The new electronic exposition techniques will combine to create more effective ways of propagating thought than have yet been seen.

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With new online techniques of exposition, material can be crafted from the absolute best of many thinkers’ words:  a compelling paragraph from one source, an even more eloquent passage from another, and so forth.

It would be hard to overestimate the quality, or the sheer vitality, of the material that can be created in this manner.

Now add the ability to skim the material at a high level, or delve into as much supporting detail as we like, point by point.  We will also have the option of checking out logical challenges to it on the spot, as well as seeing additional material that supports it.   And we will be able to see logical implications that the material’s original authors may never have foreseen, in areas they may never have considered. 

We won’t have to stop reading and break our train of thought as we try to find some other article, or locate another journal.  It will all be right there in front of us.

All told, this will be a more powerful tool for the sharing of knowledge than anything yet devised.

Because virtually anybody will be able to link material, its content will gain the vigor of diversity.  Yet quality will remain as high as today or higher, because people can simply set their filters to reflect the same kinds of rigorous peer review that existing journals provide--and whatever does not meet these standards will be effectively invisible to them.

© COPYRIGHT 2004 ROBERT WINTER.  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.