Business

Relevance (law)

Neuroscience

Knowledge management

Adaptation (eye)

Political science

Psychology

Need to know

Public relations

Computer science

Computer security

BMJ Global Health

If …the problem of society is mainly one of rapid adaptation to changes in the particular circumstances of time and place… [then] the ultimate decisions must be left to the people who are familiar with these circumstances, who know directly of the relevant changes and of the resources immediately available to meet them.We cannot expect that this problem will be solved by first communicating all this knowledge to a central board which, after integrating all knowledge, issues its orders.We must solve [the problem] by some form of de-centralization… But the '[people] on the spot' cannot decide solely on the basis of [their] limited but intimate knowledge of the facts of [their] immediate surroundings.There still remains the problem of communicating to [them] such further information as [they need] to fit [their] decisions into the whole pattern of changes of the larger […] system.How much knowledge [do they] need to do so successfully?Which of the events which happen beyond the horizon of [their] immediate knowledge are of relevance to [their] immediate decision, and how much of them need [they] know?-F.

The uses of knowledge in global health