Introduction to the Topic - Evolving Global Information Infrastructure and Information Transfer - page 8

Using Cleveland's (ibid.) definition, information is organized data. Given con-
nections or context, data can form information. In this case, we may be watching
a baseball game, and the Red Sox are leading their opponent four runs to two in
the eighth inning. Now we have information, because we have put the numbers to-
gether in a meaningful way.
Knowledge
Knowledge, according to Cleveland, “is organized information, internalized by
me, integrated with everything else I know from experience or study or intuition,
and therefore useful in guiding my life and work” (ibid.). The noise of a distant
train's whistle, a passing car, conversation in the next room, the sound of a furnace
or air conditioner, or the television in the background as we read all give us data or
information that we may reject or do not retain or remember. When we watch the
television news, read a newspaper, or read our e-mail, we remember only a small
percentage of what we read, view, or listen to. That which we remember or incor-
porate in our memory becomes our personal knowledge. In other words, informa-
tion that is processed, selected, and synthesized by a human becomes knowledge.
Knowledge is also processed by groups of people, and we will refer to social
knowledge when we discuss information transfer and knowledge diffusion. As with
personal knowledge, social knowledge requires analysis, selection, and synthesis
of information in order to be accepted as knowledge. We discuss this process in
much more detail later in chapters 6 and 7.
Wisdom
When knowledge is integrated into the thinking of human beings and incorpor-
ated into their decision-making processes, it becomes wisdom. Cleveland defines
wisdom as follows:
Wisdom is integrated knowledge, information made super-useful by theory,
which relates bits and field of knowledge to each other, which in turn en-
ables me to use the knowledge to do something. (1985, 23)
Using the example above of the baseball game, we know that the Red Sox are
leading their opponent 4-2 in the eighth inning. This information tells the fan im-
portant game information, and combined with the individual's experience of follow-
ing baseball games over time, the fan knows that the Red Sox do not have a com-
fortable lead and could still lose in the ninth inning. Leaving the game before the
ninth inning could mean missing the last inning and any action to come in that in-
ning. In other words, new information is taken in, evaluated, and acted upon based