"We Don't Need A Philosophy of Library and Information Science: We're Confused Enough" Zwadlo

We Don't Need a Philosophy of Library and Information Science: We're Confused Enough
Already
Author(s): Jim Zwadlo
Source: The Library Quarterly, Vol. 67, No. 2 (Apr., 1997), pp. 103-121
Published by: The University of Chicago Press
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THE LIBRARY QUARTERLY
Volume67 APRIL 1997 Number2
WE DON'T NEED A PHILOSOPHYOF LIBRARYAND

INFORMATIONSCIENCE- WE'RECONFUSED
ENOUGH ALREADY1
Jim Zwadlo2
Is there a philosophyof libraryand informationscience?The thesis pre-

sentedhere is that there is not, and we do not need one. Thatis, we do not
need, nor do we have, one single philosophy,to either fill a philosophical
vacuum,or to replacean existingphilosophy.Instead,we need to find a way
to manage a confusion, a "fused together" mass of many contradictory
ideas, in order to do useful things,and to be helpful to our patrons.This
searchamountsto a philosophicaldiscussionaboutwhylibrariansand infor-
mation scientistsdo not need a philosophy.The discussionshowshow to
handlethis kind of contradictionand showsthatfor librariansand informa-
tion scientists,a "con-fusion"of ideas is worth seeking, rather than re-
solving.
Sometimes,in doing philosophy,onejust wantsto utteran inar-

ticulatesound. (Wittgenstein)
This article is about the missing philosophy of libraryand information
science (LIS). It is also about why so few librariansseem to miss it. The
assertion that LIS lacks a philosophy, offered here as a thesis, is only
the first step; it leads to the more interesting question of whether we
even need a philosophy of LIS. After all, if we, as librariansand infor-
mation scientists, have anything in common, it ought to be a philoso-
1. Commentsand encouragementfrom Peter Liebschermade this article possible. Peter

Liebscheris associateprofessor,PalmerSchool of Libraryand InformationScience,Long
IslandUniversity.
2. Director,LibertyPublicLibrary,North MainStreet,Liberty,New York12754.
[Library vol. 67, no. 2, pp. 103-121]

Quarterly,
1997 by The Universityof Chicago.All rightsreserved.
0024-2519/97/6702-0001$01.00
103

104 THE LIBRARYQUARTERLY
phy, at least. Yet, we seem not to agree on which one we follow now,
assuming we even have one, or which philosophy to choose to replace
it. With this in mind, "confusion" is offered next, as a term of conve-
nience, to describe this state of affairs.That is, if we all have confusion
in common, perhaps we can make a philosophy out of that. Ratherthan
a pejorativeterm, however, confusion is offered here as a description of
a state of affairsworth continuing, to create and maintain, not to re-
solve or eliminate. It provides a theme around which to organize the
many variations of what goes on in our libraries and in our thoughts,
and which can be useful to us and our patrons.
Perhaps one reason why many librarians do not miss a philosophy
of LIS is that writers on libraryand information science rarely discuss
philosophy. This article is not intended as a full surveyof the past dis-
cussions on the philosophy of LIS,but it is interesting to note in passing
that back in 1934, J. Periam Danton surveyed publications aimed at
librarians, and found that only 1 percent to 5 percent of them con-
tained any discussion of the topic [1] . A cursoryreview of more recent
publications suggests that this statistic is still accurate today. Profes-
sional philosophers apparently never discuss libraryscience.
In 1976, H. CurtisWrightfound so many similaritiesbetween librari-
anship and philosophy, that he made the startlingsuggestion that they
may be identical: "Whereas librarianshipcan be studied scientifically
as an existential object, or as a social phenomenon, its nature can best
be studied, perhaps, as an integral part of the larger studyof the nature
of man which contains it. This is essentially the philosophical study
of human information processes, not the scientific study of data. The
natures of man and information are probably the same thing, just as
librarianship and philosophy may turn out to be, not merely similar,
but identical" [2, p. 302].
Wright presented some evocative similarities between librarianship
and philosophy: "Both are concerned with how the human mind oper-
ates rather than the sense data of experience." "Librariansare the
philosophers of research, not the researchers." "Information can be
studied critically,but no one, not even the scientist, can study it scien-
tifically" [3, p. 256].
In 1979, Wright also compared librarianshipand science:
Librarianshipand science are antithetical as knowledge systemsbecause the
substance of the former is instrumental to the latter and vice versa. . . .
1. The objectof studyin science is matter; in librarianshipit is form.
2. The methodof studyis empirical in science; in librarianshipit is rational.
3. The objectof mastery
is the physicsof experience in science; in librarianship
it is the metaphysics of thoughts.
4. The meansof masteryis formal in science; in librarianshipit is material.
[4, p. 67]

