Marco Lisi
Present times are witnessing an exponential growth in the quantity of information available as a whole for human beings and its distribution at a global level by an increasingly sophisticated "mass media". The quantity of information in a broad sense (technical, scientific, literary, etc.) produced in the last twenty years of history, is equivalent to all the previous millennia combined. In the coming decades this quantity will double again. This enormous, almost disheartening mass of data, which could not be explored even in several lifetimes, is now available to anyone owning a computer and connected to the telephone network by the touch of a button. Paradoxically, this abundance of data, information, facts and figures which surrounds us and permeates our existence, further highlights our growing incapacity to finding a unifying thread to help us understand reality and guide our actions. Economic reality in particular is becoming more dynamic and competitive, and requires fast and proactive decisions. This is so important that we feel the need for a tool that can aid us in passing from the overabundance of useless information to the essence of real knowledge. "Knowledge management", meaning the ability to extract operational knowledge (economically assessable) from the data available, is a great challenge which every company faces at the dawn of the third millennium.
The evolution of work and economic assets
An exponentially evolving situation entails radical social changes and more especially a different conception of work and the economic assets associated with it. Throughout history, the concept of work and associated social systems have continuously evolved since the "invention" of agriculture, about 6,000 years before Christ and, even more significantly, since the introduction of the plough around 2,000 B.C. Since then there has been a continuous, accelerated rate of innovation, which has taken humanity from an economy based on hunting to an agricultural economy, and finally to an industrial economy. However, the transition to a knowledge based economy has begun for the nations of the developed and developing world at least. A range of expressions (like "know-how", "knowledge management", "knowledge worker") have become commonplace and show the importance given to knowledge as an economic "asset" of a company (often the most important asset). The transition to the era of knowledge and a global knowledge based economy is being accelerated by the convergence of telecommunications, television and computers, i.e. the so called multimedia technologies. The Internet phenomenon can be viewed as a paradigm for this.
Knowledge as a product and its economic content
Speaking of a knowledge-based economy is equal to defining knowledge as a real product, equipped with economic content and value on the financial markets. But what does this "knowledge" product effectively comprise? And what do the so-called "knowledge workers" actually produce? An initial concise answer could be that the value of knowledge is linked to the value of creativity. Creativity in turn allows us to save the only truly non-renewable resource we have: our time. More precisely, knowledge work is creativity applied to the sea of information, in an analytic-synthetic way that creates new perspectives and in sum, more efficient actions. Knowledge workers, avoid the gravitational attraction of rigidly deductive speculation, and use unconventional thought mechanisms instead (e.g. "lateral thinking"). They can therefore free themselves from the mass of information and "invent" new perspectives, to then communicate to others. The cultural tools of the knowledge worker are typically those of inductive and lateral (rather than deductive) thinking: analogies, myths, metaphors, dreamy images. At this point we should be reminded of the story of one of the fathers of organic chemistry, the German chemist Friedrich August Kekulè, who defined the circular structure of the benzene molecule after having dreamt of a snake grasping its tail and forming a ring (the archetypical symbol of the "uroboros"). Even Albert Einstein often admitted using scientific metaphors as instruments to stimulate his creativity. He said that his first insight into the theory of relativity came by imagining himself "riding" a ray of light. Metaphors and metaphoric language are also highly evocative means by which the knowledge worker manages to communicate the fruits of his/her creative work to others.
The McLuhan prophecy
Back in 1964 McLuhan, in his famous book "Understanding Media", described the arrival of the Internet and World Wide Web within thirty years with amazing accurateness: "Today, after using electricity for more than a century, we have extended our central nervous system to encompass the globe, which abolishes time as well as space, at least for our planet. We are quickly reaching the final phase of the extension of man: that is, the phase in which, through technological simulation, the creative process of knowledge will be collectively extended to the entire human race, just as we have extended our senses and nerves through various means". And if it is true that, continuing to cite McLuhan, "the medium is the message", then, beyond an apparently specialised and immensely parcelled message, the "medium" represented by modern IT, on the contrary, is highly unifying and suggests a holistic approach to knowledge which is almost shamanic.
