Human intuition and perception are basic and essential phenomena of consciousness. As such, they will never be replicated by computers. This is the challenging notion of Hubert Dreyfus, Ph. D., archcritic of the artificial intelligence establishment. It's important to emphasize that he doesn't believe that AI is fundamentally impossible, only that the current research program is fatally flawed. Instead, he argues that to get a device (or devices) with human-like intelligence would require them to have a human-like being in the (...) world, which would require them to have bodies more or less like ours, and social acculturation (i.e. a society) more or less like ours. This helps to explain the practical problems in implementing artificial intelligence algorithms. (shrink)

How can we identify and estimate workers’ tacit knowledge? How can we design a personnel mix aimed at improving and speeding up its transfer and development? How is it possible to implement tacit knowledge sustainable projects in remote areas? In order to answer these questions, it is necessary to distinguish between types of tacit knowledge, to establish what they allow for and to consider their sources. It is also essential to find a way of managing the tacit knowledge ‘stock’ and (...) distribution within the workforce. In short, a conceptual framework is needed to manage tacit knowledge. Based on previous works and 2 years of action research, this paper introduces such a framework and describes its partial application to support the pre-operational training and hiring in a large industrial plant in Brazil. Two contributions emerge from the research. First, the concept of ‘levels of similarity’ is introduced as a means to qualify the experience of workers and estimate the associated tacit knowledge. Second, the capability of carrying out three types of judgement properly and speedily is put forward as being a core ability of those who possess what has been called ‘collective tacit knowledge’ (Collins in Organ Stud 28(2):257–262, 2007). In practical terms, the results indicate the opportunity for companies to capitalize on the experience and tacit knowledge of their workers in a systematic way and with due recognition. Ultimately, positive impacts are expected in their absorptive capacity as well as in their management and human resources systems, accident prevention, productivity and the development of sustainable projects in remote areas. (shrink)

Merleau-Ponty's views are the fruit of the method of "phenomenological description," in part taken over from Husserl. This consists of describing our "original" experience of the world without assuming the truth or validity of any statements we may know about it. Unlike the Cartesian method it does not mean that we should suppose false those statements we know are true, but rather that we should "put these in brackets," or "suspend" their rel- evance, consider them as void of ontological implications. (...) For only if we succeed in doing so, the theory runs, will our description be "pure" or "presuppositionless," free of prejudice with respect to the nature of that which we are trying to describe. In doing the phenomenology of perception, then, we must deliberately discount all that we may chance to know about the "how" or the "why" of perception. In describing our "original" experience of the world, we must not let ourselves be influenced by any empirical or philosophical theory of perception, any hypotheses concerning its nature, causes, or physiological or other underlying processes involved. To cite a concrete example, in describing our perception of some visible scene we must discount anything we may chance to know about light rays impinging upon the retina, etc. Failure to do so might lead to a description not of that which we do see, but that which, given the retinal image, we ought to see, i.e., that portion of the visual scene, light rays from which, impinge upon our retina, and not the visual scene itself. Here, then, is one of the reasons for which we must go through a process of "phenomenological reduction" with respect to our knowledge of the world. But it is not the only reason. In fact the interdict goes further. We are not even entitled to use the usual categories of everyday or scientific descriptive discourse. Nor should we use the language of sense data, or that of the introspectionists. For both of these "presuppose" the validity of some at any rate of its categories. Both rest in the last resort on some theory regarding the nature of the "objective" world, or of our experience of it. (shrink)

This paper elaborates on the link between different types and degrees of experience that can be gone through within a form of life or collectivity—the so-called levels of immersion—and the development of distinct types of tacit knowledge and expertise. The framework is then probed empirically and theoretically. In the first case, its ‘predictions’ are compared with the accounts of novices who have gone through different ‘learning opportunities’ during a pre-operational training programme for running a huge nickel industrial plant in Brazil. (...) These are also analysed vis-à-vis the experience of an expert who has designed and experienced the outcomes of two pre-operational training sessions in the nickel industry before developing and managing the one discussed here. Theoretically, the framework is used to pinpoint exactly what interactional experts who have developed their expertise through linguistic socialisation alone are able to do as well as to analyse the case of technical connoisseurs. The results indicate that the proposed framework is useful. It supports the design and improvement of training programmes for the development of tacit knowledge while at the same time bringing about a refined analysis of claims concerning the abilities of types of experts and expertise. (shrink)