People Are Not Sponges: Information vs. Knowledge

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In The Social Life of Information, Brown and Duguid (2002) distinguish between mere information and learning—or knowledge, asserting that humans are not mere sponges. They say that if information, alone, equates knowledge, bots might indeed replace the need for human involvement toward prosperity. Yet, they assure that this is not the case.

Learning is a human response to information—it entails a knower and it requires processing, understanding, and internalizing of information.

Information stands alone.

Brown and Duguid develop this idea as follows: “In general, it sounds right to ask, ‘Where is that information?’ but odd to ask, ‘Where’s that knowledge?” (p. 119).

“People treat information as a self-contained substance. It is something that people pick up, possess, pass around, put in a database, lose, find, write down, accumulate, count, compare, and so forth. . . . You might expect, for example, someone to send you or point you to the information they have, but not to the knowledge they have.” (p. 120).

"Knowledge is something we digest rather than merely hold. It entails the knower’s understanding and some degree of commitment. Thus while one person often has conflicting information, he or she will not usually have conflicting knowledge. And while it seems quite reasonable to say, ‘I’ve got the information, but I don’t understand it,’ it seems less reasonable to say, ‘I know, but I don’t understand,’ or ‘I have the knowledge, but I can’t see what it means.’ “ (p. 120).

Learning is constructive assimilation.

As an individual selects information to process and further internalizes and learns that information, he/she constructs or molds the core of his/her being.

You might like to read more of my summaries of points made in this book:


Are Machines Replacing People?

Don't Stamp Out the Stand-Outs