Cyberspace, virtual reality and shamanism
The metaphor of the shaman is often associated with the experience of navigating in cyberspace. In the state of altered conscience with which one is immersed in virtual reality, the modern navigator of knowledge enters into a light trance that is similar to the shamanic experience. Just like the shaman of the Andes and the Amazon rainforests who leaves the earth to blend with it by temporarily cancelling the individual "ego" (and far from being possessed by it eventually ends up possessing it), the virtual reality navigator in cybernetic space achieves a direct experience in the world of information and data, and an empathetic, non analytical approach to knowledge. The altered (but not suppressed) state of consciousness induced by the immersion in virtual reality seems to reawaken the sedated force of the concerted and holistic Dionysian myth, under the surface of our Apollonian-Platonic cultural training which is monodic and individual. It is the overcoming of the classical Cartesian duality between subject and object that reminds us of the direct experience of the truth told by the mystics and sung by poets such as Dante. It is not by chance that Mircea Eliade, in his book on shamanism, defines the shamanic experience as more similar to ecstasy than a dream. Virtual reality must not be interpreted as a world of dreams, but rather as a new "medium", whose message is that of the multi-sensorial approach and fundamentally syncretistic to knowledge.
Consciousness and knowledge in the global network era
An evolution of the cognitive experience can only imply parallel evolution of the concept of consciousness. Roy Ascott, a forerunner of cybernet and Internet art, announced the arrival of "noetic networks" which can merge individual neural networks, i.e. our brains, through a global network, and thereby creating a new dimension of the conscience, comparable to Teilhard de Chardin's noosphere or the futurologist Peter Russell's "global brain". The new culture of consciousness has been defined as "technoethical" culture from the Greek words "techne" (technical, technology) and "noetikos". The term "noetikos" derives from the words "nous" (mind), "noein" (think) and "noesis" (intuitive knowledge). The technoethical culture studies the interaction between technology and consciousness and the evolution of a global conscience, with associated new paradigms of acquisition and management of knowledge. A paradoxical countertrend is confirmed again: in parallel to an exponential growth of specialist information, the need for a more global approach to knowledge emerges, just as our individual consciences tend to converge in a global conscience.
"Renaissance man" as the model for the "knowledge manager"
A knowledge manager's mind type is that of the insatiable intellect along with the desire to learn new things, but at the same time resist the Faustian temptation of achieving omniscience, and knowing how to extract a global vision from the specialist knowledge. The term "Renaissance Man" is used, especially in English speaking cultures, to indicate a polyhedric minded person ("polùtropon andra" in the definition that Homer gives Ulysses) who can move freely through the entire spectrum of human knowledge in a critical manner, without necessarily being an expert in any specific discipline. The concept dates back to Aristotle who, in his treatise "on the parts of animals", makes a distinction between a subject having "scientific knowledge" and being "culturally familiar" with it. The educated familiarity to which Aristotle refers is that of someone who has received an education aimed at providing him/her with methodology and concepts, rather than details and particulars. According to Aristotle, this person will be able to discuss specific matters critically, and often with more creative results than experts. It is like wanting to judge the beauty of a tapestry or carpet by observing the weave too closely: only at a certain distance it is possible to see and appreciate the design as a whole. For Aristotle a person with a universal education was one who had been educated in all the branches of knowledge in a critical manner. In the Renaissance, Aristotle's model of universal education fascinated the best engineers of the time and was adopted by men like Leonardo da Vinci, Pico della Mirandola, Francesco Bacone, Erasmus of Rotterdam and Thomas More. His friend Erasmus coined the Latin definition "omnium horarum homo" to describe Thomas More who was a humanist, statesman, and orthodox Catholic martyr, which was then translated as "a man for all seasons". "A man for all seasons": a concise definition which summarises the cultural and human behaviour which the "knowledge manager" of the third millennium should have, although from a different perspective. A man for all seasons, but also a man for all seasons of the human soul. A person with vast horizons, and who is non prejudiced; a person of vision with deep intuition, a person who empathises with others. An authentic Renaissance Man.
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