A PHILOSOPHYFOR LIS 105
A welcome revivalof the debate on whether librariansare scientists,

philosophers, or something else has occurred in several recent articles
byJohn M. Budd [5], GaryP. Radford [6], and Archie L. Dick [7]. In
these articles, the writersbelieve LIS has (or at least had) a philosophy,
and that it is the wrong one: positivism. Positivism, they say, was the
past philosophy of LIS (borrowed from the natural sciences) , that it
has been kept too long, and is overdue for replacement by a new philos-
ophy. The three writers each propose a different replacement, and all
together convey the idea that for LIS, obtaining a philosophy is some-
thing like borrowing a book from our libraries. But like the borrowed
books, the borrowed philosophies do not really belong to us, always
seem to need to be renewed, and we end up returning them, only to
borrow others.
The first question is not necessarilywhich philosophy should replace
positivism,but whether positivismever reallywas the philosophy of LIS.
This articlewill show that even if positivismwere the philosophy of LIS,
it was not really followed, and was not an appropriate one to follow.
Another question that takes precedence is whether it is a good idea
for one philosophy to replace another at all. This question is discussed
below, but for the moment, consider that the process of replacement,
or substitution, as with movie stars'spouses, can undermine legitimacy
by invoking it too often.
Confusion
As the key part of the discussion of whether LIS ever had its own philos-
ophy, and the further discussion of whether librarians can or should
agree on adopting one, this article will present a case for the state of
confusion as characteristic of the past, present, and, it is hoped, the
future of LIS.
"Con-fusion," the "fusing together" of ideas, is a creative act of the
mind. Librarianscan be more creative in their thinking, and be more
helpful to their patrons, by understanding and using confusion as a
way to guide the search for knowledge. Being confused is a stimulant
to seek knowledge, but the discoveryof knowledge is alwayscontingent
on a constantly changing set of specific problems, in a specific time
and place. So the search for knowledge does not necessarily require
that the search be for an ultimate truth. One may seek to reduce confu-
sion, but it may be just as useful to encourage and maintain it. The
effort to make confusion useful is practical;a way to get useful things
done. In other words, we do not need a philosophy to do librarywork,
we are confused enough already.

As mentioned above, some recent articles claim that LIS needs a

new philosophy. They agree, in general, that positivismis (or was) our
philosophy, adopted by LIS (and the social sciences, in general) from
the natural sciences. Perhaps "imposed" is a more accurate term than
"adopted"; these writersfind positivism to be a monolithic, reductive,
power philosophy of science that governs library thought and work
"whether or not it is realized or accepted" [5, p. 295]. Their critiques
of positivism aim, first, to make practitioners of LIS more aware that
positivismis lurking, latent, implicit, and taken for granted in LIS,and,
second, to show that alternatives to positivism exist. They all achieve
these two important goals in their writings, and do so clearly and well.
The next step in their strategy is to propose alternative philosophies
to replace positivism.
However, this article begins by questioning these writers' assertion
that positivismis the philosophy of LIS, an idea alreadyimplied in their
description of positivism as latent or implicit in LIS, rather than ex-
plicit. The advantageof beginning without the assertion that positivism
is the philosophy of LISis that it obviatesthe need to specify an alterna-
tive to positivism. This idea leads to the further proposal that the re-
placement of one philosophy by another (essentiallythe same thing as
seeking alternativephilosophies) is not a useful strategyfor LIS,mainly
because it turns out that there is no logical way to choose between
or among the competing alternativephilosophies. The absence of this
logical means to choose also suggests the possibility that there is no
philosophy of LIS. That is, logically, because the empty or null set is
a member of the set of all sets; therefore, a list of all alternativephiloso-
phies must include "no philosophy" as a member.
Even if it were accepted or assumed that positivism is the explicit
or implicit philosophy of LIS, the above-mentioned writers'attackson
positivism are revealing; they illustrate the irony of seeking power to
resist power. After all, during the past thirtyyears, many philosophers
of science have mounted their own attacks on positivism, some quite
extreme. Paul Feyerabendis an example; at one point, he described the
philosophy of science as properly promoting "anarchy," and that the
best methodology is "anything goes" [8, p. 23]. The irony is that by
attacking positivism, especially now, the philosophers of LIS continue
to follow the thinking of the philosophers of science. Their attackslead
them, as will be shown below, back into positivism, not awayfrom it.
Perhaps it would be more accurate (and useful) for us to see positiv-
ism as protean rather than monolithic. Ever since the concept was de-
scribed by Auguste Comte,3positivismwas (and remains) a useful phi-
3. The term "positivism,"in the sense used by Comte,was first used by Henri, Comte de
Saint-Simon,to whom Comtewas secretary,around 1817. However,Comte did coin the
term "sociology"(sodologie)
as a replacementfor the then currentterm, "socialphysics"

