bath Spa University's MIX Conference and we work with them to secure additional showcasing and publicity opportunities for their projects.
The programme is open to UK-based writers and creative technologists who can apply either as a ready-made pair or as an individual seeking a creative partner.
We have tried to design an open and light touch process so that there is room for projects to evolve through the collaborative process – we think this is where the magic happens!
The Writing Platform Bursary Programme – 2013
Cadan Lovelace showcases Invisible Islands at MIX 02 Conference, 2013
The Writing Platform Bursary Programme first ran in 2013 with support from the NALD Development Fund.
In 2013 we awarded two bursaries of £3000. These were awarded to:
Caden Lovelace and Laura Grace who created 'Invisible Islands', a web-app that overlays stories about a fictional world on the real world.
Ben Gwachmai and James Wheale who made a working prototype of 'Fabler Move', an audio playback system for stories that requires listeners to move to trigger audio.
Both works were showcased at the MIX 02: Text on Screens Conference in July 2013.
The 2013 selection panel was Kate Pullinger, Editor of The Writing Platform and Professor of Creative Writing & Digital Media at Bath Spa University; Leila Johnston, writer, journalist and creative technologist; and Joanna Ellis, co-founder of The Writing Platform.
Read more about out more about 'Invisible Islands', here; and about 'Fabler Move', here.
Screenshot of My Mother's House by Victoria Bennett and Adam Clarke
Adam Clarke and Victoria Bennett who made 'My Mother's House', a poem-world built in the hugely popular game of Minecraft.
'My Mother's House' uses Minecraft to immerse the player in the experience of the poem. It expands the idea of what literature and videogames can be and demonstrates how the two can come together to help people explore and engage with aspects of life that are difficult to talk about in a way that is accessible and unintimidating.
Kelly Jones and Linda Sandvik, who made a prototype of '1.4 for copy', an interactive sound sculpture inspired by the true story of Kelly's parents meeting on illegal CB Radio.
'1.4 for Copy' reflects on connection, intimacy, ephemerality and permanence in the digital age and uses a story to connect members of an audience within a venue.
The audience has to work together in order to hear the story. The work uses real sound clips of Kelly's parents and written scenes performed by voice actors and PIR sensors and Arduino on the entry and exit doors to monitor the audience – the more people, the better they can make out the story.
Both projects were showcased at MIX 03: Writing Digital Conference in July 2015.
'My Mother's House' was reviewed in Alphr and the Guardian where reviewer, Stuart Dredge, called it "The most moving poem I have ever played".
Based on their prototype Kelly and Linda have been invited to apply for the Experimentica Festival. They plan to continue their artistic collaboration and develop '1.4 for Copy' work further.
The 2015 selection panel was Tom Uglow, Director at Google Creative Labs; Naomi Alderman, writer and Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University; and Joanna Ellis, co-founder of The Writing Platform.
Read more about 'My Mother's House', here; and about '1.4 for Copy', here.
The Writing Platform Commissioning Programme
We are currently working with our Australian partners Queensland University of Technology on a commissioning programme titled 'Queensland Writers on the International Stage'.
The programme supports Australia-based writers and interaction designers to collaborate and develop works for exhibition on thewritingplatform.com. It is supported by Arts Queensland.
'Provocare' is the first project commissioned for 'Queensland Writers on the International Stage'.
Screenshot of Provocare by Meg Vann, Mez Breeze and Donna Hancox
'Provocare' is based on Provocation, a short story by Meg Vann that has been adapted and made into a multimedia verse thriller by the writer working in collaboration with interaction designer, Mez Breeze and project manager, Donna Hancox.
The work explores themes of female agency and violence against women at a time in Australia when in 2015 alone; sixty-three women have been murdered by their partners or ex-partners.
Readers can explore both works online – 'Provocare' is available here, and 'Provocation' is available here.
We also ask participating artists to reflect on their project and the collaborative process. These reflections are shared with our wider community of practitioners on thewritingplatform.com. You can read Meg Vann's reflections on 'Provocare' here.
The second work created for 'Queensland Writers on the International Stage' will be an audio adaptation of the short story 'Crawl Space' by Krissy Kneen, which will launch in early 2016.
If you are interested in supporting The Writing Platform Bursary and Commissioning programmes, or in working with us to develop new programmes that support artistic collaborations, please get in touch.


