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This discussion starts with the message from Ofer Meilech.
Ofer Meilich. - 2/23/96
Hi Bo et al.!
There is a fundamental question that I'm struggling with:
What is the difference between knowledge and information?
It seems to me that in the past decades, when organizational theorists were referring to "information" in organizations, they were referring to both knowledge AND information. Conversely, with the resurgence of the knowledge management issue, the definition of knowledge seems to encompass both terms! Are we just playing with words and bottling old wine in new bottles?? Is "knowledge" a more encompassing term than "information"? Are these concepts inherently different? Can we define them as two related, yet mutually exclusive concepts?
I have been tinkering with the issue, and in particular with the last question. Yet, I prefer to get the forum's comments before "contaminating" you with my perspective.
Has anyone done any related academic/practical research in this area? I wasn't able to find clear leads in my literature search.
I'd appreciate posting this question and encouraging the forum's participants to respond directly to me (meilich@usc.edu). Once I'll receive a "critical mass" of responses, I'll put a summary for further discussion.
Best regards,
Ofer Meilich.
+------.....Ofer Meilich........MEILICH@usc.edu........-----------+ | University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089-1421 | Dept. of Management & Organization, School of Business Administration | Office:(213) 740-0752 / 740-0728 | |----------------------------------------------------------------------| |"No one is ever free to do something (s)he can't think of!" (Weick, 1979)| +---------------------------------------------------------------------+
Karl Wigg - 2/24/96
To the knowledge management forum:
As part of the hands-on knowledge mangement work that we have performed for about a decade, first with Arthur D. Little, later with Coopers & Lybrand, and now with Knowledge Research Institute, Inc., we have settled on the following "working definition" of knowledge vs. information:
"Knowledge consists of facts, truths, and beliefs, perspectives and concepts, judgments and expectations, methodologies and know-how.
Knowledge is accumulated and integrated and held over time to handle specific situations and challenges.
Information consists of facts and data organized to describe a particular situation or condition.
We use knowledge to determine what a specific situation means. Knowledge is applied to interpret information about the situation and to decide how to handle it."
To illustrate, a customer contacts his/her broker to conduct a transaction and the distinctions between information and knowledge for this interchange are:
Customer: "I have an account with you, its number is 4567. What is my balance?"
-- this is INFORMATION
The customer representative (CR) possesses KNOWLEDGE on: How to operate her worksation, how to talk to customer, how to verify that caller is authorized person, how to interpret customer request, how to interpret account data, and how to explain it to customer. That knowledge may be considered "How-to" knowledge. In addition, the CR possesses (or can obtain from others or from support systems) other kinds of knowledge such as concepts about customers, customer accounts, and brokerage in general (e.g., different kinds of balances, margin status, legality of trades, etc.)
The CR obtains from her system INFORMATION such as: Account holder's name, needed password, type of account, account restrictions, account balances.
The above is a "practical delineation between information and knowledge. However, in our view, the progression from signals -> data -> information -> knowledge -> "wisdom" may be a continuum with many grey areas where it may not be clear what is information and what is knowledge. However, these grey cases typically become clearer when considering how the "information/knowledge" will be used.
Greetings
Karl M. Wiig Knowledge Research Institute, Inc.
Maarten Sierhuis - 2/24/95
As a response on the knowledge vs. information discusion I would like to add to the definition of knowledge the fact that knowledge is always "situated."
The way people in AI and cognitive science have looked at knowledge in the last two decades is changing today. Cognitive science has viewed knowledge as symbolic representations stored in the brain (Newell, 1990).
Today's view about knowledge is changing. Knowledge is not something that is stored in the brain. Knowledge is created in a situation, and is never again used in exactly the same way. This is called "situatedness" or "situated action". As an example; Think about a ballet dancer dancing on stage. There is *no* symbolic knowledge about the dance stored in the brain of the dancer. It is created while dancing, listening to the music, feeling the music, and the audience. It will never be that same dance again (Suchman, Clancey, Edelman, etc).
In this sense the question about knowledge vs. information is very clear. We can represent knowledge as information (i.e symbols), but that is *not* the same as knowledge. Knowledge is fluid, tacit, and forever changing. We cannot recall knowledge, as we can recall information, we can only experience a situation as similar and react to it in a similar way.
My views have changed over the years; a knowledge-based system does NOT contain knowledge, it represents knowledge as information that can be applied dynamically by the system.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Maarten Sierhuis NYNEX Science & Technology, Inc.
