Academics From The United Kingdom

"Classification in documentation is a tool for selection. It is essentially a 'finding system' for subject items... It is an artificial language, designed as a tool to aid in the selection of information from a store in response to search questions. The classification serves to standardise subject description, so that the description of a subject used by indexer and inquirer are more likely to coincide, thus maximising the probability of finding all items relevant to an inquiry."

"Throughout the nineteenth century, apart from the division in theoretical sciences and arts, classifiers attempted to divide the sciences into two groups. Already they had before them the examples of Francis Bacon (speculative and descriptive) and Hobbes (quantitative and qualitative). For Coleridge, the sciences were either pure (Grammar, Logic, Rhetoric, Mathematics, Metaphysics) or mixed. Arthur Schopenhauer’s similar groups were called pure and empirical, Wilhelm Wundt in 1887 called them formal and empirical, Globot mathematical and theoretical, and the St. Louis Congress of Arts and Sciences (1904) normative and physical. made similar division of the sciences into abstract and concrete"

"Four basic operations in the effective use of graphic records (documents), to store information and make it available, have been listed by Hyslop: A, recording information in documents; B, storing recorded information—documentary items; C, identifying items containing information relevant to a given problem, situation, or subject; D, providing the identified items from storage. Information storage and retrieval in the wide sense covers all these operations. In the narrow sense used in this paper, information retrieval means only C, identifying documentary items by subject."

"In scientific information, then, we find that subjects - the themes and topics on which books and articles are written - cluster into fields, each of which can be analysed into its characteristic set of facets of terms."

"The areas traditionally concerned with such systems are: publishing in all its ramification, librarianship, bibliography, documentation, record management, archives and the like. Systematic study of the activities in all these areas has lead to increased recognition of their common features. They are all concerned with information systems, and their study may include in the wider field of 'information science and technology' (as the Americans put it) or 'informatics' (as Soviet writers would have it)."

"Classification in its simplest terms, means putting together things or ideas that are alike, and keeping separate those that are different."

"The basic rules of classification are - Each characteristic of division must produce at least two classes - Only one principle of division must be used at a time, to produce mutually exclusive classes. - The species of any genius must be completely exhaustive of their parent class."

"In science there are uses many classifications of entities - plants, animals, rocks, soils, stars, diseases, occupations, and so on. In these taxonomies a classification must display genetic relations - for example, an evolutionary family tree of animal species - but its prime purpose is to aid in the identification of entities... Classification enables us to select, from the whole universe of known entities, the one that best matches one newly encountered."

"The classification of subject matter may be carried out for all sort of special purposes - to arrange books on shelves, to group inventions in patents, to classify the raw materials, intermediates and products of importance to a particular manufacturer, and so on. All such arrangements have their particular uses and their particular problems."

"I met Ranga on several occasions. He was a fascinating personality, highly organised, a tireless worker, a fierce enthusiast, a charming man. Speaking of his passion for work, he told me once how his young son had stuck a notice on his study door: “Librarianship is unfair to families”... It really was a privilege to have known him."

"Interaction is the mode of life of living organisms. Each must feed on its environment, ingesting chemicals or other organisms. This is something more than "interaction", it is activity directed towards the environment. Since the organism must be selective in what it ingests, it needs to discriminate among the entities in its environment. From very primitive forms of discrimination, the sensory mechanisms of organisms have evolved into the senses of man, interpreted by an internal cognitive apparatus, memories of past experiences, and an ability to take rational decisions. By "rational" I mean activity that achieves intended results because it is based on a reliable understanding of the nature of the environment. In interacting with each other to carry out tasks jointly, men have further developed language, leading to a shared understanding of the environment. This shared understanding is knowledge."

"Scientific information is faced with the following problem. On the one hand, we have the world’s literature of science and technology, past and present, in many languages; on the other, and enquirer with a question. How to select, from a vast mass of words, the few that are the most closely relevant to an enquiry? It is this selection process that makes use of classification."

"The preface to the first edition of this book... shows that in 1958 the classification ideas in it were felt to controversial, needing to be championed. A few years before, the had issued a memorandum proclaiming "the need for a faceted classification as the basis of all methods of information retrieval'. As part-author of this memorandum, I must now judge the claim to have been too bold, even brash."

