Classified information

“ Educational journals, forestry publications, mining statistics, geological surveys, court decisions, all furnish valuable data. The only requirement in obtaining information is personal observation and investigation. ”

“ Do we find that the quantity of acquirement measures the quantity of insight? Is the amount of cardinal truth reached to be inferred from the mass of collected facts that serve as appliances for reaching it? By no means. Wisdom and information do not vary together. Though there must be data before there can be generalization, yet ungeneralized data, accumulated in excess, are impediments to generalization. When a man's knowledge is not in order, the more of it he has the greater will be his confusion of thought. ”

“ But classification consists in detecting resemblances of all degrees of generality, and ascertaining exactly how far such resemblances extend, while assigning precisely the points at which difference begins. It enables us, then, to generalise, and make inferences where it is possible, and it saves us at the same time from going too far. A full classification constitutes a complete record of all our knowledge of the objects or events classified, and the limits of exact knowledge are identical with the limits of classification. ”

“ In a minute a business man may put his hand on any one of ten thousand letters if they are properly classified. In the same way, the student of history, sociology or any other branch, can, if he studies the subjects aright, have all his knowledge classified and speedily available for use.... ”

“ Instead, such inclusion simply reflects that archived articles and/or research is available about a group or person that has generated some interest and/or controversy. All the information archived must be evaluated critically, through a process of independent and individual judgment. ”

“ To show how sociology can be systematized, a number of statistical tables, formulae, diagrams and maps are presented; and to encourage further investigation along these lines, blank forms are furnished for the collection and consideration of sociological data. ”

“ On the other hand the economists, the scholars who busy themselves with comparative law, with the history of religions, of art, of moral ideas, or who criticise political constitutions, all these perform a work of systematization upon the data collected with reference to these different orders of facts. ”

“ The object of classification is clear. We understand things if we can comprehend them; that is to say, if we can grasp and hold together single facts, connect isolated impressions, distinguish between what is essential and what is merely accidental, and thus predicate the general of the individual, and class the individual under the general. This is the secret of all scientific knowledge. Many sciences, while passing through this second or classificatory stage, assume the title of comparative. ”

“ Alienage classifications present a related variant, for strict scrutiny is applied to such classifications in the economic and social area, but only heightened scrutiny is applied when the classification relates to "political functions." ”

“ The ends of scientific classification are best answered, when the objects are formed into groups respecting which a greater number of general propositions can be made, and those propositions more important, than could be made respecting any other groups into which the same things could be distributed. The properties, therefore, according to which objects are classified, should, if possible, be those which are causes of many other properties ”

“ By such means early inclinations to various defects are discovered and prevented, and valuable statistics are obtained which can not only be utilised for comparative purposes, but may form a basis for future legislation. ”

“ That orderly arrangement of objects called Classification has two purposes, which, though not absolutely distinct, are distinct in great part. It may be employed to facilitate identification, or it may be employed to organize our knowledge. If a librarian places his books in the alphabetical succession of the author's names, he places them in such way that any particular book may easily be found, but not in such way that books of a given nature stand together. ”

“ This stance is both unhelpful and divisive, blinding researchers to the important questions raised above regarding the types of information used, by whom, for what purpose, and under which circumstances. Rather, our role as scientists ought to be to investigate the processes surrounding the use of evidence and policy activities more widely and to disseminate findings in order to help others make informed decisions, of all kinds. ”

“ The fact that the unworked mass of modern information through excavations is so great as to put off for a long time still a systematic treatise, has led to the plan of publishing these essays and addresses from time to time as completed and in uniform style. Although written for very different audiences and in various methods, each is an attempt to gather information not generally accessible and to be, so far as it goes, either a contribution to knowledge or to the method of knowledge, a sort of preliminary report or investigation in the field, pending full and systematic report. ”

“ What gives to the statistical method its greatest scope and power is, that its evidence and proof of law applies indiscriminately to what we call physical, biological, and ethical products of society, these various effects acting and reacting on one another. ”

“ The test in each case is the effect of the book, picture or publication considered as a whole, not upon any particular class, but upon all those whom it is likely to reach. In other words, you determine its impact upon the average person in the community. The books, pictures and circulars must be judged, as a whole, in their entire context, and you are not to consider detached or separate portions in reaching a conclusion. You judge the circulars, pictures and publications which have been put in evidence by present-day standards of the community. ”

“ Classification is a matter of convenience and technic; though it may have a scientific basis, it is entirely a matter of form. There is always danger that a particular classification may become a fetich. It is the life of society that we study, it is the improvement of social relations at which we aim. Whatever method best contributes to this end is valid in classification for all except those who delight in science for science's sake. ”

“ Without the help afforded by classification he would be overwhelmed by the immense number of facts brought before him and without the aid of classification he would never have known of evolution, the guiding star of modern investigation. ”

“ If but certain common and generally accepted data are established, that may serve everywhere as sign-posts to guide investigation, a mass of facts will follow, throwing a wholly new light upon the relations of man in the past and the present. ”

“ If the recipient of information believes that its assigned classification is not sufficiently protective, he shall safeguard it in accordance with the classification he deems appropriate and shall bring his reasons for such belief to the attention of the appropriate classifying authority with a request for upgrading. ”