Member of Technical Staff Research & Development Work Systems
Design group
E-mail: sierhuis@nynexst.com 400 Westchester Avenue
voice: (914) 644-2352 White Plains, NY 10604
fax: (914) 761-4496 USA
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alex Goodall - 2/25/96
>There is a fundamental question that I'm struggling with: What is the difference between knowledge and information?
<snip>
>Has anyone done any related academic/practical research in this area? I wasn't able to find clear leads in my literature search.
>
The EuroKnowledge Project on KBS standardisation - part-funded by the European Union - is putting together a set of Terminology on KBS and has made an attempt to <define> Knowledge.
The August 1995 issue of my newsletter, AI Watch, was given over to a review of the status of the Project. Below I reproduce the section on the definition of Knowledge.
(By the way, I have a few spare copies of that issue of the newsletter and would be glad to send one to each of the first few people to ask for one.)
<Extract from August 1995 Issue of AI Watch>
(Definition of) Knowledge
Knowledge is anything that can be known or believed about a real or hypothetical world. Two important kinds of Knowledge are matters of fact and ways of reasoning. There are many other kinds.
This is an extremely broad interpretation of the term, intended to incorporate what is commonly referred to as either "data" or "information". The authors recognise that this definition does not provide a way of distinguishing those aspects of Knowledge that are neither data nor information. In order to overcome this they propose some early ideas that they admit need refinement. These ideas are that knowledge...
include facts and relations in a relational database, just as well as rules or frames or objects or semantic nets. This certainly is a useful conclusion.
<End of Extract>
The Terminology work is being co-ordinated by Mike Ushold at AIAI, Edinburgh, UK (mfu@aiai.ed.ac.uk) EuroKnowledge is being co-ordinated by Mari George at Ilog, France (georges@ilog.fr)
Alex Goodall AI Intelligence PO Box 95 OXFORD OX2 7XL United Kingdom T:+44 1865-791 600 F:+44 1865-791 007 E: alex@aiintelligence.com
Eunika Mercier-Laurent - 2/26/95
My answer to Ofer Meilich
>What is the difference between knowledge and information?
Information is static, knowledge is information in "knowledge representation" form (conceptual model, objects, frames, constraints, cases, rules, graphs, etc) and different kind of reasoning (decision making, learning, etc). Knowledge has an environment and can be shared (information to, but only data). Knowledge management includes also organisation, strategy, "corporate" decision, and "corporate model".It is very difficult to build everything from scratch. Starting first application think about all aspects (model , strategy, influence on organisation, integration, ROI, reutilisability, genericity,..) and build first component of Corporate Memory. Next applications will be next components. Building CM and playing LEGO is similar. Classic Information processing is different.
>Has anyone done any related academic/practical research in this area?
Yes, Over ten yers in research and applications, mainly industrial. Unfortunately most of my papers are in french but I have some in english and I'm writing a book. It is not easy to publish on applications because of confidential aspects and competitors of involving compagnies.
List of papers :
1. Optimisation de la distribution physique grce aux techniques de l'intelligence artificielle - Carrefours Logistique 1990.
2. Programmation par objets - Systmes Experts en Gestion d'Entreprise - Clermont-Ferrand 1990.
3. Programmation par Contraintes - Systmes Experts en Gestion d'Entreprise - Bayonne 1991.
4. Diagnostic des cartes electroniques analogiques, Seminaire AIA Paris 1992
5. CORAIL, l'Interface en langage naturel aux bases de donnes relationnelles - Colloque : Evolution de l'outil informatique l'Universit (Lyon 1992)
6. Informatique Stratgique: Apport de l'IA dans l'entreprise, Contraintes et gestion des ressources, Diagnostic des pannes de rseaux, Interfaces Intelligents, Methodologie et Connaissances, Entretiens de la Technologie Paris 1992
7. Mthodologie de dveloppement de systmes base de connaissance - Expersys - 93 (Paris)
8. Right tool for the right problem - Expersys - 94 (Houston)
9. Maintenance of PlaneÆs Engines using CBR, Expersys95 San Francisco
10. Methodology for Problem Solving using AI, Expersys95 San Francisco
11. Quo vadis IA ? Bulletin AFIA n22 1995
Comming : Tutorial on Knowledge management Expersys 96 Paris
I organise seminars on using CBR in KM, knowledge modeling, cognitive aspects in virtual reality and corganise seminars on KM with IIR. In Europe we organise ISMICK annual conference on management of industrial and corporate knowledge.
