In my second blog-post I implored those who profess to be knowledge practitioners to read some basic philosophy, and in particular some epistemology. To fill this hole I thought over the next couple of blog-posts I would introduce ‘truth types’ and ‘belief’.

In my opinion one of the problems with the knowledge management discipline is we can’t define what it means, and in particular we can’t define in a consistent way what we mean by knowledge. The Macquarie Dictionary provides eight definitions of knowledge. The first says knowledge is ‘acquaintance with facts, truths, or principles, from study or investigation.’ Another says knowledge is the ‘perception of fact and truth and being cognisant or aware of fact or circumstance.’ The last definition says knowledge is the ‘body of truths or facts accumulated by human beings in the course of time'.

From these definitions we might deduce that in order to have knowledge one must first have some facts. The same dictionary provides three definitions of a fact. The first says a fact is something that ‘has really happened or is the case.’ The second says a fact is a ‘truth known by actual experience or observation’, and the last muddies the waters by saying a fact is ‘something said to be true or supposed to have happened’.

The linking concept in both cases is truth, but what is truth? The Prussia philosopher Immanuel Kant held that there were two types of truth – analytic truths and synthetic truths. Analytic truths are statements whose denial leads to a contradiction (Horner & Westacott 2000, p. 21). For example, the assertion that ‘all mothers are female’ is an analytic truth because all mothers can be defined as a female parent. To deny the statement that ‘all mothers are female’ results in the absurd assertion that not all female parents are female. We arrive at this truth simply by analysing the subject term in the statement. According to Kant analytic truths are both necessarily true and universally true. By this he means that the truth cannot be conceived in any other way, and that the truth has a law-like generality with no exceptions.   Analytic truths represent knowledge because they are undeniable facts.

On the other hand synthetic truths are statements that are true but can be denied without creating a contradiction. For example the statement ‘most human mothers are over twelve years old’ is a synthetic truth because it contains two unrelated concepts – the concept of being over twelve years old, and the notion of being a human mother. We know the statement is true on the basis of experience, and not simply by understanding the meanings of the words. It is not inconceivable for there to be a nine year old human mother, but from experience we know that this is most unusual. Indeed, if we changed the statement to ‘most human mothers are over nine years old’ it would remain a synthetic truth.

If on the other hand we change the statement to ‘all human mothers are over nine years old’ we introduce a degree of fuzziness to the argument. We have an absolute statement that we understand to be generally true, and which many would believe to be true. Now we have to determine in what circumstances the belief is a truth, and when a truth constitutes knowledge. This is where the notion of ‘true belief’, and particularly ‘justified true belief’ and ‘appropriately caused true belief’, enters the debate – a subject I will deal with in the next blog-post.

At the moment it appears knowledge is a content-free word - maybe this doesn’t matter!

Regards, Graham