Tim,
I'm sorry about the rant based on what was clearly a careless misreading
of your words.
Russian proverb: measure three times before you cut.
Other than that, in response to Tim's post, I really want to say that we
need to define "know". :) (I have other questions to, but they'll need
to wait).
OK, unless I have any more apologies I need to make, I'm really done
now.
Regards,
Nathan Rinne
Media Cataloging Technician
ISD 279 - Educational Service Center (ESC)
11200 93rd Ave. North
Maple Grove, MN. 55369
Work phone: 763-391-7183
-----Original Message-----
From: Next generation catalogs for libraries
[mailto:NGC4LIB_at_listserv.nd.edu] On Behalf Of Tim Spalding
Sent: Tuesday, August 07, 2007 11:47 AM
To: NGC4LIB_at_listserv.nd.edu
Subject: Re: [NGC4LIB] Elitism - and Aristotle again! - in libraries
(was "Elitism in libraries")
> In what I would call Clay-Shirkean fashion, Tim has dropped the
d-word! I am beginning to wonder when someone here is going to rather
seriously post something I'd consider slightly bombastic (though not
worth disengaging, to be sure!) - like "librarian fundamentalism".
After all, I looked up "dogmatism, definition" on Google, and found out
that it can mean "bigotry: the intolerance and prejudice of a bigot"
(from Princeton.edu)! Yikes.
Just to be clear the quote was:
"Insisting that books are about three or any fixed or suggested number
subjects, and about them to the same degree, is just dogmatism."
I'd just as happily be even more bombastic and say stupid, childish
and so forth. But I don't think I'm attacking you or anyone else on
this list when I say that. I'm sure you don't believe it. Any decent
defense of the three-subject rule and of the binary nature of LCSHs is
not based on really *believing* that books are about three things.
Rather, it's based on practical considerations: It's not a bad system
for assigning subjects. Simplifying reality isn't a bug, it's a
feature.
But, regarding LCSH, I think we can do better. Limiting the number of
subjects and having all relationships be 100% or nothing works very
well when your physical cards have limited space. And a card can't be
"40% there" in the card catalog. But those are no longer factors.
> In any case, some more observations from Mann are appropriate here.
In one of his recent papers ("More on what is going on at the Library of
Congress" - available online), he talks about "misreading the evidence
on indexer consistency" (see p. 9 and 10 of this article or the article
"'Cataloging Must Change!' and Indexer Consistency Studies: Misreading
the Evidence at Our Peril" in Cataloging and Classification Quarterly,
vol. 23, no. 3/4 (1997), 3-45) and points out the glaring lack of real
evidence for the claim that catalogers only have 10-20% consistency for
their headings for the same book. Mann asserts that 80% consistency
among properly trained catalogers who are using LCSH is a reasonable
expectation - and I think that is probably quite accurate. Of course
unless someone is going to do a costly, careful, detailed study...
I saw that. I think that's good data. And it means one criticism isn't
as valid as some have argued. But just because you can train people to
make the same decisions doesn't mean they're the right ones. I
recently spoke to God, and he told me that catalogers have no better
than a 25% understanding of what a book is really about.
> Now, a deeper philosophical excursis follows (I insist you *stop
reading now* if you find my philosophical stuff getting to you :) )
In the immortal words of President Bush, "Bring it on!"
> Given Tim's words elsewhere, I think it is reasonable to say that he
is a hard-core postmodernist-type. :)
No! (I read it as sarcasm, but apparently it was just a typo.)
>In all seriousness though, I believe Tim, may be using the word
"dogmatism" in a more Kantian sense, i.e. "the dogmatic manner of
thinking...is a blind trust in the ability of reason to expand a
priori through mere concepts without critique, simply because of the
seeming success of this expansion" - therefore, "dogmatism" in the
sense of something opposite to skepticism which is also concerned
about evidence as well as the power of rational thinking.
