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A DIRECT APPROACH TO INFORMATION RETRIEVAL

Table of Contents
   WHAT
   WHY
   HOW
1. INTRODUCTION
2. THE LINE OF ATTACK
3. SYSTEMS VS. USERS
   3.1 Discrimination
   3.2 Prediction
4. DOCUMENTS VS. SURROGATES
5. THE THEORY OF INTERPRETATION
   5.1 Denotation and Connotation
   5.2 The Theory of Ogden and Richards
   5.3 Implications for Information Retrieval
6. PROPOSAL FOR FILE ORGANIZATION
   6.1 Incentives
   6.2 Extracts as Indexing Sources
   6.3 Extracts as Review Sources
7. CONCLUSION
8. REFERENCES


Contents

1. INTRODUCTION

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In this study I am concerned with file organization [1] of scientific literature [2] in view of discovering useful information [3] efficiently; largely, the problem of information retrieval. It seems that information retrieval now implies something more than a mechanistic and technical problem, [4] something that gradually resolves into complexity of human communication, understanding and knowledge. Similar views have recently been expressed by Mitroff, et al.1 and by Brookes2 in a wider context. "As we may think" [5] or look back, our initial hope for information retrieval has been faded in spite of tremendous development of computer techniques and others made for the past thirty years. This frustration was anticipated as early as 1948 by Wiener.3 [6] Still we are not sure if we could restore the hope in the near future, particularly along the same line of thought.

As to scientific information* in the wide sense, the following fundamental questions may be raised: [7]

  • What is scientific information?
  • Why should scientific information be organized?
  • How can scientific information be organized?

Obviously, information retrieval is most closely related to the last question. But I feel that the other two questions should also be taken into consideration when we intend to discuss information retrieval carefully. I selected the prefatory statements by Popper4, by Bernal,5 and by Wells6 as the most thought-provoking with respect to these three fundamental questions. And the statements represent my standpoint that I have taken in approaching the problems of information retrieval.

In the following chapters, I discuss first some fundamental considerations for information retrieval. I shall understand the narrowed retrieval problems mainly owing to Fairthorne's insightful contention.7 Further I shall attempt to understand the problems in the light of communication and information which appear to be almost undefined. For this purpose I attend to Cherry's critical view on human communication8 and to Ogden and Richards' classic theory of interpretation.9 In short I am seeking for a solution to the problems of information retrieval, by questioning what influences those who communicate and obtain information.

Eventually, I propose a way of file organization as most essential for information retrieval. The proposal is only crude at this stage. In fact, the discussion of fundamental considerations is thus intended to make clearer and justify to some extent the idea which might require further elaboration and application.

The main feature of the proposal is to use in retrieval those extracts in which the source document cites, describes, criticizes, and/or collates other documents. Such extracts seem to provide concise but significant clues for discriminating the cited documents. The most concise clues should be regarded as significant when they are coherent in their proper environments or contexts.

* Honestly I cannot quite clearly distinguish between scientific information and scientific knowledge, and again science, in the sense that these are sometimes interchangeable. Information and knowledge may represent the same thing in essence, which I shall understand as information particularly when it is oriented to the specific use or value.

AFTERTHOUGHTS

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Quadrant information cycle

Adapted from Triangle of reference
See also Talk:Triangle of reference#Implications

informer
informative
encoder
encoding ⊕ decoded
decoder
information
informed

  • Subjective encoder-decoder axis
  • Objective encoding-decoded axis
See also
  1. ^ This term, aka file system in Wikipedia, is not mine. Some preferred "file structure" in favor of structuralism.
  2. ^ I'm happy this term scientific literature has survived as "recorded scientific information" or "recorded knowledge."
  3. ^ The qualifier 'useful' is redundant, as information is information only when it is of any use, in my view.
  4. ^ From the beginninig, I, as an educated mechanical engineer, was definitely against mechanists such as Vannevar Bush and in effect his followers Doug Engelbart and Ted Nelson, not to mention Gerard Salton of SMART. I had to go elsewhere than where they were!
  5. ^ Vannevar Bush (1945), "As We May Think," Atlantic Monthly (July), pp. 101-108.
  6. ^ Norbert Wiener's (1948) response to Vannevar Bush's (1945) simplist mechanization.

    As in the case of the individual, not all the information which is available to the race at one time is accessible without special effort. There is a well-known tendency of libraries to become clogged by their own volume; of the sciences to develop such a degree of specialization that the expert is often illiterate outside his own minute specialty. Dr. Vannevar Bush has suggested the use of mechanical aids for the searching through vast bodies of material. These probably have their uses, but they are limited by the impossibility of classifying a book under an unfamiliar heading unless some particular person has already recognized the relevance of that heading for that particular book. In the case where two subjects have the same technique and intellectual content but belong to widely separated fields, this still requires some individual with an almost Leibnizian catholicity of interest.

    — Norbert Wiener (1948). Cybernetics (Chaper VIII. Information, Language, and Society. p. 158)
  7. ^ Three Similar & Different Threads of Questioning
    Blair (2002)*1
    "explicit
    questions"     		Bates (1999)*2
    "Big
    Questions"     		Park (1975)*3
    "fundamental
    questions"
    "One: What is 'knowledge'?" "The physical question: What are the features and laws of the recorded-information universe?" WHAT: "What is scientific information?"
    Resolution of WHAT (1975)
    "What we should do ... is to give up the idea of ultimate sources of knowledge, and admit that all knowledge is human; that it is mixed with our errors, our prejudices, our dreams, and our hopes; that all we can do is to grope for truth even though it be beyond our reach." -- KR Popper (1963) Conjectures and Refutations
    "Two: Why are people [...] thinking about Knowledge Management?" "The social question: How do people relate to, seek, and use information?" WHY: "Why should scientific information be organized?"
    Resolution of WHY (1975)
    "Each one knows that his work depends on that of his predecessors and colleagues, and that it can only reach its fruition through the work of his successors." -- JD Bernal (1939) The Social Function of Science
    "Three: What are the enabling technologies for Knowledge Management?" "The design question: How can access to recorded information be made most rapid and effective?" HOW: "How can scientific information be organized?"
    Resolution of HOW (1975)
    "The modern World Encyclopaedia should consist of relations, extracts, quotations, very carefully assembled with the approval of outstanding authorities in each subject, carefully collated and edited and critically presented." -- HG Wells (1938) World Brain
    (All boldtypes are not original.)
    Note that Park's (1975) resolutions of the three separate questions commonly center around science in and for society, implicitly if not explicitly.

    [*1] David Blair (2002), "Knowledge Management: Hype, Hope, or Help?" Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, vol. 53, no. 12, pp. 1019-1028. Abstract

    [*2] Marcia Bates (1999), "The Invisible Substrate of Information Science," Journal of the American Society for Information Science, vol.50, no.12, pp. 1043-1050. Text

    [*3] Kyung-Youn Park (1975), A Direct Approach to Information Retrieval

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