On last Friday’s Morning Edition, Richard Haass discussed some “softer” approaches to combating terrorism. One example he mentioned was a Carnegie Foundation project to make classical works on liberal Islamic thought freely available online. These texts, it is hoped, will influence intellectual discourse within the Islamic world.
For many of us who pursue digitization projects, the impulse to digitize has much to do with the desire to see historical materials connected with current public discourse. The current information age has a historical dimension, and the cultural products of the past can help us progress culturally, politically, socially, and economically.