losophy. But during the past two centuries, the definition of positivism
has been modified, debated, and alternatives to it have been sought.
For example, Gertrude Lenzer, in her introduction to the writings of
Comte, said that there is a "strong resistance to being classed as a 'posi-
tivist,' which was as clearly the case over a hundred years ago as it is
now" [9, p. xxxvi]. Even a cursorysummaryof the history of positivism
shows that there is no such thing as "generic" positivism [5, p. 296].
In the late 1970s, Richard Rorty showed that there is no positivist
method for deciding between competing epistemological theories
[10] . He concluded that, if we have no wayto choose between theories,
we cannot choose at all, and so we cannot have any one theory at all.
If no theory of knowledge can tell us, a priori, that it is better than a
competing one, then we must live without such certainty,and live with-
out a theory that claims the special privilege of telling us what is true.
However, when positivism in one form did not serve well, scientists
and philosophers proposed changes. The driving principle was to dis-
cover methods of research that were useful, that got results. The scien-
tific method, cycling through hypothesis, experiment, evaluation, and
new hypothesis, evolved, driven by the method's apparent success in
finding useful things, things that worked.
The point is that those who would attack positivism as a philosophy
should realize that positivismhas alwaysbeen under attack.It has never
been accepted for long in any one form, and is continually adapting
to its critics. Even two of the writers on the philosophy of LIS men-
tioned above, Budd and Radford, acknowledge positivism's adaptabil-
ity. Quoting Harris,Budd implies that positivismis a fetish, and blinds
us to alternatives,but, later in his article, admits that "positivismis not
a single, monolithic, school of thought," that "[we now practice] . . .
a crude version [of positivism] that almost eschews the philosophical
foundation," and finally that "it would be foolish to believe that all
involved in ... LIS ... are positivists" [5, pp. 295-96, 299-300]. Rad-
ford, echoing these remarks (and those of Lenzer, mentioned above),
says:"veryfew modern scientists ever would call themselves positivists"
[6, p. 411].
Their remarks seem to contradict their previous claim that we, as
librarians, are positivists. But we need to remember that the great
strength of positivism is its protean ability to adapt to criticism. Like
the plasmodium (the agent of malaria), positivism has infiltrated the
body of science, causing periodic bouts of fever and chills. When at-
tacked, like plasmodium, positivismresponds by adapting, disguises it-
self in a new form, and exists in peace for awhile, until it again overdoes
(physiquesodak) . (This information is taken from TheEncyclopediaofPhilosophy,1972 edition,

under headingsfor "Comte"and for "Positivism.")

it in some wayand provokes another cycle of fever, chills, and attempts

to eradicate it. Here again, Budd seems to sense this point, referring
to how "it was by subtlety and insinuation that positivism became an
operational epistemology" [5, p. 304] , but he does not go on to realize
that positivism is an adaptation to criticism or to the further realization
that positivismcan be seen as perpetuating itself by attractingcriticism,
so that attacking positivism actually is a positivist thing to do.4
Another problem appears in light of Rorty'swork mentioned above;
that, as Thomas Kuhn put it, there is no "algorithm of choice" for
deciding which of several competing epistemological theories is true
[11, p. 326].
With these two problems, it seems we are doubly stuck. If we claim
positivismwas or is the philosophy of LIS,we cannot criticize it without
becoming practitioners of it, and we have no method for deciding
which philosophy (or epistemology, if you prefer) to substitute for it,
even without criticizing it. We cannot criticize or attack positivism, re-
place it, ignore it, and it will not just go away.
But is there anything wrong with just going on faith, and accepting
positivism, in some form, as the best choice of philosophy for LIS?Let
us try this strategy, and ask whether accepting positivism under those
terms would then be useful to us. And let us ask the question regarding
usefulness, not as a criticism of positivism (to avoid being preempted
in our choice of it) , but only in order to describe it.
For the natural sciences, choosing positivism on faith seems to have
been and continues to be a rewarding choice; positivism, through its
many transformations,seems to have been and continues to be useful.
But for LIS, the answer is not so clearly positive.
If we askwhether positivismis or can be useful to LIS,we can answer
with more specific questions: What are the hypotheses of LIS?What
experiments have been, or can be performed? What results have been
obtained, or can be expected?
Remember, because these questions are intended to describe positiv-
ism, not to attack it, these questions do not need to be answered. They
are only examples of the kinds of questions we would ask if we were
positivists.
4. Budd refersto PaulTibbets'seight claimsof positivismas "applicableto a generic mode
of thought."But considereven a cursoryhistoryof positivism:it has changedconstantly.
Comte'spositivism,derivedfrom the systematicscienceof FrancisBacon,wasmodifiedby
J. S. Millto makeit less dogmatic.ErnstMachand Avenariusinventedtheirownversions,
which led to logical positivism,a reaction to Hegelian idealism,which others modified
again to make its moral and ethical position more acceptable.Later,in responseto the
problemof definingmeaning,KarlPoppermadedrasticchangesto positivism.Itwasmodi-
fied, in turn,by the workof KurtGodel and studiesof the historyof scientifictheoriesby
Kuhn,Polanyi,and manyothers.

