Cyberspace beliefs

This list was written in the 1990’s, as an attempt to summarise the worldview of the supporters of cyberspace, as it was then called. For clarity: these are not my views, and were not in the 1990’s. The list still seems to be an accurate summary of a certain techno-liberal worldview.

PROCESS

• Process legitimises outcome.

ACCESS

• Access to harm legitimises harm.
• Equality of access legitimises harm.
• Equality of access legitimises inequality of outcome.
• Equality of access legitimises other inequalities.
• A decision to grant access is a gift, and therefore inherently good.
• An elite which grants access, is better than equality without access.

COMMUNICATION

• Communication legitimises harm.
• Communication legitimises injustice.
• Communication legitimises inequality.
• Communication has priority over justice.
• Communication has priority over innovation.
• Dialogue is preferable to justice.

INTERACTION

• Interaction legitimises harm.
• Interaction legitimises injustice.
• Interaction legitimises inequality
• Interaction has priority over justice.
• Interaction has priority over innovation.
• Interaction overrides individual autonomy.

DEMOCRACY

• Democracy legitimises injustice.
• Democracy legitimises inequality
• Democracy has priority over justice.
• Democracy has priority over innovation.
• Individuals must accept collective democratic decision.

INFORMATION

• All information can flow.
• All information must flow.
• There are no negative consequences of information flow.
• No flowing information conflicts with other flowing information.

KNOWLEDGE

• Knowledge is good.
• All knowledge is equally good.
• No knowledge should be destroyed.
• Knowledge is cumulative.
• Flow of information cumulates knowledge.
• Knowledge is singular: there is no alternative or dissident knowledge.
• Knowledge has priority over innovation.

HISTORY

• Global history progresses as a global unit.
• Global unity intensifies.
• Global history is singular: there is no other separate history.
• History is linear.
• The world undergoes a series of transitions, forming a linear sequence.
• The most accurate number, to describe historical stages or transitions, is the number three.
• History is a path, with only three possibilities: standing still, going forward or turning back.
• The emergent is good.
• The emergent is better than the possible.
• Emergent stability has priority over possible innovation.

TECHNOLOGY

• Technology is a unit: there are no separate technologies.
• Technology progresses as a unit through time.
• Technology is transformed as a unit.
• The transformation of technology is equivalent to historical process.
• A single technology, in a single linear historical process, undergoes singular unitary transition from one phase or stage, to the next phase or stage.
• The transition to an information society / information age, is such a singular unitary transition.
• A sequence of single unitary linear transitions is progress or development.
• Only one possible sequence may be described as progress or development.
• Global technological transitions are not subject to rejection on moral grounds.
• Global technological transitions are either good, or inevitable and beyond moral judgement.
• Global technological transitions legitimise their own existence, against alternative possibilities.
• Technology as a unit progresses from few links to many links.
• Technology becomes more unitary.
• Technology tends towards global perfection of communication and interaction.
• Technology of communication and interaction, is better than technology of separation or autonomy.
• Advances, in technology of separation or autonomy, are not technical progress.

SOCIETY AND INDIVIDUAL

• Society is a unit.
• A global society is preferable.
• Autonomy from global society is undesirable.
• Society overrides individual autonomy.
• Individual freedom consists only in the freedom to interact or communicate.
• People who support the information society are more in touch with history than those who oppose it.
• People who build an information society or cyberspace are talented: those who oppose it have personally failed.
• Opponents of an information society have less value as persons, than those who build it.

US AND EUROPE

• No link between the US and Europe should be cut.
• Protection of links from the US to Europe, is protection of freedom.
• If no other means are effective, then military intervention, to protect the freedom to link to the US, is legitimate.
• Political claims in favour the information society or cyberspace, made in English only, can be applied to people who do not read or speak English.