Knowledge-Action Structures

Abstract

An argument can be made that the whole of modern computing, including information systems, depends on the discovery that knowledge, as in applied logic, can take on a machine form that guides action by the machine (see Hodges in Alan Turing: the enigma. Penguin Random House, London, 2012). Denning and Martell in Great principles of computing. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA (2015), in attempting to identify important principles that underpin computing as a whole, claim that we still have hardly come to grips with the implications of information (knowledge) becoming action in a machine. Thus, the aim of this speculative chapter is to explore knowledge-action structures in computing related disciplines. Approaches to knowledge-action structures reviewed include those from data and process modelling and from artificial intelligence. It can be seen that divergent ontological positions underlie different approaches. An open question remains. Can these different positions co-exist, as in Wittgenstein’s language games? Or is there a need for some unifying framework, as Russell and Norvig in Artificial intelligence: a modern approach. international edition (2002) argue is necessary in a demanding domain?.