Information object
Functional information objects
Used as tools that act on things, i.e. the hammer
Intermediate information objects
Acted upon, ingested, input, i.e. the nail
Reference objects
Neither acting on or acted upon, reference material, i.e. the ikea manual, checklist of things to do Relates to the notion that methods are documents.
Knowledge objects
Not actually an information object, but important to distinguish due to similar terminology. Not tangible things, more like an extended network of interconnected knowledge objects, which are packaged with other knowledge objects that can be dug down into (to uncover underlying assumptions; 'common knowledge' refers to these underlying assumptions that have been brought up to the surface) or extrapolated from to derive new or extended knowledge. For Knorr-Cetina[1], knowledge objects are like well-organized drawers in a filing cabinet. In contrast, gaps in knowledge or unexpected behaviour are characterized as untidy and incomplete drawers that exist in an unresolved state. For Knorr-Cetina, science is an endeavour focusing on deriving a coherent understanding of the world, which involves the use of already established knowledge objects in the validation of newly arrived at ideas. My notion of knowledge differs from that of Knorr-Cetina in that it is not necessarily useful in a utilitarian sense. Instead, it can and does refer to the 'thick' substrate that new knowledge must be compatible with. It is the context within which archaeological activities are undertaken, which inform and motivate them. (Wittgenstein, Ryle, Polanyi, Geertz, ????) Legitimate knowledge is grounded and recognized by methodological rigour (i.e. the appropriateness and integrity of methods and data, see below), and therefore differs from Latour and Woolgar's[2] characterization of "facts" as detached from the contexts from which they are derived.