Empirical Epistemology and the Science of Science
While working for his MSc at UNAM, he became aware of the reflexivity between the Methodology of Research in Experimental Psychology and the Behavioural dimensions of Scientific Practice. From this realization his first book -Scientific Behaviour- emerged. This approach moulded his initial research interests, paved the way for his PhD research and was nourished by his association with the Science of Science movement and his affiliation to Science Studies professional associations while in the UK, such as the 4S and the EAAST.
Empirical Epistemology and the Psychology of Science were hallmarks of his early work: “Several scientific disciplines have ventured into specific aspects of knowledge phenomena, complementing philosophy of science with a sciences of science perspective. In the 1960’s, the science of science movement, based on the progressive social perspectives of John D. Bernal undertook a critical reflection of science as a matter of social concern”. Leading figures such as Derek de Solla Price, Charles P. Snow, and Maurice Goldsmith advocated for “the examination of the phenomenon of ‘science’ by the methods of science itself”. The science of science movement set the ground for the social responsibility of science movement, as well as the consolidation of the sciences of knowledge. Similarly, the post-normal science approach led by Jerome Ravetz contextualized knowledge in a VUCA world. Naturalized epistemology, or empirical epistemology complements the former review of epistemological schools with the factual inputs and theoretical insights from scientific disciplines that have delved into aspects formerly restricted to philosophical analysis. Rather than encroaching upon the later, empirical epistemology has contributed to the understanding of knowledge by furthering philosophical inquiry with new realizations and perspectives. This approach is fundamental to an integrated theory of knowledge, complementing attempts at comprehensive accounts from the fronts of socio-politics of knowledge, social epistemology, or history of cognition”.
Knowledge management model and processes
Elements of a Knowledge Event
“Knowledge can be approached from two perspectives: either as content to act upon or as a value-creating event. In the latter sense, a key task is to determine the conditions for knowing to happen. A knowledge event comes about when object–agent–context attributes correspond with each other. Under these conditions, knowledge constitutes an emergent integration. It occurs when these three factors are effectively and mutually aligned.
As a result, KM aims at a deliberate alignment of knowledge objects, agents, and contexts. Just as the occurrence of fire (chemical chain reaction) requires the functional convergence of flammable material, heat, and oxygen (reactants) in adequate parameters, knowledge requires all three elements to occur in adequate parameters. It is not enough to aggregate objects, agents, and contexts, although this is a precondition that increases the likelihood of knowledge to happen, much as storing combustible materials in non-insulated spaces increases the risk of accidental fire. Deliberately starting a fire requires proportionate flammable material, oxygen, and heat. Fire management takes place by properly adjusting flammability, oxygenation, and temperature. Fire prevention and suppression is carried out by excluding or removing any of these. Similarly, alignment between knowledge objects, agents and contexts is enabled through KM by identifying the relevant dimensions of each and making sure these correspond”.
“Hence, strategic alignment becomes a core Knowledge Management (KM) process. The primacy of alignment has been pointed out in the management literature as much as the complexity of the concept and the challenges of measuring it. The knowledge object–agent–context alignment constitutes the essence of KM. According to the explanation above, this is achieved by identifying, measuring, and designing the correspondence between the attributes of objects, agents and contexts. The removal of the process capacity of any element will result in meaning and value dilution, for it will no longer be knowledge and will become useless. Unless a competent knowledge agent is provided with adequate contextual clues to interpret the knowledge object and act accordingly, value realization will be impaired”. Based on these concepts Carrillo and his colleagues at CKS developed a comprehensive knowledge management processes guidelines and strategy.
Capital systems
Alignment of knowledge elements
“A capital system is a universe of collective preference orders within a human activity system – those elements that stakeholders acknowledge as being valuable at all levels of analysis: individual, organizational, social, and global. A category can be disaggregated into successive subcategories, each of which highlights a distinctive and complementary value function. Each holds a negative (liability) or positive (asset) sign relative to the direction in which it operates on the whole system. It is necessary to give operational definitions to each of the first-order categories before moving on to subsequent-order categories. A capital system has the potential to overcome the dichotomy between tangible and intangible capital as well as simultaneously defining a value domain and a general capital construct. This, in turn, makes possible a general value account system and a composite indicator.
The attributes of a capital system are:
The set constitutes a homogeneous value whole. A capital system denotes a culture.
The set cannot be reduced to any of its constituent parts (financial capital cannot express the whole).
Every capital expresses a value dimension of its own and is exchangeable with others according to correspondence rules”.
Taxonomy of capital
“The rationale for a capital system can be summarized as follows:
A production function is inherent in all value systems. It refers to the system’s ability to achieve and sustain value balance.
In all production functions, an input, an agent, an instrument and a product are involved. These are productive capitals. Productive capitals belong to all forms of value systems.
Throughout history, meta-capitals were developed as a means to multiply the value-generating capability of productive capitals. With the creation of currencies, productive capitals could be represented and exchanged, increasing their spatial and temporal potential. Hence, financial capital was created.
There are two major forms of meta-capital involved in knowledge-based production. Referential meta-capital multiplies the effectiveness and efficiency of the system by providing focus, thus diminishing error (through increasingly precise internal and external feedback). This includes identity and intelligence capitals. Articulating meta-capital multiplies the productivity of the system by providing cohesion, thus diminishing transaction costs and redundancies. It includes financial and relational capital.
When we are successful in accurately and consistently capturing the capital system of any given entity, we are representing its value blueprint, the state of the system with reference to its ideal state (such as homeostasis in living systems). Such an ideal state would be one where each of the value elements existed just in the right proportion to achieving full balance. Hence, value systems are unique, as unique as personalities or cultures; and, therefore, capital systems are as diverse as the multiplicity of systems amenable to a singular description. This would apply to every individual, every organization, and every society. Through emphasizing meta-productive values, we begin to comprehend that no single form of value has primacy: it is only the degree of equilibrium of all value elements (whatever their relative weights) that becomes an ideal for all existing systems”.