> Wikipedia, interestingly, offers this 3rd way (hallelujah!): "Dogma...
is belief or doctrine held by a religion *or any kind of organization to
be authoritative*. *Evidence, analysis, or established fact* *may or
may not be adduced*, depending upon usage."
I think I was more thinking of dogmatism in a religious sense. I'm a
Catholic, however, so I guess I don't think all dogma is bad. I'm down
with the Trinity. It's the three-subject rule that gets me.
> I opt for this 3rd definition, though I would put as asterisk by
"authoritative", as of course, the LC catalogers, for example, do not
have a corner on the truth re: this or that book. Still, for the most
part, we should be able to trust them as authoritative, as we should
regularly be able to trust experienced doctors (still, get a second
opinion! - including "user-taggish" opinion).
Absolutely. To be clear, I am NOT against getting rid of LCSH. Not at
all. On the contrary, I think that sort of cataloging is EXACTLY the
sort of thing librarians can and should continue to do for some time.
I want to mash it up with tags, and I think it could be stronger if it
changed in some ways, but this is cataloging's sweet-spot.
> * We share a world out there
> * Despite all the chaos, there is some order out there,
particularly in the minds of other persons
> * It makes sense to try to learn about this world
> * Words are not only tools we use to manipulate our environment
or others, but are far more deeply significant, *often having
rather discernible meaning*, and often related to the mystery of
love and life itself
> * Our "epistemological equipment" (senses and reason) also
"makes sense", so we can rely on it to learn about the world out
there
I'm down with all this. Ask Weinberger, though. He and I have
disagreed on this, well, to the extent that an idiot with a few
philosophy courses and a world-renowned author with a PhD in
Philosophy from Harvard can disagree.
> * Not only the highly evidential, successful [and tactile] hard
sciences (which depend on the scientific method) but other disciplines
have treated the world itself "as if" it "made sense".
I guess I think that this has sometimes been a mistake. Most of
Library "Science" isn't a science in even the German sense, and
certainly the assignment of LCSHs isn't. More broadly, some things
aren't knowable and you err in treating everything as it if is. In the
field I used to pursue, there used to be a lot more confidence in what
you could "do" with respect to ancient evidence. Now there's more
caution. Knowing what you don't know is itself a form of knowledge.
Cue Zen hand-clapping jokes.
> * Expertise exists not only in "degreed" persons, and there is
interdisciplinary overlap - with the real corresponding possibility of
knowledge building on knowledge
> * I exist. You exist. (Like I'm OK. You're OK).
You're a computer program, I know.
> (Modern Western philosophy has often started with DesCarte's "I think
therefore I am", which Hume, Kant, and others showed to be very weak -
though I am very concerned with the dignity of the human person, I
prefer to downplay Descartes focus on the individual's thought/existence
as the starting point, as I think is appropriate)
Weinberger slams Descartes a lot. I haven't read him.
> I have a hard time seeing however, how these tacit assumptions I have
listed above have not been grounded in - part and parcel with -
librarianship from the beginning. I submit if you get rid of some of
these assumptions above, one ought to strongly consider that they just
might also be sawing off the branch that one sits, ultimately
unintentionally undermining the classic, core tools of the profession
itself.
No, I get that. I think there's a danger there. As you detected, I
have no pomo blood in me. I think the world is real, and opinions just
that.
I am, however, sceptical that God thinks in LCSH, that library science
should be about ontological voodoo or that truth-in-labelling is more
important than accuracy in discovering. Moby Dick will never be about
Penguins, but it is now, in a sense. If someone asks "What was that
book that Tim told David Weinberger wasn't about Penguins?" they
should get an answer. Lo and behold, I get one from Google
(http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=safari&rls=en&q=tim+spalding+
weinberger+penguins&btnG=Search).
Can you library catalog do that?
If heaven is a library, God is the OPAC. But, in both religion and
library science I believe that, on earth, our primary experience with
God is through other people.
:)
Received on Tue Aug 07 2007 - 11:02:00 EDT