Images just click save button to save these pics for your pc. They are prepared for obtain, if you want and wish to take it, click save logo on the article, and it will be directly saved to your computer.
Images I hope you will as it. That image earlier mentioned can be branded along with.


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This one page concrete5 theme comes with a modern design and provides page type for homepage as well as additional pages. It is extremely useful to build portfolio websites. It allows complete editing including homepage using custom blocks. It allows adding text, images and provides orange and green color skins. It comes with responsive layout and theme documentation. You may also see Concrete5 Templates.
This concrete5 one-page wedding event theme provides sticky floating menu, responsive design, customizable colors, high resolution and free fonts. It provides type pages for home and wide pages as well as custom blocks. It enables customizing background colors and comes with theme documentation. It is an attractive theme and supports all major browsers.
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One page concrete5 themes help in making websites powerful and attractive as well as professional. They are extensively used in various websites to create stunning effects. They are also known as responsive concrete5 themes as they support various devices and allow easy customization. They help the web designers to create impressive websites and to know more about their varieties, one can search Google with concrete5 single page controller or concrete5 single page tutorial.


How long do my running shoes last?
How can I wash my SCOTT running shoes?
Can I wash my SCOTT running shoes in a washing machine?
Can I put orthopaedic inserts into my running shoes?
What is the insole concept?
What is the extended landing zone?
What does eRide flow mean?


