Data banks become the Encyclopedia of tomorrow, exceeding any single user’s capacity

Evidence

This creates the prospect for a vast market for competence in operational skills. Those who possess this kind of knowledge will be the object of offers or even seduction policies. Seen in this light, what we are approaching is not the end of knowledge—quite the contrary. Data banks are the Encyclopedia of tomorrow. They transcend the capacity of each of their users. They are “nature” for postmodern man. — Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition, 374

Categorization

• XREF: Directly parallels the move from Diderot’s Encyclopedia to database as epistemic infrastructure — relevant to the reader’s ADDENDUM on trees-as-infrastructure? Not directly; better: connects to discussions of AI/data as background ‘nature.’ — connects to: Reading the Encyclopedia means rewriting it through personal engagement — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel: Plasticity,…, 1243
• QUESTION: Lyotard calls data banks ‘nature for postmodern man’ — what exactly is a ‘nature’ that is socially constructed and computational? Worth chasing how he would square this with social constructivism.