Intertwingularity

Intertwingularity is a term coined by Ted Nelson to express the complexity of interrelations in human knowledge.

Nelson wrote in Computer Lib/Dream Machines (Nelson 1974, p. DM45):

EVERYTHING IS DEEPLY INTERTWINGLED. In an important sense there are no "subjects" at all; there is only all knowledge, since the cross-connections among the myriad topics of this world simply cannot be divided up neatly.

and added the following comment in the revised edition (Nelson 1987, p. DM31):

Hierarchical and sequential structures, especially popular since Gutenberg, are usually forced and artificial. Intertwingularity is not generally acknowledged—people keep pretending they can make things hierarchical, categorizable and sequential when they can't.

The concept of intertwingularity has been celebrated in various ways, including the Intertwingled: The Work and Influence of Ted Nelson conference on April 14, 2014 at Chapman University. HuffPost covered the event.

Peter Morville wrote a book called "Intertwingled" about the intertwingularity of the universe, crediting Nelson with the word.

See also

• Connectedness
• Directed graph
• Interconnectedness
• Multicategory
• Multiclass classification, Multicriteria classification, Multi-label classification
• Multigraph
• Multiple inheritance
• Polysemy

References

• Nelson, Theodor (1974), Computer Lib: You can and must understand computers now/Dream Machines: New freedoms through computer screens—a minority report (1st ed.), South Bend, IN: the distributors, ISBN 0-89347-002-3 
• Nelson, Theodor (1987), Computer Lib/Dream Machines (Rev. ed.), Redmond, WA: Tempus Books of Microsoft Press, ISBN 0-914845-49-7 

External links

• blue sky: miscellaneous by Jamie Zawinski
• Intertwingly - Sam Ruby's blog named for this concept
• Intertwingled Peter Morville's blog and book inspired by this idea.