Question

Discuss and explain the differences between data and information and knowledge with examples.

Answer 1

Data - The unorganized and non-curated raw facts. It is a group of numbers, symbols or writings. Data does not actually have a meaning of its own, however, it is stored in a physical location. Data corresponds to the primary element of the information which is not completely relevant towards decision making. Hence, data can be defined as a collection of facts stored in a physical place. Data can come from external or internal sources in objective or subjective form as a qualitative or quantitative form.

Example - Collection of all the details of the people infected from COVID-19 in USA is the raw data. These are the discrete facts which as a whole is not completely relevant to take decision.

Information - The processed form of data which is filtered to make it relevant and purposeful for any decision making is known as information. Information is used for making decisions with minimum uncertainty. Adding value to the data such as context, category, calculations etc. would become the information.

Example - Data of infected patients when converted to the state wise number of infections along with the calculated numbers becomes an information as it will be helpful in identifying the hot spots of infections across the country. Decisions can be further taken with the help of information.

Knowledge - Knowledge is the mix of information, value and experiences which helps in deriving new experiences and new information. Knowledge is basically derived from the information and information is derived from the data. It is basically defined as the information processed in the mind of the individual. Knowledge cannot be stored anywhere other than brain because brain provides the mapping for the knowledge to put together different bits and act accordingly.

Example - The knowledge derived from the information of the state wise data of infections can be that, 45% of the infections of the whole country are present in "X" state and hence, it is the most dreadful case in the country.