There are twelve steps up the mountain of pride. Think of these like escalating symptoms.
Perhaps you think that AA invented the idea of the 12 Steps. If you should ever think that an idea is new, go back and see how the Greeks used it, or in this case, how the Medieval Latin scholars used it. In the Twelfth Century, St. Bernard of Clairvaux identified twelve steps up the mountain of pride, and another twelve steps down. These are detailed in his work entitled Steps of Humility and Pride.
In today's post, we focus on the twelve steps of pride. Next week, we will turn our attention to the twelve steps to greater humility. My intention is to point out some ways in which these twelve steps can be applied to our lives in the modern world.
The 12 steps of pride grow more serious as we go along them and lead, ultimately, to the slavery of sin. Those steps tend to build on one another, beginning in the mind, moving to outward behavior, then deepening into an attitude of presumption, and ultimately revolt and a slavery to sin. For if one does not serve God, one will serve Satan.
(1) Curiosity: There is such a thing as healthy curiosity. But curiosity can also lead to sin if we delve into things we should not, either because they are other people's private affairs or because they are not good for us to know. Curiosity becomes tainted with pride when we cast all caution aside, and with a certain indiscreet and privileged sense, we pry, meddle, and look into things we ought not as if we had a right to do so. This is sinful curiosity.
(2) Levity of mind: The tendency to occupy the mind with inappropriate things can grow and lead to a tendency to become superficial in wider matters. Here, too, there is certainly a valid sense of humor and a kind of recreational diversion that has a place in a balanced life. A little light banter about sports or pop culture is perfectly healthy and appropriate. But this can become all we do, and we may be tempted to cast aside matters about which we should be serious as we pursue only light and trivial things. Hours of watching sitcoms and "reality TV" but no time for prayer, instruction in the faith, and wider cultural things of beauty and truth shows a lack of seriousness. When we lightly brush aside what is important to God and substitute our own foolish and trivial interests, we act in pride.
(3) Giddiness: With giddiness, we move from levity of mind to the frivolous behaviors produced by it, behaviors in which we routinely over-emphasize lightweight experiences and situations at the expense of more meaningful and godly things. We maximize the minimum and minimize the maximum. We find plenty of time for trivia, but little or no time for prayer, works of mercy, or the study of truth and the enjoyment of real beauty.
Jesus is the standard we must meet. But rather than refer our self to Jesus and seek mercy, we refer our self to others we look down on and give way to pride.
(4) Boasting: Increasingly locked into our little world of idle thinking and foolish behavior, we may begin to exult in banal activities and consider such behaviors to be a sign of greatness. We begin to boast of foolish things. The boaster thinks too highly of himself, and either claims qualities he does not really have, or forgets that what genuine good he does have is a grace and a gift. St. Paul says, "What have you that you have not received? And if you have received it, why do you boast as though you had not?" (1 Cor 4:7). Boasting springs from pride.
(5) Singularity: Ironically, as our world contracts, we think ourselves ever greater. As our pride grows, we too easily forget our dependence on God and others for who and what we are. In truth, there is no such thing as a self-made man. We are all contingent beings, very dependent on God and others. Therefore, by relying only on our own counsel, we discount reality and stop seeking information and counsel from others. The man who seeks only his own counsel has a fool for an advisor, and a prideful advisor at that. Singularity springs from pride.
(6) Self-conceit: Self-conceit means an unduly high opinion of our own abilities or worth. As our world gets ever smaller and our pride ever greater, our self-focus grows ever stronger and we become increasingly self-referential. A thing is now considered true merely because we say it is true. Similarly, we consider ourselves fine because we say we are fine. We deny that all of us are a mixture of strengths and weaknesses, sanctity and sinfulness. We find faults in others but fail to see them in ourselves. We compare ourselves to others whom we look down on and give way to pride.
(7) Presumption: At this stage of pride, even God's judgments must cede to ours. This is a sin against the virtue of hope wherein we believe that salvation is due to us no matter how we live. The Theological Virtue of hope teaches us to ask with confidence for God's help in attaining eternal life. It is great pride to presume that we have already accomplished it and possess what we do not.
(8) Self-justification: Jesus must now vacate the judgment seat because we demand to take his place. Not only that, but he must also vacate the cross because we do not really need his sacrifice. We think that we can save ourselves and frankly, we do not need a lot of saving. Self-justification is the attitude that says we are able, by our own power, to justify, that is, to save ourselves. It is also an attitude that says, in effect, "I will do what I want to do and I will decide if it is right or wrong." St. Paul says, "I do not even judge myself. My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me" (1 Cor 4:3-4). Yet the prideful care only for their own point of view and refuse to be accountable ultimately even to God. The prideful person forgets that no one is his own judge.
And thus we have climbed in twelve steps the mountain of pride. It begins in the mind with a lack of sobriety rooted in sinful curiosity and frivolous preoccupation.
(9) Hypocritical confession: The word "hypocrite" in Greek means "actor." We may observe that, in certain settings, some degree of humility and acknowledgement of our faults is "profitable." We may see that we can get "credit" for humbly acknowledging our faults and calling ourselves sinners. But the prideful are just acting, just playing a role more for social credit than out of real contrition or repentance. We may believe that, after all, we are really not that bad. And if posturing and playing the role of the humble and contrite sinner will get us somewhere, then we will say our lines, play the part and look holy if the applause from the audience is forthcoming.
(10) Revolt: Pride really begins to go off the rails when we openly revolt against God and his lawful representatives. To revolt means to renounce allegiance, accountability, or obedience to God, his Word or to His Church. It is prideful to refuse to be under lawful authority and act in ways that are directly contrary to what that authority rightly asserts.
(11) Freedom to sin: Here pride reaches its near conclusion as it arrogantly asserts and celebrates that it is utterly free to do as it pleases. The prideful person increasingly rejects any restraints or limits. But the freedom of the prideful is not really freedom at all. Jesus says, "Whoever sins is a slave to sin," (John 8:34) and the Catechism echoes, "The more one does what is good, the freer one becomes. There is no true freedom except in the service of what is good and just. The choice to disobey and do evil is an abuse of freedom and leads to the slavery of sin" (Catechism 1733). But the prideful will have none of this and arrogantly go on asserting the freedom to do what they please, even as they descend deeper and deeper into addiction and slavery.
And thus we have climbed in twelve steps the mountain of pride. It begins in the mind with a lack of sobriety rooted in sinful curiosity and frivolous preoccupation. Then follows frivolous behavior and excusing, and presumptive and dismissive attitudes. Last come outright revolt and slavery to sin. Pride is then in full flower.
We have seen the escalation in these steps which illustrates an old admonition: sow a thought, reap a deed; sow a deed, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character, sow a character, reap a destiny.
Is there a way down this mountain of pride? You can read the answer to that question in our next CERC bulletin as we explore "12 More Steps: Out of Pride and into Humility, from St. Bernard."
Monsignor Charles Pope. "The Twelve Steps up the Mountain of Pride According to St. Bernard of Clairvaux." Archdiocese of Washington (March 19, 2013).
Reprinted with permission from Monsignor Charles Pope.
Monsignor Charles Pope is the pastor of Holy Comforter-St. Cyprian, a vibrant parish community in Washington, DC. A native of Chicago with a bachelor degree in computer science, his interest in the priesthood stemmed from his experience as a church musician. He attended Mount Saint Mary's Seminary and was ordained in 1989. A pastor since 2000, he also has led Bible studies in the U.S. Congress and at the White House in past years.


text:
Q: Which compiler to use when learning D? I'm interested in learning D. However I'm a bit turned of by the DMD, because it is not fully opensource. This is why I am considering using the LDC, but I'm not sure what's it's status. In the debian package it says:
Version: 1:0.14.0.dfsg-1
LDC already compiles a lot of D code, but should still be considered beta quality. Take a look at the
     tickets to get a better impression on what still needs to be implemented.

