Free Knowledge

Abstract

Broadly speaking, this collection looks at the question of knowledge: how it is generated and shared, and to what purpose. This includes both applied knowledge and what contributor Arthur Schafer refers to as “knowledge for its own sake” (page 46)—for one can hardly exist without the other. The devaluing and withdrawal of public support for the latter, and simultaneous profit-seeking commandeering of the former, leads us toward a future when human knowledge, in all its myriad forms, is dimin¬ished in the public sphere