Knowledge

The simple dictionary definition of knowledge is knowing or familiarity gained by experience. Creating a precise definition of knowledge is difficult. So, what is knowledge is distinguished from what is not. Knowledge is a pluralistic concept. No one framework can capture its facets and its richness. It is not data, nor information. It exists only in human minds and cannot be stored directly or completely in computers or in any other medium. Knowledge cannot be communicated directly unlike data, and information, which can be. Both cognitive mapping and concept mapping are used as intellectual devices with aims of representing and recording facets of knowledge. Churchman (1971) explains that knowledge and information are distinct entities; knowledge resides in the user of information and not in the collection of information; it is how the user reacts to the collection of information that matters. Information becomes knowledge when it is understood or comprehended at a deeper level as a result of human mental activity involving perhaps the further analysis of information including association with other data or information (Jarvis, 1999). Such knowledge can lead to purposeful human activity, in particular managing those things considered to be risks to successful achievement or completion of that purposeful human activity.