I know Debian repositories can sometimes be a bit ancient, but 1.0.0 seems to be the latest LDC release.
I intend do use libraries written in C a lot. Which compiler will fit this purpose better? LDC or DMD? I know this question has been asked before, but all the questions I found are rather old and I want to know the current status.

A:
I'm interested in learning D. However I'm a bit turned of by the DMD, because it is not fully opensource.

edit: since April 8th 2017 DMD is fully OpenSource.

This is just a licensing about the backend. The entire development happens on Github: https://github.com/dlang/dmd
My recommendation is to use DMD as it has the fastest compile-time which is quite helpful when learning a language (seriously it's blazingly fast!). On Linux you can easily install DMD - even just as a user - with the install script:
curl https://dlang.org/install.sh | bash -s dmd

(see the downloads page for more instructions and download options.)
Last but not least there are a couple of nice tools like rdmd (it allows a script-like execution of DMD source files) that you should familiarize yourself with, because they can save you a lot of time & make programming in D even more fun!

This is why I am considering using the LDC, but I'm not sure what's it's status. In the debian package it says:
  I know Debian repositories can sometimes be a bit ancient, but 1.0.0 seems to be the latest LDC release.

"A bit ancient" is an understatement ;-)
In case you want to go with LDC, you should definitively grab a more recent release. As of now 1.0.0 is the latest release, but 1.1.0 will be released very soon (the second beta is already out). You can also grab the latest LDC with the install script:
curl https://dlang.org/install.sh | bash -s ldc

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


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When taking into consideration a youngster's education in an international land most countries use three choices: state colleges, independent schools and international colleges. This article concentrates mainly on the potential benefits and also downsides of worldwide schools although some factor to consider is likewise given to the state institution choice. Classes in international schools are generally educated in English and scholastic outcomes are typically excellent. The educational program is most often British or American stylishly with making use of senior high school qualities and SAT ratings or International GCSEs at age 15/16 and also A Levels or the International Baccalaureate at 17/18, the last being identified by universities worldwide. Topics educated are additionally comparable to those instructed in the US or UK.
Almost all global colleges are fee paying although grants and scholarships might be available and costs can be considerable. Typical fees for a day chinese international school are around 10,000 each year yet it needs to be kept in mind that fees normally increase as the pupil grows older. The ordinary charges for youngsters aged 12 or over are around EUR 20,000 per year. Costs for boarding as opposed to day schools are a lot greater. Along with annual fees it might additionally be smart to take into consideration the other expenditures which are likely to be sustained when sending a youngster to an international school. These costs could include an enrollment charge, purchase of an attire, insurance policy, task charges and transport.
Occasionally they are the only option if immigrants are not allowed to participate in neighborhood state schools as is the case in the United Arab Emirates or if the state colleges are complete. Many moms and dads are additionally worried about the result learning a new language and also adding to a brand-new culture are likely to carry both their youngster's education and learning and also joy. Typically kids take these challenges in their stride but older children may battle or feel estranged. Another advantage of participating in an international primary school is that it offers the moms and dads a possibility to fulfill other deportees! Nonetheless, not all expats pick worldwide schools and the state institution alternative may in fact be more effective in many cases. In addition to the evident price financial savings a regional state school is an outstanding place for a kid to discover the new language and also several expats discover that their children are frequently fluent in the local lingo within a really brief time period.


1959 CADILLAC COUPE DEVILLE for sale. Motorcar Classics is pleased to present this 1959 Cadillac Coupe DeVille featured in White with a White and Black interior. The 1959 Cadillac is an iconic design with arguably the largest tail fins ever to grace a car. It came at the end of a period in which automotive stylists competed to produce ever more stunning and futuristic design elements and the 1959 Cadillac marked both the pinnacle of that movement and the turning point toward more restraint that was to come. Our Coupe DeVille is largely original. It has one repaint in the original White while the interior is the factory combination of White leather with Black cloth inserts. The brightwork remains in very good condition and the car runs and drives well. This is a car that we would characterize as a strong #3 condition example. Cruise-Night season is coming and this handsome Caddy will bring grea fot pride for its next owner.


