KERBABEL

You have entered through The KERBABEL Doorway.  Here you will find information about the philosophy and purposes of the ePLANETe platform, and presentation of our distinctive KerBabel knowledge mediation and deliberation support tools.

KerBabel is our trademark.  It is a neologism, composed as an oxymoron of ‘ker’ (Breton for hearth/locality) and ‘Babel’ as in Tower of Babel or cacophony.  This highlights the challenge of positioning action at a “local” scale, with the intelligence of immediate experience, relative to wider systemic perspectives.  It highlights the challenge of human intelligence and action grounded in a specific time and space, while making use of capacities for synthesis and abstract representation.  Finally, in this dawning age of 'AI' (Algorithmic Imbecility), it proposes vigilance in affirming and maintaining self-conscious inter-subjectivity as we get buffeted around in our increasingly 'augmented' reality.  

Through the KerBabel Doorway, you have access to three distinct Thematic Spaces, offering:

• An introduction to the KerBabel Deliberation Support Tools.
• An introduction to the KerBabel Knowledge Warehouse with its set of Elemental Catalogues that permit the cataloguing and mobilisation of meta-information profiles for Indicators and for diverse sources of concepts and data of use in sustainability studies.  
• An introduction to the 'PANORAMIX' Thematic Space giving an overview of the entire ePLANETe system.

A core ambition of the ePLANETe is to "build knowledge partnerships for sustainability".   This means finding ways to “bridge” between different perspectives and forms of expertise, and to facilitate reciprocal exchanges or dialogues between different groups of people with their distinctive knowledge sets and preoccupations.  The ‘KerBabel’ knowledge mediation and deliberation support tools are designed to build capacity for collaborative and participative actions in territorial governance.  They provide for (1) the interfacing between “local” (vernacular) and more “formal” (systematised, scientific, technical) dimensions of knowledge; and (2) the interfacing of different stakeholder perspectives in the search for inclusive, equitable and environmentally sustainable solutions.

The on-line KerBabel Deliberation Support Tools include, at the present time, the KerBabel Deliberation Matrix (or KerDST, for short), and the K4U (Knowledge-for- You) tool for nested multi-criteria evaluation.  In general terms, the ambition is to allow stakeholders to work together to build and carry out an exercise of multi-stakeholder multi-criteria evaluation.  An evaluation problem is structured along three dimensions, the axes of the Deliberation Matrix, which portray: (1) The objects of comparative evaluation attention (e.g., scenarios, alternative sites, investment strategies, public policy options); (2) The spectrum of the high-level performance criteria, goals and challenges; and (3) The different actors or stakeholders involved in, or potentially affected by the problem.

An evaluation exercise must be informed by propositions of knowledge about the situation and possible futures, and by normative judgements about the quality or acceptability of the different options.  Several KerBabel "service" tools therefore provide specifically for the cataloguing of knowledge propositions in preparation for their mobilisation in evaluation exercises.  Via the KerBabel Knowledge Warehouse, users are initiated to several galleries of Elemental Catalogues, including:

• The KerBabel Indicator Kiosk (KIK) which catalogues concepts as Indicators and Arguments potentially to be mobilised to inform a deliberation;
• The Cabinet of Curiosities, or gallery of Well-Springs, which organises the interfacing of the KerBabel tools with external sources of information and data;
• The KerBabel Representation Rack (Grille de Représentation) which classifies knowledge propositions for their pertinence with reference to, on the one hand, their origins or sources (conceptual frames, classes of knowledge holders) and, on the other hand, the target objects of evaluation and the spectrum of performance issues.  
• The Babel²Gardens, which is a repository for any sorts of documents or media files, including bibliographical data on publications and Internet Websites, identified as supplementary resources potentially useful as Further Information in relation to an Object mobilised in any ePLANETe gallery.

Several functionalities of ‘ePLANETe’ provide a reflexive overview of the ePLANETe itself.   These functionalities are presented in the 'PANORAMIX' Thematic Space which (among other things) provides access to two important galleries:

• "The Gallery of Galleries", which presents (1) the complete set of ePLANETe galleries, (2) the types of objects that they house, and (3) the main uses of these objects.
• The gallery "Les SMMAAD", which is a catalogue of the Project Portals (known in French as a SMMAAD = Système Multimédia d’Apprentissage et d’Aide à la Délibération) that have been developed with the aid of ePLANETe.

The “Gallery of Galleries” presents the profiles of the 24 distinct galleries found in ePLANETe, profiles of the Types of Objects found in Collections in each of these galleries, and the catalogues of the 'Records' - or Identity Cards - for the Collections of Objects.  Moving through these levels, the visitor will find elements of information about the uses of each Type of Object in the various collaborative learning, knowledge mediation and deliberation support activities facilitated by ePLANETe.  In many cases, the objects belonging to one gallery, can be exploited within that gallery or, in various ways, in other galleries.  By explaining the uses of a type of object, we explain therefore the roles of the reference gallery, and also the inter-relations between galleries.

The gallery "Les SMMAAD" presents profiles of the bespoke Project Portals that have been developed with the aid of ePLANETe.  We have a specific name, in French, for such a portal: it is called a SMMAAD, which is an acronym for Système Multi-Média d'Apprentissage et d'Aide à la Délibération.  (Translated into English this would be a multi-media system for collaborative learning and deliberation support).  Each SMMAAD is oriented to a specific User Community, who make intensive and concerted use of ePLANETe functionalities.  For these User Communities, a distinct portal gives access to the wanted ePLANETe functionalities and collections of objects in a customised way.  Typically, this involves the exploitation of a sub-set of the ePLANETe galleries, and the mobilisation in particular ways of the KerBabel tools in support of the specific collaborative learning, knowledge mediation, and deliberation support activities of this Community.  

Last but not least, through the KerBabel Doorway, you have entered into The People's ePLANETe.  This is the portal that gives access to any person who, navigating on the Internet, chooses to look into the ePLANETe and to explore the opportunities it provides for collaborative learning and deliberation about ecological transition and territorial sustainability challenges.  It is the SMMAAD for "The General Public"  - that is, for all or us, all of you.  By entering into the PANORAMIX Thematic Space (as described above), you can explore all the galleries, with access to selected Collections of Objects, examples of knowledge mediation tools, and demonstrations of deliberation support tools in the public domain.