Sincerely yours
Eunika
==================================================================== Eunika MERCIER-LAURENT EML Conseil 17, Avenue du Plateau 78990 ELANCOURT, France Tel/Fax : 33 1 30 51 06 31 eml@diamant.ens-gestion.uvsq.fr ====================================================================
David J. Skyrme - 2/27/96
Re Ofer's message
>There is a fundamental question that I'm struggling with: What is the difference between knowledge and information? Are we just playing with words and bottling old wine in new bottles??
Unfortunatley many people are jumping onto the Knowledge bandwagon and don't really understand what they are talking about. Even a weel known academic recently wrote about Knowledge mapping, and on closer reading it was very much what Woody Horton would desrcibe as Information Mapping.
>Is "knowledge" a more encompassing term than "information"? Are these concepts inherently different? Can we define them as two related, yet mutually exclusive concepts?
Definitely YES.
>Has anyone done any related academic/practical research in this area? I wasn't able to find clear leads in my literature search.
I don't know about research, but I, with some business colleagues thought long and hard about this a few years ago - we even had off-site meetings defining the differences between a knowledge utility and an information utility. Here is a table I produced in 1992 - I still think most of what is says is valid today.
If anyone can refine or add, this is the place to do it!!
Table 2. Information vs. Knowledge
| Information | Knowledge |
| Tangible - informs humans | Human process - thinking/awarenesses |
| Processing changes representation | Processing changes consciousness |
| Physical objects | Mental objects |
| Context independent | Context affects meaning |
| Entity | Awareness and intuition |
| Easily transferable | Transfer requires learning |
| Reproducible at low cost | Not identically reproducible |
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
David J. Skyrme
Management Systems Consultant Tel/Fax: +44 1635 551434
David Skyrme Associates Limited Newbury, Berks, England
New - 'Management Insights' at http://www.hiway.co.uk/skyrme
-o- Intelligence -o- Insight -o- Innovation -o-
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Daniel W. Rasmus - 2/28/96
Bo [et al], see my latest column in Object Magazine (just out) for my twist on
this.
Daniel W. Rasmus Defining the intersection of technology and culture. Contact me at dwrasmus@earthlink.net or visit my WEB page: http://www.earthlink.net/~dwrasmus/
Avron Barr - 3/4/96
Bo, Ofer et al.,
I've finally caught up with the discussion on Knowledge vs. Information
Here's a couple of perspectives:
"Information is not knowledge until and unless it is applied effectively." Dan Burrus, Futureview, 1989. This is how a futurist explains the issue to lay people, but I think it captures something that
was expressed in different ways in our discussion.
John McCarthy talked about knowledge as an "ascribed" quality -- something we say about systems based on our observations of their behavior, knowledgeable behavior.
We can create as many types of "knowledge" as we want, to describe behavior, but we can't objectivize them. We can't say that any of them are representable, much less that they exist in some system, any more that we can say there is a neural engram based on observing people's
memory-related behaviors. Knowledge and information are two different kinds of things, only one of which can exist in data structures or other artifacts. (See "The Represenation Hypothesis," Barr, IJCAI '79, Tokyo).
.Avron
_____________________ Stanford Computer Industry Project Avron Barr and Shirley Tessler Co-Directors, Software Research 415.725.3856 Fax: 725.5913 barr@cs.stanford.edu, tessler@cs.stanford.edu http://www-scip.stanford.edu/scip/sirp.html
Denham Grey - 3/4/96
I do not picture a clear cut definition or division between information or knowledge rather I see one flowing into the other as qualities such as (truth, relevance, context, novelty, timeliness etc) are added or subtracted. There is also a very personal aspect to this continuum as one person's knowledge may be anothers information.
Where do you classify valuable heuristics and quality algorithms? They may be clearly represented (information) only of use when applied (knowledge), useful to a small segment of the population (novelty, scarcity).
My suggestion is: we are constrained by our language in our quest to delineate information from knowledge. Where does understanding belong?
Denham
------------------------------------------------------------------- GreyMatter, Inc. Knowledge Management Consultants 305 3rd Street Call: (412) 828-6059 Oakmont, PA 15139 E-mail: dgrey@telerama.lm.com Concepts are the currency of the knowledge age, invest wisely!! -------------------------------------------------------------------
Charles H. Green -- Fri, 8 Mar 1996
Bo,
With respect to the knowledge vs. information discussion thread, I'd like to add another distinction--that between information, knowledge and wisdom.
