ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts covered in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book discusses the nature of information and the conditions under which information becomes communications, that is, logic, understanding, and thereby meaning. Its foundation, though never made explicit, is the ancient theory of logic and rhetoric as first expounded in two great Platonic dialogues, the Phaedo and the Phaedrus, the dialogues respectively, about logic and rhetoric, their requirements, and their limitations. The book shows the impact on social and community structure of our new ability to define, move, and use information. It is particularly concerned with the impact on that proudest of nineteenth-century achievements, the modern city, based as it was on the then new technology of moving people. The book provides information on the social organization of people at work and shows how our newly gained information ability changes both the conceptual basis of organization and the relationships within it.
