The Cognitive Cosmos
Pavilions and palaces are very partial
exhibitions of selected nuggets and weblets
from the arising cognitive cosmos.

In the following excerpt from The Wireless Age
the cognitive cosmos is called The Grand Idea.
The metaphor is that within the communications cosmos
that is the Internet
all knowledge becomes interconnected
on the basis of its meaning,
in a way comparable to how
the sum of what you come to know over your lifetime
becomes interconnected within in your thoughts.
Because the Internet is in its infancy, The Grand Idea is not obvious. Like the baby’s conception of a tree, it is not as rich as his idea will be in later life, but the connections are valid. The Grand Idea is organic. It grows, and parts of it wither and are pruned and then refreshed. New twigs of knowledge sprout, and develop into branches. Most academic disciplines have already hyperwebbed their ideas to some degree, including: mathematicians, herpetologists, biotechnolgists, astronomers, linguists, geographers, political scientists and theorists, anthropologists, and so on and on. Where fields touch each other, increasingly they can be traversed on the Internet as experts link avenues to exchange what they know. The hyperweb gets richer as mathematical geographers are sharing their formulas with theoretical geometry, as herpetologists and anthropologists find common ideas in the study of migrations. Two huge forces are maturing The Grand Idea. The first is the cascade of new knowledge on to the Internet, along with the advances in cognitive design that make the newer knowledge increasingly instructive and beautiful. The second is the quickening pace of interconnection of related pages and sources. The Grand Idea allows all of us to follow our way through the connections to new understanding and ideas. The vision of the Library of Alexandria need haunt us no more. The knowledge of humankind is converging on the Internet. Its quickening divergence will bring it to everyone on the planet, including all children who hold cheap access to The Grand Idea in their hands.

The Grand Idea is not the teacher nor a theory. From the perspective of education, The Grand Idea is the substance of what can be taught and known. Many of the biggest battles in education today are fought over theories of how to teach. I think all the theories are essentially correct. If well employed, every method across the spectrum of approaches teaches children, from rows of kids learning by rote, to the least confined discovery environment. The Grand Idea is not part of the pedagogical battle. All of the theories of teaching thrive in the new hyperwebbed Grand Idea. Everything is to be found that [is called for by every method].