My perspective is predominantly that of business, given 20 years of post-MBA management consulting. However, I majored in philosophy and one parent has a doctorate in philosophy, so I have a foot in both camps.
As I think about it, I think in these terms:
--"Information" is "raw", i.e. un-acted upon by any receiver;
--"Knowledge" is information acted upon cognitively, i.e. transformed into some conceptual framework and hence manipulable and usable for other cognitive uses;
--"Wisdom" is applied knowledge, i.e. knowledge along with the common (or uncommon) sense to know when and how to use it.
The interesting distinction is between knowledge and wisdom. By this notion, "knowledge" connotes a solitary action, capable of being taken in the abstract by any one individual. The addition of wisdom implies the addition of experience. Experience is a cumulative matter; it may refer to an individual's own experience, or to the collective experience of more than one individual.
It is in this context that the distinction becomes useful. If we are to talk about "knowledge management" in a practical context, I think we should be talking about dialogues, not monologues, i.e. talking about people sharing experience and using that to transform knowledge into things practical. My personal excitement about things like the internet, intranets, and groupware is that these are vehicles for transforming the solitary concept of "knowledge", by sharing, into what merits the term wisdom.
I haven't got this all sorted out to my satisfaction, and I'm sure the other readers can poke some holes in this logic. Please do so, it'll certainly help me; but in so doing, be gentle--I think there's something to the equation of knowledge-plus-experience, even if I haven't quite articulated it right just yet.
Thanks for any help in thinking this through.
--Charles H. Green GreenSea Consulting
Gene Bellinger -- Sat, 9 Mar 1996
Responding to: Charles H. Green's remarks on Fri, 8 Mar 1996 (see above)
Charles;
I find your interpretations most meaningful, yet I seem to think I would push them down a level to read as:
--"Data" is "raw", i.e. un-acted upon by any receiver;
--"Information" is data acted upon cognitively, i.e. transformed into some conceptual framework and hence manipulable and usable for other cognitive uses;
--"Knowledge" is applied information, i.e. informaiton along with the common (or uncommon) sense to know when and how to use it.
--"Wisdom" is eternal truth distilled from knowledge.
And I also am still trying to sort it all out...
Gene Bellinger CrbnBlu@aol.com
Karl E. Sveiby - Monday, 3 March, 1996
For me it is dangerous to equate knowledge with information,
watch the most informatized markets in the world, the financial
markets! If you are interested why I think so, you may read a
recent article of mine about the strange behaviour of the
information markets.
One of the most confusing things in the present debate is that
the English language lacks the distinction common in most other
languages between knowledge as facts and knowledge as abilities.
To overcome this problem the British philospher Gilbert Ryle in
1949 coined Knowledge as facts "Know-That" and Knowledge as
ability "Know-How".
My own view on knowledge is influenced by the French
constructivists and the Hungarian/British Philosopher Michael
Polanyi (1891-1976, who first coined the label "Tacit
Knowledge".
He said in his book Personal Knowledge that
knowledge is an activity that is best described as a process of knowing.
The French constructivist philosophy was born in the late 1800s. They regard reality as something that is constructed in our minds. At first ridiculed by most scientifc disciplines, they regained influence in the wake of quantum physics.
You are welcome to learn more about Polanyi`s concept of Tacit Knowledge in a digest I have made.
Can you help me solve a puzzle? I am confused by the contradiction in the definitions of the concept of Information by the two founding fathers of Information Theory, Claude Shannon and Norbert Wiener. According to Wiener Information is a structure, which is similar to "facts" and thus makes common sense. According to Shannon however, Information is = Chaos, which seems to fit today` s reality much better. Wiener was the founder of cybernetics and systems theory, which has been a very influential paradigm for science not the least computer science. Suppose Shannon`s definition is more true today? What does that mean for Systems Theory?
For our understanding of Knowledge Management?
I also invite you to my web site and would of course like your views in an email.
Karl E. Sveiby
Eunika Mercier-Laurent Thursday, 21 March, 1996
After 2 weeks of vacation spent on Guadeloupe (thinking about KM definitions), some remarks on Karl's message :
>For me it is dangerous to equate knowledge with information, watch the most informatized markets in the world, the financial markets!
Financial market has the same problem in definition like others! Lets consider the begining of computer science : the vocabulary was : cybernetic, data processing (knowledge=data???), information processing.