Screenwriter Hossein Amini (The Wings of the Dove, Drive) makes a stylish directing debut with this sleek thriller set in Greece and Istanbul, 1962, and adapted from Patricia Highsmith's novel. Intrigue begins at the Parthenon when wealthy American tourists Chester MacFarland (Viggo Mortensen) and his young wife Collete (Kirsten Dunst) meet American expat Rydal (Oscar Isaac), a scammer working as a tour guide.
Instead of becoming his latest marks, the two befriend him, but a murder at the couple's hotel puts all three on the run together and creates a precarious bond between them as the trio's allegiance is put to the test.


ZIG Wink of Luna metallic brush marker.
Ideal for adding controlled metallic to your illustration, craft products, use when writing or even on rubber stamps.
The nylon brush tip is brilliant for creating artistic freedom by allowing thin and thick lines.
Available in 6 colours: Gold, Silver, Green, Violet, Blue and Red.
Please select your choice of colour from drop box.


text:
import sys
sys.path.append("..")
from chatterbot.chatterbot import ChatBot
from settings import HIPCHAT

'''
See the HipChat api documentation for how to get a user access token.
https://developer.atlassian.com/hipchat/guide/hipchat-rest-api/api-access-tokens
'''

chatbot = ChatBot(
    'HipChatBot',
    hipchat_host=HIPCHAT['HOST'],
    hipchat_room=HIPCHAT['ROOM'],
    hipchat_access_token=HIPCHAT['ACCESS_TOKEN'],
    input_adapter='chatterbot.adapters.input.HipChat',
    output_adapter='chatterbot.adapters.output.HipChat',
    trainer='chatterbot.trainers.ChatterBotCorpusTrainer'
)

chatbot.train('chatterbot.corpus.english')

# The following loop will execute each time the user enters input
while True:
    try:
        response = chatbot.get_response(None)

    # Press ctrl-c or ctrl-d on the keyboard to exit
    except (KeyboardInterrupt, EOFError, SystemExit):
        break

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Montana's six cottages overlook the clear water of Khlong Hin as it flows into the sea at a sheltered beach of the same name.
If you're okay with a large Russian package tour resort backing most of the beachfront, this is an unforgettable setting and we're glad to see some accommodation geared towards independent travellers popping up here.
Above the estuary stand three large stilted salas where guests can relax on cushioned mats and chairs and watch the birds go fishing. A small restaurant sits at the mouth of the canal as the coast turns to some unusual rock formations—here the resort added several decks, swings and hammocks with an outlook across the bay. The short concrete footpath to Ao Jak also begins here, giving you two beaches to choose from within a five-minute stroll.
The small concrete bungalows were full during our visit but after experiencing the setting and speaking with staff and a French couple that was staying here, we felt confident enough to include Montana in our update, especially since it's the only place to stay on this beach apart from the Russian-dominated Khlong Hin Resort.
Bungalows open through glass doors leading to grass within steps of those stilted salas. All rooms come with air-con, fan and hot water in ensuite bathrooms, and free WiFi is advertised. There's also one larger bungalow that looked like a good one for families.
Though we didn't meet the owner, a young Thai man did a good job with limited English to answer our questions. We dig the isolated setting and it truly is beautiful, but do expect a bumpy two-kilometre ride up to the main road and the nearest shops and non-resort restaurants.
If you like the look of Montana but it's above your price range, check out nearby Neverland Resort and Gumm Lonely Club, both set beside tranquil canals of their own.
Check rates at Montana Koh Kood on Booking.com.


text:
Sunderland South was, from 1950 until 2010, a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elected one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election.

History
Sunderland South, as can be inferred from the name, formed the southern part of the County Borough (now City) of Sunderland. The constituency was created by the Representation of the People Act 1948 for the 1950 general election when the existing two-member Sunderland seat was split in two. Parts also transferred from Houghton-le-Spring.

It was abolished for the 2010 general election when most of its contents were divided between the two new constituencies of Sunderland Central (eastern areas) and Houghton and Sunderland South (western areas). St Anne's ward was transferred to the new constituency of Washington and Sunderland West.

Boundaries

1950–1955

 The County Borough of Sunderland wards of Bishopwearmouth, Hendon, Humbledon, Pallion, Park, St Michael's, Sunderland East, Thornhill, and West.