The next question is to ask if these are the kinds of questions that
librariansand information scientists need to ask. If librariansand infor-
mation scientists ask positivistquestions, so be it; we become positivists.
But what if we ask different questions, such as:Whyshould we, as librar-
ians and information scientists, ask positivist questions? What other
questions would be more useful for us to ask?Why do we need a philos-
ophy at all? What will, or should, a philosophy do for us?
In regard to the last two questions, of course, making a statement
that we do not need a philosophy seems itself like philosophizing, and
seems to contradict itself. However, this type of contradiction is easy
to point out, whenever statements that are made about doing some-
thing else are then applied to the act of making those statements.
For example, Thomas Kuhn's famous notion of "paradigmshifts," if
accepted by the "community" (his word), would then contradict itself.
After all, if everyone believed that paradigm shifts really happen, that
belief would become the new paradigm, and would, itself, have
to shift in order for a paradigm shift to occur. In other words, paradigm
shifts would have to stop happening in order to continue happen-
ing.
However, this process of "meta-ing," leading to strange contradic-
tions, can actuallybe quite useful. It can provide us with a wayto handle
contradictions, so that we can be clear about confusion.
Vaihinger's Philosophy of "As If"
So, in order to hold the philosophy that we do not need a philosophy,

we need some method of handling contradictions. A useful source of
ideas to develop such a method is Hans Vaihinger's philosophy of "as
if" [12].
Vaihinger (1852-1933) began with a basic question: Why do we have
thoughts at all? He answered that thought is an organic part of our
relation to the world. We have thoughts because they help us to "deal
with things"; they are "an instrument for finding our way about more
easily in this world." It turns out that something apparently so simple
as finding our way about requires "ingenious operations," the inven-
tion of "brilliantexpedients," and the introduction of "highly compli-
cated processes" [12, pp. 5-6, 15].
The brilliant expedient that Vaihinger invented is the concept of
"fictions." Fictions are conscious errors. We make them deliberately
and knowinglybecause they prove useful to us. The words "as if" are
the external sign of a fiction. When we say "as if," we are constructing

a fiction. The construction of contradictions is an example of an appli-

cation of the method of fictions.
Vaihinger discovered fictions everywhere:for example, in poetry,
metaphors and symbols are fictions; in law, the presumption of free-
dom is a fiction; in mathematics, the concept of "limit" in calculus,
and imaginarynumbers are fictions; in statistics,the "average" man is
a fiction; in ethics, the social contract is a fiction [12, pp. 19-53].
An important point for our purposes is Vaihinger's claim that fic-
tions are used in the same way in the social sciences, in the arts, and
in mathematics. That is, he gathered these disciplines into one group,
and separated them as a group from the natural sciences. The social
sciences, the arts, and mathematicsall use the method of fictions, while
the natural sciences use the method of hypotheses. This point is
valuable to us because it raises the possibility of viewing LIS (usually
classified among the social sciences) as not needing to follow the
methods of the natural sciences, but, instead, to follow different, more
appropriatemethods, more similarto those used in the artsand mathe-
matics.
Vaihinger proposed fictions as a third member of the systemof logic.
He included the method of fictions as a logical device along with de-
duction and induction. In the past, he claimed, fictions were mistakenly
treated as hypotheses (which use induction) . Here is how they differ:
A hypothesis "is directed towardreality ... it submits reality to the test
and demands verification[Vaihinger'sitalics], i.e., it wants to be proved
true . . . and an expression of reality" [12, pp. 85-90].
A fiction, on the other hand, instead of verification, demandsjustifi-
cation. A fiction "is an assumption made in the full realization of the
impossibilityof the thing assumed, but the assumption is made in the
expectation that the fiction will be useful, or expedient" [12, pp. 85-
90] . Fictions help us to invent, while hypotheses help us to verify.
Deduction, the third member of the system of logic, uses axioms.
Vaihinger thought that axioms, which he defined rather generally as
"expressions about reality,"have also been mistakenfor fictions, which
are not expressions about reality and do not claim to be.
Here is Vaihinger's summary of these definitions: "Induction is a
methodology of the descriptive sciences; fiction, a method of the exact
mathematical and the ethico-political sciences. . . . We should not be
able to get very far in the natural sciences by means of fictions [where]
only hypotheses may be used. On the other hand, the fiction is all the
more necessaryfor the other sciences, where it is not possible to make
any progress with deduction and induction alone" [12, p. 79].
Vaihinger's remarksparallel and amplifythe second and third points
made by Wright comparing librarianshipand science, quoted earlier:

2. The method ofstudyis empiricalin science;in librarianship it is rational.

3. The object
ofmastery is the physicsof experiencein science;in librarianship
it is the metaphysicsof thoughts.[4]
To illustratethe differences among hypotheses, axioms, and fictions,
here is an example of a fiction from mathematics:, the imaginarynum-
ber. As Vaihinger described it, , or V- 1, uses an unjustified extension
to a case where the definitions of the terms render the result meaning-
less. The extension is not an axiom, because it violates existing axioms,
and it is not a hypothesis, because there is no way to verify it. It is a
fiction, and mathematicians agree, it was invented for a specific use,
though known to be impossible. Mathematicsmade real progress using
imaginarynumbers, which permit all solutions to quadraticequations,
and are useful in handling vectors, tensors, and differential geometry,
with innumerable applications in engineering. "Of course, this object
... has nothing to do with the concept of a number as a means of
counting.It is purely a symbol,. . . and its value will depend entirely on
whether by this introduction a really useful and workable extension of
the number system can be effected" [13, p. 89].
Thus imaginarynumbers fulfill the definition of a fiction: known to
be impossible, but justified because they are useful.
George Boole said the reason we can use ideas such as is because
"it may be observed in everybranch of analysisthe formal laws of com-
bination of the symbolsare of wider extent than the laws of their inter-
pretation. In strict obedience to those laws we can pass from an inter-
pretable to an uninterpretable result, and again from this to an
interpretable result" [14, p. 165].
Robert Osserman's description amplifies these remarks:
The notion of an imaginarynumber- one whosesquareis a negativenum-
ber- followeda similarpatternof initialrejectionand gradualacceptance.
The problemwasthatthe ordinaryrulesof arithmetictell us thatthe product
of twopositivenumbersis positiveand the productof twonegativenumbers
is alsopositive.Asa result,anynumbermultipliedbyitselfproducesa positive
number(or zero, if the originalnumberis zero), nevera negativenumber,
such as -1. However,it turnedout to be convenientto act as if therewerea
numberwhosesquarewas - 1.... The introductionof such a new speciesof
"number"wasbothan imaginativeanda riskyact,sincetherewasthe possibil-
itythatthe use of imaginarynumberscouldbecomemoreandmorecommon-
place, and only much laterlead to a seriouscontradiction,in whichcase all
previousworkwouldhaveto be discarded.However,by the nineteenthcen-
tury,whennumbersystemswereexaminedmuchmoreclosely,it becameclear
that "imaginarynumbers"were no more or less "real"than the standard
"realnumbers."[15, p. 62]
Note Osserman's use of "as if (his italics), and that he describes
the possibilitythat a contradiction may occur later (although it is more

accurate to say that the contradiction has alreadyoccurred in the defi-

nition of imaginary numbers in the first place) . Vaihinger describes
the inherentand deliberate contradiction in the definition of imaginary
*
numbers, and goes on to explain, in 'Antithetic Error" (pp. 109-24),
why the contradictions
'
do not cause problems later (they are corrected
through a second 'antithetic" use of fictions).
An example of a fiction in LIS is the classificationsystem.Vaihinger
described all classificationsystemsas "half-fictions,"because they con-
tradict reality, but not as self-contradictory.He used examples from
the sciences, such as botanical classification,but his reasoning applies
equally to libraryclassification systemssuch as the Libraryof Congress
Classification(LCC). LCCfrequently contradictsrealitywhen new phe-
nomena arrive for classification. The cataloger must choose either to
create a new category,which leads to a proliferation of new categories,
or to fit the phenomena into an existing category, which creates an
interaction with the contents of the categorythat redefines the category
itself. In either case, contradictions occur. We need to decide whether
the contradictions are false, or the hypothesis is false- that is, whether
the contradictions are useful, and a necessarypart of any classification
system, or whether we need to change, even abandon, the LCCclassifi-
cation system. When seen as a fiction, however, LCC is understood as
a provisional, artificial, temporary organization of certain selected
characteristicsof phenomena, constructed in the full knowledge that
they contradict reality. Its fictional character means that we do not
need to resolve the contradictions within LCC, because we know that
they will occur in any alternative scheme. It is in the nature of fictions
to contain contradictions (in this case, only of reality, because these
schemes are only half-fictions). We can use the classification schemes
without resolving their contradictions.The purpose of the classification
scheme is to be useful, not consistent.
An example in LIS of a full fiction, a pure fiction, that not only con-
tradicts reality but is self-contradictoryas well, is the reference inter-
view. The interaction between librarian, patron, and libraryhas been
studied extensively [16, 17].
There is no question that the reference interview is useful, but it
contains contradictions that fit Vaihinger'sdefinition of fictions. It con-
tradictsrealityby presuming that one person can objectivelydetermine
the thoughts of another. Subjectivejudgments, such as whether the
librarian "looked exasperated," "didn't seem interested/didn't
smile/didn't look at me" are cited as important to the success of the
reference interview [18, p. 218].
The concept of the reference interviewis also self-contradictory.One
researcher described the patron at the beginning of the interview as