What's difference between data and information ? From computer science point of view, I consider both static (without reasoning). From life point of view: I give you information, it is not knowledge, it is a part of my knowledge and it can become a part of your knowledge, but you decide about it.
>One of the most confusing things in the present debate is that the English language lacks the distinction common in most other languages between knowledge as facts and knowledge as abilities. To overcome this problem the British philospher Gilbert Ryle in 1949 coined Knowledge as facts "Know-That" and Knowledge as ability "Know-How".
I think it is not necessary to spend years searching philosopher expressions. Knowledge is "what we know" (in french : le savoir) and "know-how" (in french : le savoir-faire ). We can add "le savoir être" - it means acting in given situation. The last depends on personality, culture and mentality of "knowledge worker". This aspect is very important if we have to manage knowledge in world-wide environment.
I am member of Institut Fredrik R. Bull having multi-disciplinary workgroups(philosophers, psychologists, medecins, sociologists, linguists, biologists, neuro-biologists, psychiatrists, psychoanalysts,engineers. One of them was "Analogy, memory and knowledge", we have spent 3 years (4 days per year) to define these 3 words. If you are interested I can give you more information .
>My own view on knowledge is influenced by the French constructivists and the Hungarian/British Philosopher Michael Polanyi (1891-1976, who first coined the label "Tacit Knowledge".
Which was knowledge management activities in this period ??
>"knowledge is an activity that is best described as a process of Knowing."
Knowledge is not activity. Knowledge acquisition is an activity
> According to Wiener Information is a structure, which is similar to "facts" and thus makes common sense.
OK
>Shannon however, Information is = Chaos, which seems to fit today`s reality much better.
At the end of 20th century, today reality is chaos. Old theories are wrong and nobody has new theories.
>has been a very influential paradigm for science not the least computer science. Suppose Shannon`s definition is more true today? What does that mean for Systems Theory?
One element of my approach to KM is close to Newell : "Knowledge level" From Systems theory : knowledge is strategic element of systems. There are not systems without knowledge.
I'm looking forward to all additional comments.
======================================================================== Eunika MERCIER-LAURENT EML Conseil 17, Avenue du Plateau 78990 ELANCOURT, France Tel/Fax : 33 1 30 51 06 31 eml@diamant.ens-gestion.uvsq.fr ========================================================================
Karl E. Sveiby -- Friday, 22 March, 1996
[Note from host: Quotes from previous messages, available above, have been removed except as required for clarity].
Dear Eunika,
Thank you for your very interesting comments on knowledge - information.
>What's difference between data and information ? From computer science point of view, I consider both static (without reasoning).
>From life point of view: I give you information, it is not knowledge, it is a part of my knowledge and it can become a part of your knowledge, but you decide about it.
YES!
>>One of the most confusing things in the present debate is that the English language lacks the distinction common in most other languages between knowledge as facts and knowledge as abilities. To overcome this problem the British philospher Gilbert Ryle in 1949 coined Knowledge as facts "Know-That" and Knowledge as ability "Know-How".
> I think it is not necessary to spend years searching philosopher expressions. Knowledge is "what we know" (in french : le savoir) and "know-how" (in french : le savoir-faire ). We can add "le savoir être" - it means acting in given situation. The last depends on personality, culture and mentality of "knowledge worker". This aspect is very important if we have to manage knowledge in world-wide environment.
Dont you agree that the lack of a clear distinction in English language is a problem? I think it is, because the dialogue is in English language. You being French, me being Swedish are having a dialogue in English. Our own languages make this distinction, but we communicate in a language which is poor in the "knowledge field". We are caught and limited by the language we use.
> Which was knowledge management activities in this period ??
Depending on the definition we use, Knowledge Management is very old. I like and agree with Bo Newman's intro remark in the KMF-Forum:
"If we accept the premise that knowledge management is concerned with the entire process of discovery and creation of knowledge, dissemination of knowledge , and the utilization of knowledge then we are strongly driven to accept that knowledge management is much more than a "technology thing" and that elements of it exist in each of our jobs".
> Knowledge is not activity. Knowledge acquisition is an activity. If we are to "manage" something we need to understand what this something is. By using the noun Knowledge we connote it with a static object. Knowledge is however much more dynamic, we are changing our knowledge every second of our lives, without concsiously or actively acquiring knowledge. This is why I prefer Polanyis notion of knowledge as an "activity", and his preference of the verb "knowing" like in "tacit knowing". It is a huge difference in managing an object compared to an activity.