Knowledge-Based Development (KBD)
In “What Knowledge Based Development Stands for” Carrillo summarized the critical analysis of this movement in the following terms:
The dominant view of KBD stems from the intention to leverage aggregate production though k-intensive factors (science and technology, education, and innovation).
A corollary of that view is that a KBD policy aims at improving global competitiveness of a given collective (city, region, and nation) through the attraction, retention, multiplication, and capitalization of k-intensive resources.
Productivity, though, may be expanded to account for all results of human activity contributing to overall future social worth.
The reach of the KBD concept has been constrained by received views on what ‘k-based’ denotes. Amongst received views, two are prominent:
Instrumental view: economic growth can be promoted through adequate access to k-intensive resources (science and technology, human capital, digital connectivity, and green economy).
Incremental view: attainment of ‘lower’ stages of social progress will eventually lead to ‘higher’ stages: an information and technology-intensive environment will breed a knowledge society.
Since concepts and theories to address the issues involved in the two former views pre-existed KBD, unless this latter concept proves distinct and meaningful, it could be rendered obsolete and subsume within mainstream areas such as technological progress, regional innovation, urban development, sustainability and so forth.
The current attempt to assign a distinct meaning to KBD is identified as disruptive, radical, or holistic, insofar, it requires dealing with all relevant value dimensions for a given community. Also, once knowledge is entered as the main element in social value dynamics, new functional realities emerge that radically transform the space of possibilities.
The notion of KBD undertaken here aims at a dynamic identification, measurement and balance among major value elements shared by a community.
The knowledge-based attribute refers to an economic, political, and cultural order, placing as much emphasis on the intangible value or intellectual assets as it has so far done on the material and monetary ones.
Two developments contribute to substantiate the viability of the disruptive view of KBD:
Capital systems as a universal language to capture all relevant value dimensions in a community within a nested taxonomy.
Knowledge markets as a new breed of value exchanges where the quantity, quality and terms of interactions amongst agents are all determined primordially by the dynamic properties of IC.
Drawing on these proposals and advancements, KBD can be defined as: the collective identification and enhancement of the value set whose dynamic balance furthers the viability and transcendence of a given community.”
This perspective enables a sensible pursue of human social improvement without resource to the biophysical unviability of indefinite economic growth or the lost currency of the development neocolonial ideology.
Knowledge Markets
‘Occupy the market!’ becomes more than a resistance expression under a KBD perspective. It becomes the possibility -well documented in numerous and diverse settings- to redefine social value exchange beyond the restrictive dogmas of economic liberalism. Knowledge markets are value transaction system where the quantity, quality, and terms of interactions amongst agents are determined primordially by the dynamic properties of intellectual capital. This concept involves the following demarcation criteria:
predominance of knowledge capital in value-exchange content.
appeal to open, self-organization.
reduction of intermediation and transaction costs.
mixed use of traditional and low-tech techniques such as one-to-one barter, local currencies, social swarming, talent banks, with state-of-the-art leveraging technologies such as matching algorithms, ubiquitous computing, smart contracts, flash organizations, decentralized autonomous organizations, and so on.
emphasis on a distinctive set of values, such as transparency, trust, equality, and balance; and
awareness and capitalization of the properties of knowledge-based value creation and distribution. On these bases, he developed a Taxonomy of Knowledge Markets with some slight variations throughout the years:
Knowledge for the Anthropocene
As Carrillo personally and the WCI at large shifted focus by adding to the original KBD and Knowledge Cities topics an emphasis on Alternative Economic Thinking and Doing as well as on Knowledge for the Anthropocene and on City Preparedness for the Climate Crisis, he recruited a WCI team to convey an international state-of-the-art report on each of these issues, with respective reports published in 2021.
In the Foreword to the former, Noel Castree captures the challenge: “But the ‘wickedness’ of the Anthropocene problem, the variety of possible means and ends required to ‘fix’ it, and the inertia caused by those favouring the status quo will make action very slow, very fragmented, and highly contested. Where does ‘knowledge’ feature in this incipient socio-ecological transformation? What kinds of knowledge are required to steer a path forward? Whose knowledge should exert influence in the world to come? What areas of ignorance do we need to shine a light on with new or repurposed knowledge? How can different bodies of knowledge be brought into a productive dialogue? And can knowledge be deployed effectively and quickly? This book seeks to answer these large and very important questions.”
Regarding City Preparedness, Carrillo summarized the circumstance in the Introduction to the later: “In order to responsibly face the environmental conditions of the Anthropocene as these unfold, we must closely examine the axiological and conceptual foundations of our cities and question their environmental economic, cultural, and political underpinnings. This requires a deep questioning not just of modern urban living, but of the whole way of inhabiting Earth. No urban mitigation, adaptation or reform will suffice unless such deeper scrutiny takes place. No fashionable urban development framework, be it the smart, sustainable, or resilient city, is up to the task unless the whole Holocene City paradigm is scrutinized. This means letting go of the very way of life that brought us here. This means farewell to the Holocene City.”
Integrated knowledge theory
In 2022, he published A Modern Guide to Knowledge: From Knowledge Economies to Knowledge in the Anthropocene. Therein, he condeses most of his work on knowledge as a basis to address the unprecedented challenges of the Anthropocene: “Outlining an integrative theory of knowledge, Francisco Javier Carrillo explores how to understand the underlying behavioural basis of the knowledge economy and society. Chapters highlight the notion that unless a knowledge-based value creation and distribution paradigm is globally adopted, the possibilities for integration between a sustainable biosphere and a viable economy are small.”