RE: [ECCO] Choosing interesting books for ECCO

[margeret heath]

I vote for Mixel’s idea. It has the additional benefit of ensuring some discussion between folk on the books requested, which means that one benefits from ‘interpretative’ aspects of ‘the other’, and not just from a subjective ‘private’ read. It also builds friendships and collaborative possibilities. And I certainly do not feel comfortable digging around in CLEA’s basement!   However, to facilitate co-ordonation and housing of books, we still need to find a *neutral* place where they can live. Given the fight for ‘space’ in CLEA, ECCO could temporarily benefit from another library ‘place’, as CLEA would definitely be ‘uncomfortable’.   A suggestion for discussion: It appears that I will be reassigned to a new office in C building which because of voice-dictation I shall have to my self (am I blessed or what?). I am happy to suggest that I leave a spare key with out secretary with a list of people who belong to ECCO, and if I am not there, or it is outside of the strange hours I generally keep, perhaps they could respectfully browse the library in there as it seems that there will be space. There should be no problem with security for example, as anything I own of value (????) would be in my filing cabinet anyway. If anyone has any other idea along these lines perhaps it should be examined?   I have Dan Dennett’s Freedom Evolves (on its way from Canada), but suggest that what we begin to do is move away from the more ‘popular science’ versions of the subjects of common interest (not that Dennett’s book is exactly non-academic),  and that we start getting into the meat of some of these issues. (Apologies if they are needed …?). I really think we should be striving for rigour, and whilst most subjects are often approached through ‘softer’ versions of the subject initially (a necessary step), ramping-up our expectations would be a good thing. Of course I speak for myself, intellectually, too.   I would like the online data base to have information that includes the academic papers touching in some significant way on these subjects (selected by ourselves and the next-neighbourhood of colleagues), and papers which critique the ideas in the book. I see no reason why the digital database should not commence immediately. Why wait? We will all just get busier and busier, so now is as good a time as any.   Margeret         " ... capacities that belong to spontaneity are in play in actualizations of receptivity.." (Mc Dowell, Mind and World)   -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mixel Kiemen Sent: Wednesday, September 29, 2004 2:52 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [ECCO] Choosing interesting books for ECCO   On 29-sep-04, at 13:18, Francis Heylighen wrote: I have some other books on memetics in my personal library here as well but I foresee that they will move to the CLEA library or to my office there pretty soon. The idea I have in mind is too pool our personal belongings into a shared "library" in the following way. If somebody owns an interesting book, but does not need it at the moment and is willing to let other ECCO members read it, that person can store that book in a place accessible for ECCO members (e.g. the book cupboards in the basement of the CLEA house), but including a label or "ex-libris" that clearly identifies the owner, so that no discussion can arise about who owns what. If someone sees that book in the library and wants to borrow it for reading, that person inserts a piece of cardboard with his/her name, date of borrowing, and title of the book in the space where the book used to be. If someone else (including the owner) would like to get the borrowed book, they then immediately know who to ask for it. The same system would apply for books that belong to ECCO as a group (or even to CLEA, which has also quite a collection). In this way, the scattered collections of books that we have built upt individually or collectively can be easily converted into a pretty extensive and easy-to-use library. It will help *me* at least to create some more space and order in my own book cupboards at home and in the office, while supporting the research of others... In a later stage, we can enter all books titles, authors, and perhaps keywords in a database that can be consulted and edited over the web, so that you can check from a distance which books are available in the library and who has borrowed what. -- I've got some interesting books as well. I like to have them near to look something up, storing them in the CLEA house would be uncomfortable. Still with a good database readable form the internet it would be as easy to borrow this books as they where in the house. So I like to skip the first stage and get more involved in the later one. I would love to start talking about webhosting for ECCO. We could create a separated workgroup on it. The book I had planed to order, could be interesting for ECCO: "On Becoming Aware: A Pragmatics of Experiencing", Natalie Depraz, Francisco J. Varela, Pierre Vermersch "The Hidden Connections: A Science for Sustainable Living", Fritjof Capra "Freedom Evolves", Daniel C. Dennett "Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution and Epistemology", Mary Catherine Bateson (Foreword), Gregory Bateson "Politics of Nature: How to Bring the Sciences into Democracy", Bruno Latour, Catherine Porter "A Devil's Chaplain: Selected Writings", Richard Dawkins (still need to be published)=> "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive (Allen Lane Science S.)", Jared Diamond Interesting books for ECCO that I posses: "Natural-Born Cyborgs", Andy Clark "Pandora’s hope: Essays on the Reality of Science Studies", Bruno Latour "Nature via Nuture", Matt Ridley "Rationality in action", John Searle "The Rise of the Creative Class and How It's Transforming Work, Life, Community and Everyday Life", Florida Richard "Growing Artificial Societies", Joshua M. Epstein and Robert Axtell "Artificial Minds", Stan Franklin "Self-Organization and the City", Juval Portugali "Machine consciousness" edited by Holland Owen Francis Heylighen Center "Leo Apostel" Free University of Brussels http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/HEYL.html --- --- --- --- Mixel Kiemen: http://www.mixel.be/ PhD student at ECCO: http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/ECCO/