New conceptions of knowledge

Our task for his week in CETL-IET is to contribute to a particular Wikipedia entry. The class has been discussing how difficult we are finding this, particularly changing someone else's text, contributing publicly on a subject we are not experts in, and writing in a medium where we are unsure of the rules, let alone the conventions.

In an excellent post to the class forum Richard commented that he saw the reluctance stemming from:

1. Conceptions of knowledge that are connected to expertise, rather than collaboration.
2. Assumptions about truth as being absolute, and already existing.

Richard said "But, what if truth is primarily a dynamic uncovering? (The Greek word for truth is aletheia which literally means uncovering.) That moves knowing into a more fluid realm." and went on to say that, in wikis, "The key is for thoughtful people to engage the process so that knowledge gets created."

If knowledge ever existed as something that could be packaged by experts and delivered to novices, it certainly no longer exists in that form.

Shifting describes how the last decade has fundamentally re-written how we:

• acquire knowledge
• collaborate in creating knowledge
• find and store information
• authenticate and validate information
• express ourselves and our ideas
• relate to information/knowledge
• function in knowledge intense environments