Missed Information: Better Information For Building A Wealthier, More Sustainable Future (mit Press)
by Jay Schulkin /
2016 / English / EPUB
4.2 MB Download
How better information and better access to it improves the
quality of our decisions and makes for a more vibrant
participatory society.
How better information and better access to it improves the
quality of our decisions and makes for a more vibrant
participatory society.
Information is power. It drives commerce, protects nations, and
forms the backbone of systems that range from health care to high
finance. Yet despite the avalanche of data available in today's
information age, neither institutions nor individuals get the
information they truly need to make well-informed decisions.
Faulty information and sub-optimal decision-making create an
imbalance of power that is exaggerated as governments and
corporations amass enormous databases on each of us. Who has more
power: the government, in possession of uncounted terabytes of
data (some of it obtained by cybersnooping), or the ordinary
citizen, trying to get in touch with a government agency?
In
Information is power. It drives commerce, protects nations, and
forms the backbone of systems that range from health care to high
finance. Yet despite the avalanche of data available in today's
information age, neither institutions nor individuals get the
information they truly need to make well-informed decisions.
Faulty information and sub-optimal decision-making create an
imbalance of power that is exaggerated as governments and
corporations amass enormous databases on each of us. Who has more
power: the government, in possession of uncounted terabytes of
data (some of it obtained by cybersnooping), or the ordinary
citizen, trying to get in touch with a government agency?
InMissed Information,
Missed Information, David Sarokin and Jay
Schulkin explore information -- not information technology, but
information itself -- as a central part of our lives and
institutions. They show that providing better information and
better access to it improves the quality of our decisions and
makes for a more vibrant participatory society.
David Sarokin and Jay
Schulkin explore information -- not information technology, but
information itself -- as a central part of our lives and
institutions. They show that providing better information and
better access to it improves the quality of our decisions and
makes for a more vibrant participatory society.
Sarokin and Schulkin argue that freely flowing information helps
systems run more efficiently and that incomplete information does
just the opposite. It's easier to comparison shop for microwave
ovens than for doctors or hospitals because of information gaps
that hinder the entire health-care system. Better information
about such social ills as child labor and pollution can help
consumers support more sustainable products. The authors examine
the opacity of corporate annual reports, the impenetrability of
government secrets, and emerging techniques of "information
foraging." The information imbalance of power can be
reconfigured, they argue, with greater and more meaningful
transparency from government and corporations.
Sarokin and Schulkin argue that freely flowing information helps
systems run more efficiently and that incomplete information does
just the opposite. It's easier to comparison shop for microwave
ovens than for doctors or hospitals because of information gaps
that hinder the entire health-care system. Better information
about such social ills as child labor and pollution can help
consumers support more sustainable products. The authors examine
the opacity of corporate annual reports, the impenetrability of
government secrets, and emerging techniques of "information
foraging." The information imbalance of power can be
reconfigured, they argue, with greater and more meaningful
transparency from government and corporations.