A quick note to the personal knowledge management fanatics: Niklas Luhmann positively did NOT invent the Zettelkasten. The idea predates him by quite a bit and had even earlier forms. He’s also not the only significant example.
Home
Published by
Chris Aldrich
I'm a biomedical and electrical engineer with interests in information theory, complexity, evolution, genetics, signal processing, IndieWeb, theoretical mathematics, and big history. I'm also a talent manager-producer-publisher in the entertainment industry with expertise in representation, distribution, finance, production, content delivery, and new media. View all posts by Chris Aldrich
mitpress.mit.edu/books/paper-ma…
Would love links to any descriptions of the systems used by Conrad Gessner (1516-1565) or Johann Jacob Moser (1701–1785)
Luhman wrote a description of his, it was adopted by Robert Green, who taught Ryan Holiday, who wrote the post I read.
Not all the ancients are ancestors.
Conor, here’s a link to a reference for Konrad Gessner from 1548 with some tidbits: https://boffosocko.com/2021/12/02/55799053/
More coming shortly based on research/reading in progress.
Syndicated copies:
Commonplace books are great, I looked into those extensively in 2016/2017 as I searched for analog metaphors.
Your post says nothing at all to suggest Luhman didn’t “invent” “Zettelkasten” (no one says he was only one writing on scraps of paper), you list two names and no links
If you’re generalizing Zettelkasten to “All Non-Linear Knowledge Management Strategies” You should include Mortimer Adler and the Syntopicon, and John Locke’s guide to how to set up a commonplace book
This isn’t a game of calling “dibs”
it’s about 🧠👶s
fs.blog/2014/07/john-l…
You’re right. There is a sophistication of ideas in Luhmann’s essay on “Communicating with Slip Boxes” which is lacking from most of the written and video commentary I’ve encountered so far.
What do you get out of Luhmann’s paper if you leave aside for the moment all the technology of cards, slip boxes, indexes, links, and back links?
What remains is still the core of something powerful.
The paper is called “𝘊𝘰𝘮𝘮𝘶𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 with Slip Boxes” …
“Theoretical publications do therefore not result from simply copying what can already be found in the slip box. The communication with the slip box becomes fruitful only at a high level of generalisation namely that of establishing communicative relations of relations.”
A refutation of John Searle’s Chinese Room … ? 🤔
CC: @Paul_Rony
He derives a lot of inspiration from Common place books as well for @kosmik_app
twitter.com/Paul_Rony/stat…
This part is absolutely, very Christopher-Alexandrian (+ 100% resonates wi my experience of Roam so far …)
I like it that he casually mentions that the system isn’t loss-proof.
If you try to failsafe EVERYTHING, your system will lack life.
(from luhmann.surge.sh/communicating-…)
Edwards did this too. He’d take notes on scraps while walking and pin them to his coat. (Zettelmantel?)
Later, he’d organize them and add them to his “Miscellanies” (1,500+ topics over his career).
edwards.yale.edu/research/misc-…
Not as sophisticated as Luhmann, but still impressive.
Contingence is a major pillar of his communication theory.
I’m only 1/2 down the rabbit hole on some of these sources myself, a task made harder by my lack of facility with German. I am reasonably positive that the Gessner & Moser references are going to spring directly out of the commonplace book tradition [more]
boffosocko.com/2021/07/03/dif…
I’ll definitely grant this and admit that there may be independent invention or re-discovery of ideas.
I’ll also mention that it’s far, far less likely that any of these people truly invented very much novel along the way, particularly since [more]
boffosocko.com/2021/07/03/dif…
My post was more in reaction to the overly common suggestions and statements that Luhmann did invent it and the fact that he’s almost always the only quoted user. The link was meant to give some additional context, not proof. [more]
boffosocko.com/2021/07/03/dif…
It’s definitely not a game of “dibs”, but we’re all fooling ourselves if we’re not taking a look at the incredibly rich history of these ideas.
(boffosocko.com/2021/07/03/dif…)
Bullet Journals certainly are informed by the commonplace tradition, but are an incredibly specialized version of lists for productivity.
Perhaps there’s more influence by Peter Ramus’ outlining tradition here as well?
I’ve seen a student’s written [more]
boffosocko.com/2021/07/03/dif…
You could ask @rydercarroll
Or read what he’s written bout the origin story
Let’s be honest that these are some of the lowest hanging fruit on the tree of this incredibly deep history.
Adler as an encyclopedist was assuredly more than aware of the commonplace tradition and likely knew or read any/many of the following:
[more]
boffosocko.com/2021/07/03/dif…
Also @rydercarroll and bullet journal for more modern take on commonplace books
#bujo on Pinterest
Feature Idea: Chaos Monkey for PKM
Such a pity the author of the takingnote blog deleted it. It’s a treasure trove of historic note taking examples: web.archive.org/web/2020051021…
For a somewhat in depth look at Luhmann’s zettelkasten , I made a rough translation of this talk: https://vimeo.com/173128404 here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1re3lYaALScZ49189XIGqUVjQlMPe9uOfLEyz8y7mJuE/edit#heading=h.ygj23kjvy5z
Johannes Schmidt: Der Zettelkasten als Zweitgedächtnis Niklas Luhmanns from Labor für Kunst und Technik on Vimeo.
This is awesome. Thanks!! My dramatic lack of German makes digging into the history of these practices incredibly difficult, particularly when looking back as far as examples like Jean Paul.
Syndicated copies: