We’re beginning this in and with the year 2018. It will be updated “backwards” in time as we get the time to do so.
We live in a time where short articles, secondary literature – as well as images and videos – dominate and is, mostly, accessible on the Internet. Readily available information of course has many good sides. But, while people have easy access to lots of information, what do they know?
Information and knowledge is not the same.
Knowledge is structured information, based on some categorisations of types of information which are again based on theories and concepts: How do things work, how are different types of information/facts/data related to each other, how complex is a problem that we need to solve?
Knowledge is a tool to avoid superficiality, and the more you know, the more you are likely to want to know more. It’s about a never-ending source of curiosity.
Self-deceptive simplifications reign everywhere in today’s fast and rather fleeting world – and little research and deep thinking. At TFF we do not endorse or contribute to it. Because, simply, it leads to civilisational decay…
To be able to search something isn’t the same as knowing that something in-depth. It doesn’t help us to distinguish between facts, fake and omissions.
A person without knowledge will be confused and – guaranteed – be fooled, at least in political matters, if she or he has no knowledge to interprete information with.
Knowledge leads to understanding, sheer information doesn’t. Knowledge is about the long argument, or reasoning. It’s about how various elements of a problem relate to each other.
Such long and complex stuff can only be found in books – not in smart arguments, slogans, mantras or public relation statements.
We need book learning to educate ourselves and it is the only effective barrier against fake, lies and propaganda.
We need books to avoid ending up in a dark place where we seem to be heading: toward the post-literate society with a thick surface and thin depth, no substance. Educated people stand a better chance to look through attempts to fool them.
TFF Associates are people who read and who write books. Too.
We have listed good sources to trustworthy knowledge about violence, peace and conflicts – and more – here.
On this page we focus only on TFF Associates’ books. This guides you to: a) substantial, longer analyses by TFF Associates and b) we want to help our Associates sell their books. So, it’s a win-win for all.
If you’ve read an interesting article by a TFF Associate here on The Transnational, why not visit this page and see whether she or he has also published the larger, complex argument from which you can learn more about the world?
2018
John Scales Avery
The Information Explosion
David Swanson
Curing Exceptionalism: What’s wrong with how we think about the United States? What can we do about it?
Richard Falk
Revisiting the Vietnam War And International Law: View and Interpretation of Richard Falk
Editor Stefan Andersson
See alsoTFF PressInfo # 447: Richard Falk on US wars as criminal enterprises
Ina Curic
Peace education books for children and parents
Scilla Elworthy
The Business Plan for Peace. Building a World Without War
Jonathan Power
Ending War Crimes, Chasing the War Criminals