in an ''anomalous state of knowledge," a self-contradictory term

("anomalous" is defined by "contradiction"); it means that the patron
(and perhaps the librarian, as well) must contradict herself during a
successful reference interview [19-21].
As these examples demonstrate, librariansare alreadyusing fictions.
Accepting the implications of doing so obviates the need to develop
hypotheses that require proof; fictions only require justification, not
verification. Rather than to hypothesize about the reference interview
and to seek proof of what is unprovable, we need only to justify it, to
show that the reference interviewworks, that it is useful.
Some major problems of research in the social sciences, such as self-
reported data, external and internal validity, and uncontrolled vari-
ables, result from using hypotheses where they do not belong. The
value of fictions is their usefulness: "As soon as a fiction is regarded
apart from . . . the purpose it fulfills, then it is a husk without content
. . . fictions possess validity only in relation to reality;without it they
are dead . . . fictions possess value in their relation to a purpose" [12,
p. 123].
The deliberate construction of fictions, which contradict reality and
themselves, can become a means of solving problems. Rather than re-
solving contradictions, we construct contradictions to help us to solve
specific problems.
For example, Douglas Lenat discovered, in his cyclopedia (CYC)
project (an attempt to program artificialintelligence) , that the knowl-
edge base had to be modified to incorporate internal contradictions.
After the programgrew to "contain more than 10,000 rules- 1 percent
of CYC's [ultimate] size- it became difficult to add new knowledge
without interfering with something already present. . . . Fictional con-
texts . . . allow CYCto understand metaphors and use analogies to solve
problems" [22, p. 82].
Fictions act like catalysts in chemical reactions; they provide the
means for a process to go forward,but they drop out of the result. Like
catalysts,fictions can be added to a thought process, make it work bet-
ter, and then disappear from the result.
Vaihinger's "Lawof Ideational Shifts" explains why we try to resolve
contradictions rather than accept that they exist and make use of them.
In his article, Vaihinger describes the mental tension required to sup-
port new, different, or unverified ideas. "Dogmas" are ideas about
which we have no doubt, that we regard as expressions of reality.
"Hypotheses" are ideas about which we have doubts as to their objec-
tive validity.Hypotheses are harder to accept than dogmas; mental ef-
fort is required to keep them from slipping into dogmas. "Fictions"
are the hardest to accept because we are "asked to assume something

that we are convinced is not the case at all." The easiest way to resolve
psychological tension is to give the concept "subjectivevalidityonly . . .
to recognize it as a dogma." The "as if" becomes a "because" in the
case of the shift from fiction to dogma. In the shift from fiction to
hypothesis, the "as if" becomes "if." These ideational shifts can go in
either direction, and depend only on the momentary and relative abil-
ity of the mind to sustain the discomfort of uncertainty and tension
[12, pp. 124-34].
Thomas Ruhn echoes Vaihinger's ideational shifts in TheStructureof
ScientificRevolutions,where he describes how theoretical frameworks
replace one another in unexpected ways.However,Vaihinger proposes
an organic psychological need to resolve the discomfort of maintaining
uncertainty;Kuhn does not attempt the psychological explanation [12,
pp. xxxix ff.].
The concept of fictions shows one way confusion is useful. Rather
than mechanicallyimitating the methods of the naturalsciences in LIS,
we can try to sustain the mental tension needed to invent fictions, to
deliberately blend together identities and distinctions, not to solve
problems, but to dissolve them.
Thomas Mann's LibraryResearchModels
Thomas Mann does not mention fictions explicitly in his LibraryRe-

searchModels,but the concept corresponds with his ideas. His "Princi-
ple of Least Effort" describes how most patrons use the library:"Peo-
ple tend to choose perceived ease of access over quality of content in
selecting an information source; . . . regardlessof whetherit is leading them
to the best sources" [23, p. 93].
However, this behavior is not something to change in the patron;
the patron's behavior is a given. The concept of "the patron," as some-
one who follows the "Principle of Least Effort," is a fiction in Vaihing-
er's sense. It contradicts reality,and is self-contradictoryas well. It con-
tradicts the reality of the library because, by using only a portion of
the library'scontents, the patron truncates the library,makes it seem
smaller, more limited, than it reallyis. The concept is self-contradictory
because the patron's need for information is, in Mann's word, "satis-
fied" by only those sources that come most easily to hand, not by infor-
mation selected from a search of all the available sources of informa-
tion.
Combining these contradictions with the second part of Vaihinger's
definition of a fiction, that it is constructed for a purpose, conforms
with Mann's suggestion that librarians should use the "Principle of

Least Effort" to help design librarysystems,rather than try to change

the contradictorybehavior of the patrons. Systems designers who say
the patrons are lazy, that patrons are the problem, are really saying "it
is acceptable . . . for the problem to remain unsolved as long as the
blame can be shifted" [23, p. 98]. By disregarding the problem in this
way, designers themselves illustrate the "Principle of Least Effort."
The combination of these two fictions, classificationsystemsand the
"Principle of Least Effort," in effect, defines libraries. The librarians
use the former, and the patron the latter, to form a complete system,
a cyclical process, in which a demand from the patron pushes the li-
braryto modify itself, and then incorporate that input for possible use
by another patron. Rather than the cycle of hypothesis-experiment-
evaluation in the natural sciences, which requires proof, this cycle of
fictions needs only to be justified in that it is useful to the patrons.
Mann's ideas for redesigning library systems turn the conventional
perception of library structure inside out. His diagrams showing the
alternative structures appear in his book LibraryResearchModels.One
diagram represents the existing system, in which the patron is sur-
rounded by the division of libraryresources by subject.The patron is in
the center of a circle of windows that look out on the various academic
disciplines. In this design, the patron chooses a subject and then nar-
rows the search without seeing the other subjects [23, p. 171].
Mann's second illustrationreversesthis arrangement, and places the
academic disciplines inside the circle. The patron looks in through
windows, the methods of searching, instead of divisions by subject, to
see not only all the subjects at once, but also their relationship to each
other [23, p. 172]. The different methods of searching overlap. This
model keeps the "Principle of Least Effort" off balance. The librarian
can present search methods to the patron as unskewed choices. If the
patron favors one search method, the librarian may persuade the pa-
tron to try alternativesby presenting them as equivalents, as an incen-
tive to try new methods.
Figure 1 proposes a modification of Mann's ideas. Why not place the
patron together with the librarianin the center, facing out toward the
search-methodwindows?Imagine the subjectsas intermingling and ex-
tending to infinity beyond the windows of search methods. Call this
the patron-centric model, which corresponds to the way the universe
appears to an observer on the Earth. It is a fiction, because, like the
geocentric universe of Ptolemy, it contains contradictions: We know
that we are not the center of the system, but how do we know it? After
all, it certainly looks like everything is centered around us. It is only
from space that we can directly see that the Earth is not the center of
any system.

