01378pab a2200133 454500008004000000100002600040245004500066260000900111300001300120362000800133520106100141650002501202773001701227180718b2007   xxu||||| |||| 00| 0 eng d  aTywoniak, Stephane A.  aKnowledge in four deformation dimensions  c2007  ap.53-76.  aJan  aThis paper sketches a complexity conceptualization of knowledge. Building from evolutionary theories, it defines knowledge as rules that reduce environmental uncertainty through connections between ideas and facts. Knowledge is conceived as a structure validated through action, a process contextualized in individual experience and a system embedded in social and cultural experience. It exhibits four characteristics of a complex system: it is sensitive to initial conditions, exhibits multiple feedback loops, is non-linear and is recursively symmetrical. Knowledge's four interdependent deformation dimensions are identified (personal, common, tacit and explicit) and their interactions are discussed. This conceptualization of knowledge as a complex system contributes to the knowledge-based theory of the firm by providing some micro-foundations to organizational knowledge, and it opens the opportunity to re-think theories of communities of practice, entrepreneurship and firm creation, the role of managers, and knowledge management. - Reproduced.  aKnowledge management  aOrganization