Knowledge Technology: Converting Data and Information into Valuable Ideas (SpringerBriefs in Business)

This book reviews creative technologies that underpin the human activities of converting data and information into knowledge, creating new ideas based on that knowledge, and validating those ideas. The book calls such creative technology “knowledge technology” and explores its challenges in the age of big data. Today, artificial intelligence and big data are successfully performing pattern recognition and decision making on behalf of humans, who are incapable of processing large amounts of information instantly and accurately.

In using only past data, however, there are limits to future predictions with artificial intelligence and big data. Humans need to take the lead in predicting or creating the future by trying to understand why data emerged. Knowledge technology contributes to that understanding, regardless of the field of origin. As a matter of fact, knowledge technology includes many technologies developed in informatics, management study, and systems science. The desirable features of knowledge technology are the complementary use of rational and intuitive approaches, the integration of results from quantitative and qualitative analyses, and the cooperation between artificial intelligence and humans.

Yoshiteru NAKAMORI received a Ph.D. degree in applied mathematics and physics from Kyoto University in January 1980. He joined the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology in April 1998 as a professor at the School of Knowledge Science. Since then, he has contributed to establishing a new academic field called knowledge science by integrating approaches from various fields and discovering new research themes and applied issues. His main research interest is to develop a knowledge construction systems methodology by integrating systems thinking and knowledge management.

From April 2002 to March 2008, he served as the dean of the School of Knowledge Science, Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. From November 2003 to December 2008, he served as a president of the International Society for Knowledge and Systems Sciences. From April 2008 to March 2010, he served as a vice-president of the International Federation of Systems Research. Since April 2010, he has been an academician of the International Academy for Systems and Cybernetic Sciences.

Based on the recent original research on knowledge construction systems methodology, he has been giving lectures on Innovation and Creativity and Knowledge and Systems Science at several graduate universities, including the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences in China, Thammasat University in Thailand, and Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology.

He published 20 books, 58 book chapters, 182 peer-reviewed journal papers, 286 international conference papers, 218 national conference papers in Japan, and 89 bulletins/comments/reports. He performed 259 academic lectures and 173 overseas studies. His representative books are:

• Nakamori Y (2019) Knowledge Construction Methodology: Fusing Systems Thinking and Knowledge Management. 130p. Springer, ISBN 978-981-13-9886-5.

• Nakamori Y, Ed. (2015) Knowledge Synthesis: Western and Eastern Cultural Perspective. 210p. Springer, ISBN 978-4-431-55217-8.