1955–1974

 The County Borough of Sunderland wards of Bishopwearmouth, Hendon, Humbledon, Pallion, Park, Pennywell, St Michael's, Thorney Close, and Thornhill.

Minor changes.

1974–1983

 The County Borough of Sunderland wards of Bishopwearmouth, Hendon, Humbledon, Pennywell, Ryhope, St Chad's, St Michael's, Silksworth, Thorney Close, and Thornhill.

Boundaries expanded southwards in line with those of the County Borough, including the gain of Ryhope and Silksworth from Houghton-le-Spring.  Existing boundary with Sunderland North realigned, including the loss of Pallion ward.

1983–1997

 The Metropolitan Borough of Sunderland wards of Grindon, Hendon, Ryhope, St Chad's, St Michael's, Silksworth, Thorney Close, and Thornholme. Minor changes to take account of new ward boundaries.

1997–2010

 The City of Sunderland wards of Grindon, Hendon, St Chad's, St Michael's, Silksworth, South Hylton, Thorney Close, and Thornholme. South Hylton ward transferred from Sunderland North. Ryhope ward transferred to the new constituency of Houghton and Washington East.

Political history
Having been a Labour–Conservative marginal in the 1950s and 1960s, Sunderland South was held by the Labour Party from 1964 until 2010. Its last MP was journalist-politician Chris Mullin, who served between the 1987 and 2010 general elections, inclusive. Sunderland South was abolished as a result of the Fifth Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies, which took effect at the 2010 election. Mullin did not seek re-election in 2010.

The constituency was well known for trying to be the first seat to declare its results, doing so in the general elections of 1992, 1997, 2001 and 2005.

Members of Parliament

Elections

Elections in the 1950s

Elections in the 1960s

Elections in the 1970s

Elections in the 1980s

Elections in the 1990s

Elections in the 2000s

See also
History of parliamentary constituencies and boundaries in Tyne and Wear
History of parliamentary constituencies and boundaries in Durham

Notes and references

Parliamentary constituencies in Tyne and Wear (historic)
Politics of the City of Sunderland
Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom established in 1950
Constituencies of the Parliament of the United Kingdom disestablished in 2010
Sunderland

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


It is important that greater attention is paid to the narrative contained in, for instance, complaints data, as well as to the numbers.
The new approach to inspection introduced by the Care Quality Commission places a stronger focus on how care is delivered in practice and how it is experienced, rather than only on compliance with regulations. In line with this, it is now making greater use of the information that it holds on complaints.
The Care Quality Commission already uses a range of information about complaints to inform the timing and focus of its inspections. The information ranges from aggregated numbers and patterns of complaints, to individuals who contact the Care Quality Commission and tell inspectors about their experience. The Care Quality Commission will review how it makes best use of the complaints that it receives directly from individuals, and the individual stories in complaints as well as the aggregated trends, in light of Rt Hon Ann Clwyd MP and Professor Tricia Hart's Review of the Handling of Complaints in NHS Hospitals.
The new inspection process being developed by the Care Quality Commission, working with the Patients Association, is to build an approach based on listening and focus groups, and an interview with the complaints manager. It may also involve looking through complaints file; in other words, looking at the whole complaints process.
The Care Quality Commission provider handbooks were published in October 2014 and include mandatory key lines of enquiry for use in all inspections. For complaints this means the inspection finding evidence to answer the questions – How are people's concerns and complaints listened and responded to and used to improve quality of care? For staff concerns, evidence will be gathered to answer the questions – Is the value of staff raising concerns recognised by both leaders and staff? Is appropriate action taken as a result of concerns raised?
starting to design a set of training and support for inspection team members and other the Care Quality Commission staff that is likely to include issues such as understanding the legal framework, facilitating staff forums to ensure raising and acting on concerns is discussed, how to manage sensitivities in handling concerns such as confidentiality, use of inspection guidance and tool kits, identifying good and poor practice.
In terms of complaints handling, the Care Quality Commission plan in hospitals and other care sectors to carry out an audit of a randomly selected (by the Care Quality Commission) sample of closed files to understand if these have been handled in a way that matches the good practice they expect to see.
Interviews with senior management, including the Head of Human Resources or equivalent, will include questions about policies on and the practice of handling staff concerns.
There was a positive response when the Care Quality Commission engaged on their proposed approach with groups of people who have experience of making complaints, complaint advocacy services, staff who have raised concerns about services and national bodies. The Care Quality Commission have gathered, from their inspection activity, evidence of good and poor practice in the different sectors for a Chief Inspector of Hospitals report Complaints Matter, which was published in December 2014.
The Care Quality Commission is also undertaking a wide review of "customer experience" that will understand how they can improve the way they listen and respond to concerns and complaints and the providers they regulate. This will include looking at good practice in other service sectors. They are also carrying out a review of their own whistleblowing policies using external expertise.
The Care Quality Commission is building up the relationships it has with its strategic partners to reform the wider complaints system in order to align work on vision and standards, share good practice and consistency in messaging and on a joint vision for good complaints handling.