"Throughout life, all people are engaged in activities – practical or mental – trying to solve problems, activities that themselves give rise to problems. To solve these problems, people need knowledge. They can acquire this personal knowledge in two main ways. First, they can interrogate the world – natural and social – by means of closer observation, deeper analysis, controlled experiment, all forms of cognitive interaction. Second, they can enrich their personal knowledge by communicative interaction with the stock of public knowledge that mankind has built up over the millenia, thus acquiring what we may call information. The activities in which people engage also produce two other kinds of knowledge: that embodied in people (skills) and that embodied in their artefacts."

"I would pinpoint 1958 as a special time in my career. I had for some years been working with the Classification Research Group in London, and in 1957 we had held a small but successful conference to which Jesse Shera, Gene Garfield and others had come from the USA. In 1958 I published my first book, Classification and Indexing in Science, and attended the International Conference on Scientific Information in Washington. This was my first visit to the USA - I flew in a US Army transport plane with . The Conference papers opened up all kinds of new information vistas - in many ways setting the agenda for the ensuing development of the field. I met many interesting people - some who stand out in the memory are Peter Luhn, , John O'Connor and Desmond Bernal. The experience of attending the conference, and of other visits I paid at that time, led to the writing of my second book, On Retrieval System Theory..."

"John Desmond Bernal (1901-1971) was undoubtedly the most important of the "Western" scientists who, during the twentieth century, accepted the Marxist view of social development. He did more than "accept" it: he tried to sketch the whole history of science from a Marxist viewpoint; he wrote a number of articles explicitly expounding his view of the relation of Marxism to science; and from his student days he played an active role in Communist politics. He has been criticised: during his lifetime, for too readily accepting official Soviet policy, whether relating to society or to science; since his death, for having been too ready to hope that his vision of the use of science for human ends could be implemented by capitalist societies; and at all times, for an allegedly simplistic faith in science as the salvation of mankind."

"I am always surprised that the information profession, so quick to sing the virtues of literature search for its customers, pays so little attention to its own history. I have been told: “our problems are different from those of the past”. It is not so the problems are often the same, only the technical means available for solution may be new. The thinking and experience of the past can often shed light on the present."

"Despite the fact that our profession constantly urges others to “consult the literature”, I do not think we are distinguished nowadays by knowledge of our heritage."

"An information system is an organisation of people, materials and machines that serves to facilitate the transfer of information from one person to another. Its function is social: to aid human communication. If we take this to mean all reception of signals by the human senses (sight, sound, small, touch, taste,...)- then communication is an incessant and essential accompaniment of all human activity. If we restrict the meaning of signals to flowing between people, much of the daily life of most of us is occupied by such interpersonal acts."

"What is now called ‘knowledge organisation’ in this context has a long history. The simplest forms of a knowledge organisation system (KOS) are, after all, the contents list and the index of a textbook. The knowledge is in the text; the KOS is a supplementary tool that helps the reader to find his way around the text. But as such finding aids have become more complex, and taken on wider functions, they have acquired grander names, such as retrieval languages, taxonomies, categorisations, lexicons, thesauri, or ontologies. They are now seen as schemes that organize, manage, and retrieve information."

"The most important characteristic of documentary classification is that it is concerned with subjects, not just entities of taxonomic classification. What is the nature of the specific subjects - the themes on which books, parts of books, articles or parts of articles are written? A study of book titles alone would suggest that literary subjects have simple names like 'War, Religion', 'Boats', 'Musica; pitch', 'Colour', 'Acridines', 'Wild flowers', and so on. But the study of articles on the documentation level reveals that such titles are simple in appearance only. Such a literary subject is in reality a complex aggregate of specific subjects, eahc which is the main theme discussed from one particular aspect."

"Citation does not necessarily reflect current demand."

"[Vickery in his handbook of procedures for making , writes that organizing a field into facets] can be achieved only by a detailed examination of the literature of the field"

"Information retrieval is now an accepted part of the new discipline of information science and technology... I have concentrated on the field with which I am most familiar, the problems of bibliographic description and subject analysis."

"Neither citation nor loan demand is an adequate measure of literature use by a large community. Each is only an indicator, illuminating some aspects of use but with its own inherent bias. The joint study of several indicators gives a more balanced picture.."

"The crux of the retrieval problem is that selecting documents to read grows ever more difficult, and new techniques are continually needed."

"Facet analysis results in more varied, multidimensional relationships, at least in theory, better reflecting the complexity of subject knowledge"

"User needs determine what functions should be provided, and different functions require different structures."

"We communicate with each other to inform, to instruct, to persuade, to amuse, to annoy. Informing and instructing aim to alter the receiver's concepts, whereas persuading, amusing or annoying aim to change his preferences or feelings. In a work situation people do make jokes and enemies, and use the arts of persuasion, but much of their communication has an informal or instructional aspect."

"Information science is concerned with every aspect of the chain of information transfer activities, but the heart of its interest is information search."

"”Information science” emerges (a) when conceptual explorations, not directed towards immediate practical or technical ends, begin to take place, and (b) they are seen to be concerned with a definable area of interest [that of facilitating the transmission of information between people]."

"Deep resentment was felt against him and charges of treachery were frequent. Throughout the Labour movement he was bitterly criticised for his action in 1931, and I fully shared the prevailing sentiments towards him... During 1931 and earlier I had been one of his most severe critics. While deeply conscious of his powers as an orator and liking him personally, I thought he was woolly headed; and behind the scenes I left him in no doubt of my estimate of his executive or administrative skills. Yet not once did he show ill-feeling towards me."

"MacDonald simply couldn't understand why he had been deserted by his former close friends. He felt that he had departed from none of his Socialist principles and had been true to the conceptions which had guided them through his political life."

"The Gladstone of Labour."

"Although we have differed in late years on political matters, I hope that in the bitterness of spirit you must feel at present, you will recall that there are thousands who, like myself, remember with pride and gratitude your work for Socialism and the cause of Labour in days when it was neither easy nor popular to be a pioneer."

"The formation of the new Government did not end the financial crisis, and I returned from abroad to find everything unsettled in the advent of an inevitable general election. The verdict of the electorate was worthy of the British nation. A National Government had been formed under Mr. Ramsay MacDonald, founder of the Labour-Socialist Party. They proposed to the people a programme of severe austerity and sacrifice. It was an earlier version of “Blood, sweat, toil, and tears,” without the stimulus or the requirements of war and mortal peril. The sternest economy must be practised. Everyone would have his wages, salary, or income reduced. The mass of the people were asked to vote for a régime of self-denial. They responded as they always do when caught in the heroic temper. Although contrary to their declarations, the Government abandoned the gold standard, and although Mr. Baldwin was obliged to suspend, as it proved for ever, those very payments on the American debt which he had forced on the Bonar Law Cabinet of 1923, confidence and credit were restored. There was an overwhelming majority for the new Administration. Mr. MacDonald as Prime Minister was only followed by seven or eight members of his own party; but barely a hundred of his Labour opponents and former followers were returned to Parliament. His health and powers were failing fast, and he reigned in increasing decrepitude at the summit of the British system for nearly four fateful years. And very soon in these four years came Hitler."

"The British Government which resulted from the general election of 1931 was in appearance one of the strongest, and in fact one of the weakest, in British records. Mr. Ramsay MacDonald, the Prime Minister, had severed himself, with the utmost bitterness on both sides, from the Socialist Party which it had been his life’s work to create. Henceforward he brooded supinely at the head of an administration which, though nominally National, was in fact overwhelmingly Conservative. Mr. Baldwin preferred the substance to the form of power, and reigned placidly in the background. The Foreign Office was filled by Sir John Simon, one of the leaders of the Liberal contingent. The main work of the Administration at home was done by Mr. Neville Chamberlain, who soon succeeded Mr. Snowden as Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Labour Party, blamed for its failure in the financial crisis and sorely stricken at the polls, was led by the extreme pacifist, Mr. George Lansbury. During the period of almost five years of this Administration, from January, 1931, to November, 1935, the entire situation on the Continent of Europe was reversed."

"MacDonald at Llandudno [in 1930] faced the test of a lifetime and, despite his assumed air of a weary Titan, it is hard to deny that he rose to it superbly. Even when his speech is read today – and MacDonald's speeches were very much intended to be heard, not read – its force is apparent. Picture the full scene with the presence, the gestures, the beautiful accent, the whole elegant swaying and lilting integration of voice, mind and body which is what a great MacDonald oration was, and it is not difficult to imagine the spell he cast."

