In Anticipation of Sophology

IN ANTICIPATION OF AN ARGUMENT FOR
SOPHOLOGY

: WHAT WAS DISCOVERED IN THE COURSE OF A SEARCH FOR
THE MOST IMPORTANT PROBLEM IN THE WORLD



In Anticipation of Sophology by Alexander Martin Loewi is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License. 2009
It is free for distribution and reproduction, but not licenensed for commercial purposes.
This license covers the material in the posts "In Anticipation of Sophology," "Information," "Learning," "Searching," "Sophology," and "Bibliography of the Summary."

This began as a search for the most important problem in the world. In its place, I have found the argument that is well summarized, although not fully explained, by what follows. I do not claim that it is the solution to the most important problem in the world, and no longer believe that this phrase has much, if any, meaning. However that is what I started out looking for, and even with that initial desire, I am profoundly excited by what I have found. I hope that by the end of this description, you will be as well.
At the core of everything I describe is a thing that I will call information. When this word is considered carefully, and defined correctly, a staggering swath of what we know slides sublimely into clarity with a breathtaking ease, from the most intensively reviewed academic studies, to the most mundane quotidian routines. In these pages, I have struggled to explain convincingly to you the uniquely profound importance of looking at the world in terms of it. The way of looking through this lens of information, I call sophology- “the study of knowledge,” or “the study of information.”
A fact of almost as great importance as the explanatory power of sophology is that its most important points are profoundly simple to explain, understand, and apply. Those who could benefit from it are likely to need very little if any preparation, before they are able to grasp its arguments.
This brief argument for sophology can be generally considered in three parts, although these parts are most meaningful when taken together. They are the properties of information, the way in which information is learned, and the way in which information is found.