“ Closer inspection of our materials, the employment of the comparative method, occasionally the bringing to light of new authorities—all contribute to an increase of real knowledge, and historical studies in this respect do not differ from other branches of research. ”

“ The Method of Natural Classification consists in classing cases, not according to any assumed Definition, but according to the connexion of the facts themselves, so as to make them the means of asserting general truths. ”

“ A classification system is a schedule or chart of knowledge arranged in some logical order according to a definite and invariable principle. It may arrange knowledge by the historical, evolutionary or some other and arbitrary principle, the choice of which is governed by the rule that the order must be that which is likely to be most serviceable to the users of the system. ”

“ After showing that politics is now taking its place among the sciences, and as a science its superstructure rests on observed and classified facts, he says of the registration of political facts, which consists of history and statistics, that ‘it may be considered as the entrance and propylæa to politics. ”

“ Although data can only be criticised by other data, not by an outside standard, yet we may distinguish different grades of certainty in the different kinds of common knowledge which we enumerated just now. What does not go beyond our own personal sensible acquaintance must be for us the most certain: the “evidence of the senses” is proverbially the least open to question. What depends on testimony, like the facts of history and geography which are learnt from books, has varying degrees of certainty according to the nature and extent of the testimony. ”

“ If any one is sufficiently curious and patient to study the catalogues of the average small British public or subscription library, he will be surprised at the numerous evidences of bad judgment in book-selection, the lack of proportion between class and class, author and author, subject and subject, and an entire absence of proper classification and intelligence in cataloguing. ”

“ The essential feature of the classificatory system, that to which it owes its name, is the application of its terms, not to single individual persons, but to classes of relatives which may often be very large. ”

“ The complications and intersections of human knowledge prevent anything more than an approximation to this ideal, but it has been found in actual practice to be a classification scheme which works easily and harmoniously. ”

“ In treating of an unwritten language of which others are to judge chiefly from examples, it appeared desirable that the positions advanced should be accompanied by the data upon which they respectively rest—at least, by so much of the data employed, as to enable philologists to appreciate the justice or detect the fallacy of our conclusions. ”

“ For the information given, he alone is accountable; no contemporary statements having been referred to: except those relating to statistics, which are compiled from the best and most recent authorities, and are added to make the work more complete. ”

“ See, then, what we have to guard against in collecting sociological data—even data concerning the present, and, still more, data concerning the past. For testimonies that come down to us respecting bygone social states, political, religious, judicial, physical, moral, etc., and respecting the actions of particular causes on those social states, have been liable to perversions not simply as great, but greater ”

“ For evidence in favour of this view we must take a rapid survey of the whole domain of human science, and test the chief departments of it to see how far they contain, on the one hand, objective knowledge and facts, and on the other, subjective knowledge and hypotheses. ”

“ DISCRIMINATION BY CLASSIFICATION. The intricacies of classification afford boundless opportunity for favoritism. Classification is always more or less arbitrary by necessity, and is frequently more arbitrary than necessary. ”

“ The mass of data that has not been seen, or very imperfectly seen, that has been misunderstood, or incorrectly recorded, the many pitfalls of omission and commission cause one at times to wonder at the temerity of those who feel confidence in what is termed the comparative method. ”

“ Here is a note Butler made about classification:
“Fighting about words is like fighting about accounts, and all classification is like accounts. Sometimes it is easy to see which way the balance of convenience lies, sometimes it is very hard to know whether an item should be carried to one account or to another.” ”

“ The historical student knows that his first business should be to inquire into the validity of his evidence, and the nature of the record in which the evidence is contained, that he may be able to form a proper estimate of the correctness of the conclusions which have been drawn from that evidence. ”

“ A second step could be taken, one that is already being carried on, through the medium of investigation. Thus the collection of data should be supplemented by specific investigations of various matters of interest to the public welfare. ”

“ In short, the more extended collection of economic data is now rendered possible by the better methods employed in census and statistical bureaus, and the resort to the work of verification of economic principles by the examination of these data is the one thing only which can redeem political economy from the baseless and common charge of being a set of impractical formulæ. ”

“ Even in private life this science is likely to prove of immense advantage, by directing attention to the collection and registration of facts, and thus preventing the formation of hasty judgments and erroneous conclusions. ”

“ It is of importance, however, to recognize that in all investigations classification is not an end, but a means. He who classifies clears the way for future work, either of his own or of others, but he does not necessarily reach anything permanent or effective in itself. ”

“ The first part of the classification, as published, contains the first six classifications and a combined index to them all. The seventh, the fullest classification, will have 10 sections. Five of them are published, each with its own index. Of two (Social sciences and Language and literature) about half is published. When these and the other three (Natural sciences, Industrial arts, Recreative and fine arts) are printed, a full index to the whole will be made. ”

“ Although the chief purpose of classification is to disclose the deepest and most general resemblances of the objects classified, yet the practical value of a system will depend partly upon the ease with which we can refer an object to its proper class, and thus infer concerning it all that is known generally of that class. ”

“ On the subject of Induction, the task to be performed was that of generalizing the modes of investigating truth and estimating evidence, by which so many important and recondite laws of nature have, in the various sciences, been aggregated to the stock of human knowledge. ”