116 THE LIBRARY QUARTERLY
Fig. 1.- The patron-centricmodel
When Ludwig Wittgenstein asked, "Why do people say that it was

natural to think that the sun went round the earth rather than that the
earth turned on its axis?"his companion replied, "I suppose because it
looked as if the sun went round the earth." Wittgenstein then asked,
"Yes,but what would it have looked like if it had lookedas if the earth
turned on its axis?" [24, p. 295].
We can construct the patron-centric library universe as a fiction,
knowing that it is not reality,but that it is useful, both to librariansand
patrons. What would the librarylook like if it were patron-centric?
Philosophy and Power

"Education is paradoxical in that it is largely composed of things that
cannot be learned. . . . Napoleon wanted to be surrounded by it, be-
cause he knew that nothing exists without it; but he wanted it to be
present in a singleperson,on whom, at the right moment, it would be
easy to concentrate his own hatred. To Napoleon, Talleyrandwas edu-
cation" [25, p. 48].
The quotation above is preceded by a story of Napoleon's treatment
of the philosopher Emmanuel-JosephSieyes,who briefly shared power
with Napoleon. After Napoleon's complete takeover, he taunted
Sieyes- "Well, Monsieur Sieyes, how's the metaphysicsgoing What

do the philosophers say about all this, Monsieur Sieyes?"As Friedrich

von Gentz reports the story, "these gibes about metaphysics . . . were
one of the finest pleasures that power afforded Napoleon" [25, pp. 44,
362].
Substitutethe word "change" for "Napoleon" in these stories, and it
forms a metaphor for the current situation in the library;in this sense,
change has outrun philosophy, the way Napoleon outran the philoso-
phers. Napoleon's taunting of Sieyes was a source of pleasure, because
he knew that his power was simply inexplicable, beyond Sieyes'sphilos-
ophy to explain. Napoleon was "the historicalincarnation of the princi-
ple of will, of the grand illusion that everythingcan be established from
zero" [25, p. 45]. Napoleon put a big dent in the philosophy of his
time, and it has carried through to ours, not least because that "grand
illusion" is still believed.
Talleyrand is the opposite pole from Napoleon, someone who
"understood that the unprecedented history of which he was a part
contained a mechanism that acted on its own. Talleyrand camou-
flaged himself in it, content to tighten or loosen a screw here and
there . . . , little 'finishing touches,' which he recognized as the only
action still possible."
Talleyrand "put his signature to events, he did not create them."
But that signature,which indeed was a tiny "finishing touch," had "no
less weight than other, far more influential enterprises, if we look at
the haziness of events from a certain distance" [25, pp. 45-46].
Talleyrandis a metaphor for librarians,when they face inexplicable
change, such as Napoleon, or whatever brings philosophers up short.
Where philosophers failed, Talleyrand, through his education, still
managed to influence the course of events.
The point of this rather long metaphor is to suggest that for librari-
ans, adopting a philosophy is something like Talleyrand confronting
Napoleon. It can be seen as the opposition of education and power.
To illustratethis point, let us consider the proposals for philosophies
of LIS made by Budd, Radford, and Dick, cited earlier. They propose,
respectively,a new philosophy based on phenomenology, the work of
Michel Foucault, or a combination of approaches united by opposition
to positivism.Their proposals imply that a power struggle is the way to
choose philosophies, with a new philosophy adopted through a kind
of cultural coup, whereby the winner takes on "the role of cultural
overseer . . . who knows what everybody else is really doing whether
theyknow it or not" [10, p. 317] (and see Budd, cited in [6] above).
However, Edmund Husserl, the founder of phenomenology, resem-
bles Budd's nemesis, the positivist Comte, in that both Husserl and
Comte had a messianic impulse and founded what amounted to reli-