"Mr. MacDonald’s health and capacity had declined to a point which made his continuance as Prime Minister impossible. He had never been popular with the Conservative Party, who regarded him, on account of his political and war records and Socialist faith, with long-bred prejudice softened in later years by pity. No man was more hated or with better reason by the Labour-Socialist Party which he had so largely created and then laid low by what they viewed as his treacherous desertion in 1931. In the massive majority of the Government he had but seven party followers. The disarmament policy to which he had given his utmost personal efforts had now proved a disastrous failure. A general election could not be far distant, in which he could play no helpful part. In these circumstances there was no surprise when, on June 7, it was announced that he and Mr. Baldwin had changed places and offices, and that Mr. Baldwin had become Prime Minister for the third time. The Foreign Office also passed to another hand. Sir Samuel Hoare’s labours at the India Office had been crowned by the passing of the Government of India Bill, and he was now free to turn to a more immediately important sphere. For some time past Sir John Simon had been bitterly attacked for his foreign policy by influential Conservatives closely associated with the Government. He now moved to the Home Office, with which he was well acquainted, and Sir Samuel Hoare became Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs."

"The Liberal Party, rallying round the standard of free trade, to which I also adhered, gained a balancing position at the polls, and, though in a minority, might well have taken office had Mr. Asquith wished to do so. In view of his disinclination, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald, at the head of little more than two-fifths of the House, became the first Socialist Prime Minister of Great Britain, and lived in office for a year by the sufferance and on the quarrels of the two older parties. The nation was extremely restive under minority Socialist rule, and the political weather became so favourable that the two Oppositions – Liberal and Conservative – picked an occasion to defeat the Socialist Government on a major issue. There was another general election – the third in less than two years. The Conservatives were returned by a majority of 222 over all other parties combined. At the beginning of this election Mr. Baldwin’s position was very weak, and he made no particular contribution to the result. He had, however, previously maintained himself as party leader, and as the results were declared, it became certain he would become again Prime Minister. He retired to his home to form his second Administration."

"The general election of May, 1929, showed that the “swing of the pendulum” and the normal desire for change were powerful factors with the British electorate. The Socialists had a small majority over the Conservatives in the new House of Commons. The Liberals, with about sixty seats, held the balance, and it was plain that under Mr. Lloyd George’s leadership they would, at the outset at least, be hostile to the Conservatives. Mr. Baldwin and I were in full agreement that we should not seek to hold office in a minority or on precarious Liberal support. Accordingly, although there were some differences of opinion in the Cabinet and the party about the course to be taken, Mr. Baldwin tendered his resignation to the King. We all went down to Windsor in a special train to give up our seals and offices; and on June 7, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald became for the second time Prime Minister at the head of a minority Government depending upon Liberal votes. The Socialist Prime Minister wished his new Labour Government to distinguish itself by large concessions to Egypt, by a far-reaching constitutional change in India, and by a renewed effort for world, or at any rate British, disarmament. These were aims in which he could count upon Liberal aid, and for which he therefore commanded a parliamentary majority. Here began my differences with Mr. Baldwin, and thereafter the relationship in which we had worked since he chose me for Chancellor of the Exchequer five years before became sensibly altered. We still, of course, remained in easy personal contact, but we knew we did not mean the same thing. My idea was that the Conservative Opposition should strongly confront the Labour Government on all great imperial and national issues, should identify itself with the majesty of Britain as under Lord Beaconsfield and Lord Salisbury, and should not hesitate to face controversy, even though that might not immediately evoke a response from the nation. So far as I could see, Mr. Baldwin felt that the times were too far gone for any robust assertion of British imperial greatness, and that the hope of the Conservative Party lay in accommodation with Liberal and Labour forces, and in adroit, well-timed manoeuvres to detach powerful moods of public opinion and large blocks of voters from them. He certainly was very successful. He was the greatest party manager the Conservatives had ever had. He fought, as their leader, five general elections, of which he won three. History alone can judge these general issues."

"What is the Prime Minister going to do? I spoke the other day, after he had been defeated in an important division about his wonderful skill in falling without hurting himself. He falls, but up he comes again, smiling, a little dishevelled but still smiling. But this is a juncture, a situation, which will try to the fullest the peculiar arts in which he excites. I remember when I was a child, being taken to the celebrated Barnum's Circus which contained an exhibition of freaks and monstrosities, but the exhibit on the programme which I most admired to see was the one described as "The Boneless Wonder". My parents judged that that spectacle would be too revolting and demoralizing for my youthful eyes, and I have waited fifty years to see the boneless wonder sitting on the Treasury Bench."