> One element of my approach to KM is close to Newell : "Knowledge level" From Systems theory: knowledge is strategic element of systems. There are not systems without knowledge.
I am not familiar with systems theory, this is probably the reason why I do not understand the lack of discussion around the contradiction in the two founding theories of systems theory. From the little I know, it seems that systems theory equates information = knowledge and that systems theorists can do that based on Wieners notion of information as structure.
However, as we both seem to agree on, Shannons notion of information as chaos is more up-to-date and more in line with todays world. To me it is thus a fundamental difference if the understanding of a systems "knowledge" (= information) is based on Wieners notion or on Shannons.
If knowledge = information is chaos, a system is always "open", never closed, and more "knowledge" does not mean better knowledge or higher levels of understanding. THIS is a puzzle!
Kind regards
Karl Erik
Alain J. Godbout -- Friday, 22 March, 1996
I have followed the discussion between Eunika Mercier-Laurent and Kark E. Sveiby with some interest, mostly because it brings back to some of the early works of our KM task force here in Canada. With your permission, I will bring forward some of our conclusions and hope it will enable a more productive discussion.
First: Why do we need to differentiate Information and Knowledge in the contexte of KM?
This simple question may seem evident, but it sheds some light over the attributes of an answer which may bring consensus amongst us. In our case, we found that we were dealing with differing points of view which were in fact trying to define the solution on the basis of what they could actually contribute.
For people with an engineering or Information technology background, Knowledge is seen as an object whith similar attributes to information, and therefore, the opportunity is seen as one of thechnology transfer, as long as knowledge can take a form which is sufficiently compatible to the available technology.
For people with a philosophy background, Knowledge is a human attribute which essentially differentiates humans from other objects. Since both data and information have been transfered to machines (beit Jacquart or Crays), the questions remains what makes knowlege specific enough to resists this transfer?
For people with social sciences background, knowledge is part of social resources which influences the distribution of power, wealth and capabilities within organizations and societies. The issue here is more whether it can be managed or not like data or information has been managed in the past.
Having different perspectives is not in itself a sufficient reason for not having a consensus. To overcome this difficulty required to consider some attributes which are helpful to all parties... in other words, having descriptors which enable all parties to recognize information or knowledge when faced with some.
Second: Is there more than one knowledge... and would that be the reason for the confusion.
When Eunika is referring to the french "SAVOIR" as the French of knowledge, my reaction was, why not "CONNAÎTRE" ? I assume, it is only amongst French speaking persons that you get such picky discussions. So bear with us please. The difference between both is subtle, but essential.
"Savoir" is used mainly to describe a state of knowing, an hability to recall relevant facts or to be able to declare the existence of something. This is why it can be qualified with other verbs such as doing (Savoir-faire - Know How), saying (Savoir-dire) or being (savoir-être).
"Connaîssance" is maily used to reflect the process or way of knowing, or the aspect of acquiring knowledge. It therefore describes a result in the context of its process.
In a humorous way, you could say that universities are houses of "Savoir" and streets are beds of "Connaissances".
By taking the approach of SAVOIR as the object of management, the assumption is that what needs to be managed is what can be "objectified" as knowledge. (Therefore, only knowledge which can be translated into information terms is manageable). The alternative is to manage the CONNAISSANCES which would imply to include in the "system" the production of knowledge. This is why, in Canada at least, knowledge management is called "gestion des connaissances".
The answer is yes!... much of the discussion stems from the fact that there are various forms of knowledge and this is a major source of confusion.
In summary...
This little piece of DATA... when placed in the context of the KM forum is INFORMATION for your perusal. Should you decide to place in in the context of the issues you are trying to address, the use you will make of it will become another piece of your KNOWLEDGE.
How you will use this knowledge in the future will reflect your WISDOM.
Alain J. Godbout KM Task Force Canada godbout@magi.com
Eunika Mercier-Laurent -- Monday, 25 March, 1996
[Note from host: Eunka seems to answering an earlier posting mentioning L. Ron Hubbard. For some reason, the referenced posting is not available in this archive].
> I use the definition by L RON HUBBARD:
> "Knowledge is total certainty and understanding OF information, people, phenomena..."
>
We have NEVER total certainty and understanding of information, people, etc
======================================================================== Eunika MERCIER-LAURENT EML Conseil 17, Avenue du Plateau 78990 ELANCOURT, France Tel/Fax : 33 1 30 51 06 31 eml@diamant.ens-gestion.uvsq.fr ========================================================================