Chapter 2 THE NATURE OF KNOWING WELCOME! Chapter 2 THE NATURE OF KNOWING

WHAT IS KNOWLEDGE? LEARNING OBJECTIVES To describe the underlying philosophical traditions in western philosophy and their debates on the notion of knowledge To explain different philosophical paradigms in our understanding of knowledge To assess positivist, constructivist, postmodernist and realist perspectives in knowledge management To identify current typologies of knowledge within knowledge management

BUZZ GROUP What is ‘knowledge’? How does ‘knowledge’ differ from data or information?

THINKERS ON KNOWLEDGE ACROSS HISTORY Figure 2.1 Idealist and empiricist perspectives on knowledge

PLATO (427–347 BC) – THEAETETUS Socratic questionning Knowledge is perception Knowledge is true judgement Knowledge is true judgement together with an account

ARISTOTLE (384–322 BC) – THE METAPHYSICS Start with ‘appearances’ – ordinary beliefs and language Work through puzzles (contradictions and find central beliefs) Come back to ‘appearances’ with better understanding

DESCATES (1596–1650) – MEDITATIONS ‘Cartesian doubt’ –sceptic Lay aside things on common-sense grounds that are doubtful Doubt you are awake or perceiving anything at any moment Imagine malicious demon trying to deceive you ‘Cogito ergo sum’

IDEALISM & EMPIRICISM Idealists: Kant (bounded by ‘possible experience’), Hegel (dialectic), Husserl (Phenomenology), Heidegger (being), Satre (consciousness as ‘nothing’) Empiricist: Locke (knowledge comes from senses), Hume (truths of reason and fact), Peirce (abductive, deductive and inductive)

DAVID HUME (1711–1776) Agreed that one could make ‘inductive inferences’ such as A causes B (e.g. night follows day) But past experience could not justify future behaviour – no grounds to prove ‘principle of uniformity’ in nature Knocked bottom out of science Divided propositions into ‘truths of reason’ (from theory or a priori) and ‘truths of fact’ (from practice or a posteriori)

KANT (1724–1804) & HEGEL (1770–1831) Kant – saw knowledge as bounded by ‘possible experience’. Provided third proposition to Hume ‘Form of Sensibility’ that was synthetic and a priori (space and time are inescapable modes of experience) Hegel – saw goal of knowledge as greater development of mind towards freedom. Considered all concepts historically as part of ‘dialectic process’

AMERICAN PRAGMATISTS Peirce (1839–1914) – development of knowledge follows three phases of inquiry: ‘abductive’ (presenting theories for consideration), ‘deductive’ (preparing theories for test) and ‘inductive’ (assessing test results) James (1842–1910) – pragmatic theory of truth to be in accord with underlying evidence Dewey (1859–1952) – knowledge closely bound with activity. Keen on learning by doing

PHENOMENOLOGY & EXISTENTIALISM Husserl (1859–1938) – knowledge based on our conscious awareness. Established movement known as phenomenology Heidegger (1889–1976) – concerned with the ‘question of being’. Human existence or ‘Dasein’ linked to public norms Sartre (1905–1980) – sees consciousness as nothingness and not subject to rules of causality

DATA, INFORMATION & KNOWLEDGE

WISDOM & PROVERBS Children have more need of models than of critics (French) You can’t see the whole sky through a bamboo tube (Japanese) There is plenty of sound in an empty barrel (Russian) Trust in Allah, but tie your camel (Muslim) Wonder is the beginning of wisdom (Greek)

BUZZ GROUP Which philosophical position would you adopt to best understand knowledge in organisations? Which philosopher has the greatest influence on your thinking?

Ryle & Polanyi Ryle: Distinction between ‘knowing how’ and ‘knowing that’ Polanyi: Develops Ryle’s distinction as existing along a continuum ‘the fact that we can know more than we can tell’ Figure 2.2 Philosophy of Gilbert Ryle and Michael Polanyi

PARADIGMS & EPISTEMOLOGIES Figure 2.4 Burrell and Morgan’s four paradigms and different epistemologies (adapted from Burrell and Morgan 1979)

BUZZ GROUP Please explain why there is almost negligible management research from a ‘radical humanist’ or ‘radical structuralist’ perspective Why is management research dominated by a functionalist perspective? What are the dangers of a functionalist perspective?

REALIST THEORY OF EXPLANATION Figure 2.7 Realist theory of explanation

TYPOLOGIES OF KNOWLEDGE

STRUCTURE OF KNOWLEDGE

TAXANOMIC PERSPECTIVE Treats knowledge as a commodity Nonaka with his knowledge conversion processes Is tacit and explicit knowledge mutually constituted? Can our awareness of knowledge change over time?

PROCESS-BASED PERSPECTIVE Draws on social constructivism Emphasis on ‘knowing as a social and organisational activity’ Knowing is a form of sensemaking where individuals develop meanings of the world Only reality is one of ideas and constituted by our perceptions

PROCESS-BASED PERSPECTIVE (CONTINUED) Knowing is dynamic and subject to change Knowing is uncertain as intersubjectivity and interpretations may change Knowing is context dependent and inseparable from social context Isolates mental activity as distinctive feature of self

POSTMODERNISM Postmodernists emphasise diversity of world, plurality of perspectives and difficulty of obtaining reliable knowledge ‘Incommensurability’ – cannot understand radically different discourses while retaining own beliefs Can protect favoured discourses from criticism

FEMINISM ‘Situated’ knowledge concerning power in what constitutes knowledge Bears social context of sex, race and gender of authors Argues certain positions more advantageous than others Problematic as can assume research by white males is distorted but not black females

PRACTICE-BASED PERSPECTIVE Action is more primary than thought Knowing is inseparable from practice and ‘embedded’ in human activity Knowing is something we do rather than possess Knowing and practice are mutually constituted

PRACTICE-BASED PERSPECTIVE (CONTINUED) Orlikowski (2007) argues that social and material are ‘constitutively entangled’ Uses metaphor of a ‘scaffold’ to describe how ICT scaffolds and influences social activities Language conveys meaning but can be ‘ambiguous’ as knowledge depends on context and social activity

REALIST CONCEPTION Figure 2.8 Realist conception of organisational knowledge (Jashapara 2007)