text:
Election Update: Post-Debate Polls Show Trump Still In Big Trouble
Oct. 12, 2016 , at 4:16 PM
Bethany Heck / Getty Images
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We're spending a lot of time these days diagnosing whether Donald Trump's position in the polls is merely bad or still getting worse. Most of the evidence on Wednesday — which included the first dusting of state polls since the second presidential debate, on Sunday night — fell into the "still getting worse" bucket. Trump's chances are down to 14 percent in our polls-only forecast (against an 86 percent chance for Hillary Clinton) and to 17 percent, a record low for Trump, in our polls-plus forecast.
We'll start with the three state polls that were conducted entirely after Sunday night's debate:
First, a Baldwin Wallace University poll showed Trump trailing Clinton by 9 percentage points in Ohio. That's obviously an awful result for Trump — his worst poll of Ohio all year — although hard to put into context because Baldwin Wallace University hasn't done a lot of election polling before. Their previous poll of Ohio, in February, showed Trump up by 2 points.
Another unsightly number for Trump came from a Y2 Analytics poll of Utah, which you may remember as the state that Mitt Romney won by 48 points. It showed Trump tied with Clinton at just 26 percent of the vote, with the independent candidate Evan McMullin at 22 percent and the Libertarian Gary Johnson at 14 percent. We're going to be adding McMullin to our model in Utah — give us a day or two on that. But in the meantime, we could also really use another poll or two of Utah to confirm or contradict this result. Although polling there in the spring sometimes showed a tight race, Trump pulled ahead by margins ranging from 7 to 15 points in a series of Utah polls in August and September. If McMullin is really polling in the 20s, however — and taking most of his voters from Trump — he could create an unpredictable finish.
Finally, an Opinion Savvy poll of Florida put Clinton up by 3 percentage points. This is the least-worst of the post-debate polls for Trump, but still not good — it shows a slight uptick for Clinton from a late September poll, when Opinion Savvy had her ahead by less than a percentage point.
That's it for the fully post-debate polls. But there was also a Monmouth University poll of Missouri, conducted mostly after the debate, that showed Trump up 5 percentage points there. That's probably Trump's best result of the day, given that Monmouth's previous poll of Missouri, from August, had Trump up just 1 point. To keep things in perspective, however, Mitt Romney won Missouri by 9 points.
Finally, a Marquette University Law School poll of Wisconsin, conducted entirely before the debate, showed Clinton up 7 points — improved from a 3-point lead in Marquette's mid-September poll. That's about what we'd have expected to see from a Wisconsin poll, as our forecast has Clinton ahead there by about 8 points. In another scary bit of data for Trump, however, he did significantly worse in the portions of the poll that were conducted on Saturday and Sunday after the release of a 2005 video that showed him condoning unwanted sexual contact toward women.
There are also the national tracking polls, which variously show Trump to be rebounding slightly or Clinton to be continuing to extend her lead. Clinton also regained the lead in the Republican-leaning USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times tracking poll for the first time since Sept. 11, although we'd recommend reading this analysis of the poll from The Upshot's Nate Cohn before you spend too much time focusing on its fluctuations.
Trump now trails Clinton by 6.5 percentage points in our popular vote forecast — by comparison, he was 4.6 points back of Clinton a week ago, on Oct. 5, before the videotape or the second debate. So he's moving in the wrong direction as time is running out. While a Trump comeback is still mathematically feasible — Trump's 17 percent chance in the polls-plus model, as we've pointed out before, is the same as your chances of losing a "game" of Russian roulette — it wouldn't really have any good precedent in recent American presidential elections.
Video: How different demographic groups could swing the election
Donald Trump (1193 posts) 2016 Election (1101) Hillary Clinton (555) Florida (150) Election Update (136) Ohio (121) Wisconsin (83) Utah (33)