THE UNIVERSE OF INFORMATION.pdf - ideals

Fontaine believed, by the order of the figures making up a particular
decimal number.
In effect, the figures which represent the classes and divisions of
each subject unite into a single extremely simple numerical expression.
The affiliation, the genealogy even, of the ideas and the objects, their
dependence and subordination ... find and adequate representation in the
bibliographic sign so formed. This representation nearly excludes the
conventional and the arbitrary. Not only does each figure express in
its fashion an essential idea, but the combination of figures, that
is to say, their order in the series and their place in the number, are
actually produced according to the laws of scientific logic. In this
sense they constitute a true new language in which the phrases (here
numbers) are formed according to constant syntactical rules from
figures (here numbers). It is a kind of synthetic language: the figures
are the predicative and attributive roots in it—< purely verbal roots
in the sense that they are neither substantive, nor adjectives, nor
verbs. They are placed above and outside grammatical categories, in
that they express abstractions, pure scientific categories. Under this
double head, the Decimal Classification constitutes a veritable international
scientific language, a complete symbology of science, susceptible
of to-day bringing to intellectual workers, help analogous
to that which they received in the Middle Ages... from Latin. 55
Apart from the linguistic and logical aspects of the classification,
the fact that an index to its tables could be compiled
in any language, meant that it could be used by anyone anywhere.
As it had decimal numbers, it could also be extended
indefinitely without confusing the order of the numbers or
complicating the procedure for the arrangement of material
by them. «It responds to the essential principle of bibliographic
order, as of all order: a place for each thing, and each
thing in its place.» 16 It was not a classification of science, Otlet
and La Fontaine were quick to point out. «It is merely a
complex statement of the various subjects dealt with by the
sciences with a grouping of these subjects according to the
most generally adopted order, each being given a set place.» 17
There is much in Otlet and La Fontaine's original account
•of the Decimal Classification to which one might object today,
and much that is obscure. The distinction, for example, between
a bibliographic and a scientific classification is by no means
convincingly stated, especially as the bibliographic numbers
are said to respond to the «laws of scientific logic»- Nevertheless,
it is clear that to the Europeans it was something novel
and full of possibility. It extended Otlet and La Fontaine's
horizons indefinitely. It seemed to them feasible, now that they
had discovered an appropriate classification, to develop the
work, as yet restricted in scope, that they had begun at the
International Office of Bibliography. It seemed to them now
not an idle dream to attempt to go beyond the various kinds
of specialised bibliographic repertories in limited subject areas
such as law and sociology that they had already begun. They
could hope to produce a universal bibliographic repertory
43