"Early in the year 1923, Mr. Bonar Law resigned the Premiership and retired to die of his fell affliction. Mr. Baldwin succeeded him as Prime Minister, and Lord Curzon reconciled himself to the office of Foreign Secretary in the new Administration. Thus began that period of fourteen years which may well be called “The Baldwin-MacDonald Régime.” During all that time Mr. Baldwin was always, in fact if not in form, either at the head of the Government or leader of the Opposition, and as Mr. MacDonald never obtained an independent majority, Mr. Baldwin, whether in office or opposition, was the ruling political figure in Britain. At first in alternation but eventually in political brotherhood, these two statesmen governed the country. Nominally the representatives of opposing parties, of contrary doctrines, of antagonistic interests, they proved in fact to be more nearly akin in outlook, temperament, and method than any other two men who had been Prime Ministers since that office was known to the Constitution. Curiously enough, the sympathies of each extended far into the territory of the other. Ramsay MacDonald nursed many of the sentiments of the old Tory. Stanley Baldwin, apart from a manufacturer’s ingrained approval of protection, was by disposition a truer representative of mild Socialism than many to be found in the Labour ranks."

"In the wake of the collapse of the stock market came, during the years between 1929 and 1932, an unrelenting fall in prices and consequent cuts in production causing widespread unemployment. The consequences of this dislocation of economic life became world-wide. A general contraction of trade in the face of unemployment and declining production followed. Tariff restrictions were imposed to protect the home markets. The general crisis brought with it acute monetary difficulties, and paralysed internal credit. This spread ruin and unemployment far and wide throughout the globe. Mr. MacDonald’s Government, with all their promises behind them, saw unemployment during 1930 and 1931 bound up in their faces from one million to nearly three millions. It was said that in the United States ten million persons were without work. The entire banking system of the great Republic was thrown into confusion and temporary collapse. Consequential disasters fell upon Germany and other European countries. However, nobody starved in the English-speaking world."

"It is always difficult for an administration or party which is founded upon attacking capital to preserve the confidence and credit so important to the highly artificial economy of an island like Britain. Mr. MacDonald’s Labour-Socialist Government were utterly unable to cope with the problems which confronted them. They could not command the party discipline or produce the vigour necessary even to balance the budget. In such conditions a Government, already in a minority and deprived of all financial confidence, could not survive. The failure of the Labour Party to face this tempest, the sudden collapse of British financial credit, and the break-up of the Liberal Party, with its unwholesome balancing power, led to a national coalition. It seemed that only a Government of all parties was capable of coping with the crisis. Mr. MacDonald and his Chancellor of the Exchequer, on a strong patriotic emotion, attempted to carry the mass of the Labour Party into this combination. Mr. Baldwin, always content that others should have the function so long as he retained the power, was willing to serve under Mr. MacDonald. It was an attitude which, though deserving respect, did not correspond to the facts. Mr. Lloyd George was still recovering from an operation – serious at his age; and Sir John Simon led the bulk of the Liberals into the all-party combination."

"The Prime Minister had always had that gift of imagination, that touch of the quixotic, which might be called Scottish rather than Celtic, because it was the birthright of all their people. He had dreamed dreams which perhaps were not the dreams of many of them, but at any rate he had always had vision and a long perspective in life. There was a great deal of the Covenanter in him, and there was a great deal of the Cavalier. He had an acute sense of the past, and history was a living thing to him; but at the same time he was no drab antiquarian. He embodied, too, all their local affections, and he was a Highlander by descent and by domicile."

"MacDonald's temperament was temporising, calculating, cautious, gradualist to the fingertips... He had enormous resources of diligence and patience and endurance. These qualities together made him the expert negotiator and party manager which he undoubtedly was... [H]e also had great spasmodic gleams of imagination which enabled him to sweep aside the suffocating orthodoxies of the time."

"I know that, when the troubled history of these times comes to be studied and recorded in the cold and just light of truth, all the blame will not lie at Germany's door. That will not save it, its methods and its self-will, as shown in these latter days, from the blame of destroying the chances of success in peacemaking which were once again presenting themselves to us, and of throwing the mind of Europe suddenly into anxiety and turning it back upon the fatal ways of militarism, thus compelling the nations of Europe to return for an evanescent comfort to increased military equipment."

"The channels of world trade are so obstructed by the pursuit of nationalist economic policy that steps should be taken at once to make it possible to arrive at an international economic agreement which would revive international trade. A return to free trade pure and simple would only increase unemployment."

"This nation ought to be quipped to defend itself and to fulfil its responsibility under the League system of mutual assistance in the event of an aggressor coming to threaten us all. A defenceless Britain at this stage of evolution will not be an aid to peace but an incentive to war. But we must watch very closely lest the acceptance of the responsibility to prepare for defence may lead to a policy of militarism for its own sake. We draw this distinction and will continue to observe it."