gions. They both had disciples whom they denounced as heretics when
they made changes to the founder's ideas (even though both Comte
and Husserl themselves continually revised their own ideas). "Driven
by the need to find something to be apodictic about . . . Husserl discov-
ered 'essences/ the 'purelyformal' aspects of the world. . . . The discov-
ery of these privileged representations began once again a quest for
seriousness, purity, and rigor, a quest which lasted some forty years.
But, in the end, heretical followers of Husserl (Sartre and Heidegger)
. . . raised the same sorts of questions about the possibilityof apodictic
truth which Hegel had raised about Kant. Phenomenology gradually
became transformed into what Husserl despairingly called 'mere an-
"
thropology' [10, pp. 166-67].
Husserl and Comte both wanted to startphilosophy over, from zero,
from themselves, through an act of intellectual will, just as Napoleon
startedfrom zero. And, like Napoleon, they struggled to establish their
legitimacy, to convince others that they personally and alone had the
authorityto startphilosophy all over again, and to claim their own ideas
for the zero point; a power play.
Similarly, Radford promotes Foucault's analysis of power as the
source of a new philosophy for the library.Although Foucault wrote
an essay about libraries [26] , it is difficult to see what his philosophy
can do for librariansand libraries.EdwardSaid showed that Foucault's
philosophy was an analysisof power, not libraries:
You think about power (1) to imagine what you could do if you had power;
(2) to speculate about what you would imagine if you had power; (3) to arrive
at some assessmentof what power you would need in order to vanquishpresent
power, and instate a new order or power; (4) to postulate a range of things
that cannot be imagined or commanded by any form of power that exists at
present. It seems to me that Foucault was mainly attracted to the first and
second possibilities, that is, to thinking about power from the standpoint of
its actual realization, not of opposition to it. [27, pp. 149-55]
This translatesinto the paradox that Foucault's imagination of power was,

by his analysisof power, to reveal its injustice and cruelty, but by his theoriza-
tion, to let it go on more or less unchecked. [27, p. 152]
Perhaps Budd and Radford see the confusion of LIS as a power vac-
uum, and therefore as an opportunity to take power. They propose
new philosophies that would justify the seizure of power, although it
seems doubtful that the libraryhas the kind of power that is seizeable.
However, if they can find it, as the sayinggoes, "more power to them."
However, when Foucault wrote about the limitations imposed by his-
tory, language, and writing, he merely expressed the frustrationhe ex-

perienced in trying to establish those limitations. He failed completely

to end discourse about discourse, as we can expect anyone else to fail
when they try to limit thought.
Finally, Dick also presents the confusion of the library as an arena
of competing theories. He suggests that the "alternative approaches
are united mainly in their identification of a common enemy, positiv-
ism" [7, p. 230]. However, it is more accurate to say that what unites
these competing theories is the mistaken notion that positivism is the
common enemy. The real enemy of thought is the idea that we should
settle conflicts among theories by choosing only one of them. Faced
with competing theories, our role as librariansis to endure confusion,
welcome it, work with it, not to shift from one limited and limiting
philosophy to another. As Rortyexpressed it, we should seek compati-
bility among incommensurables [10, pp. 315 ft.]. Rorty described the
confused self-identitiesof contemporaryphilosophers, and their uncer-
tain position in the academic division of disciplines. He rejected the
claim that "philosophers know more about anything in particular, [or]
that they have a kind of sensitivityto distinctions and presuppositions
which is peculiarly their own" [28, p. 62].
Rortyattackedthe presumption that philosophy should provide epis-
temological foundations for other disciplines. He agreed with Witt-
genstein, that "the thing to do with epistemology is to cure philoso-
phers of the delusion that there were epistemological problems" [21,
pp. 200, 230-31] . He described how, when philosophy aimed at becom-
ing scientific, it tried to "attain the rigor of the mathematician . . .
rather than to help people attain peace of mind. Science, rather than
living, became philosophy's subject, and epistemology its center" [10,
p. 61].
Rorty's suggestions to cure the delusions of philosophers applies to
the similar delusions of librarians.Librariansshould use methods that
work, that serve the ends of the library,its users, and the community,
instead of trying to justify privileged claims to truth. The key part of
Rorty's critique of positivism is that it is a mistake merely to propose
replacements for positivism.Instead, we need to listen to positivism as
"one discourse among others, one among many projects we engage
in" [10, p. 382]. The lack of an "algorithm of choice" to tell us which
theory accuratelyrepresents objective reality has affected physics and
chemistry, and psychology, as much as libraryscience. As Kuhn
'' biology
ost of science would . . . now regard the sort of
put it, [M] philosophers
algorithm which has traditionallybeen sought as a not quite attainable
ideal" [11, p. 326].
In the following quotation, Rorty describes a goal for philosophers.

As a final metaphor, let us accept Wright'snotion that philosophy and

librarianshipreally are identical, and accept Rorty'sdefinition for our-
selves, and for a culture that we seek to live in as librarians:
Such a culture would contain nobody . . . who could explain whyor how certain
areas of culture enjoyed a special relation to reality. Such a culture would
doubtless contain specialists in seeing how things hung together. But these
would be people who had no special ''problems" to solve, nor any special
"method" to apply, abided by no particular disciplinary standards, had no
collective self-image as a "profession." They might resemble contemporary
philosophy professors in being more interested in moral responsibility than
in prosody, or more interested in the articulation of sentences than in that of
the human body, but they might not. They would be all-purposeintellectuals
who were ready to offer a view on prettymuch anything,in the hope of making
it hang together with everything else. [28, p. xxxix]
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1934): 527-51. Reprinted in AmericanLibraryPhilosophy:An Anthology,selected and intro-
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