1. Chapter 2 THE NATURE OF KNOWING
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Chapter 2
THE NATURE OF KNOWING

2. 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

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

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

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

6. 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

7. 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’

8. 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)

9. 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)

10. 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’

11. 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

12. 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

13. DATA, INFORMATION & KNOWLEDGE

14. 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)

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

16. 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

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

18. 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?

19. REALIST THEORY OF EXPLANATION
Figure 2.7 Realist theory of explanation

20. TYPOLOGIES OF KNOWLEDGE

21. STRUCTURE OF KNOWLEDGE

22. 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?

23. 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

24. 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

25. 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

26. 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

27. 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

28. 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

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