The phenomena of interest to Information Science*G e m o t Wersig & Ulrich Neveling

Discusses the various explicit and implicit definitionsof information and information science, against a view of
their historical development.
Shows how the various viewsof information science overlap with other disciplines, andconcludes with a proposal for a definition of information
science based on social need.
A schema of information
sciences is put forward with the plea that any discussionof information and information science should first declarethe definitions to be used.
1.

Different origins of information science"Information science", "informatics" and whatever else
it is called is a newly emerged field of study whose first
consciousness of being a discipline dates back perhaps tothe late fifties (although scientific work had been undertaken before by individual researchers).
This is one ofthe very few statements that could be made concerning "information science" which would not be discussed at length by aset of randomly collected people calling themselves "information scientists".
"Information science" did not develop out of anotherfield of study (like psychology) or from the intersection of
two fields (like bio-chemistry), but out of the needs of anarea of practical work, called 'documentation1 or 'information retrieval1.
Although the introduction of new technologies, particularly electronic data processing, made theemergence of this discipline necessary, the contributions tothe birth of "information science" came from many different

This paper was published i n the Information
pp 127-140, December 1975.

Scientist,

vol.9 no.4,

19.

disciplines (due to the different backgrounds of people
entering a field where no established educational system
existed) and were caused by a lot of different interests(due to the different areas of application involved in information work).

Some of them arecomputer science (as the technology played an important role)
library science (as a lot of people working in thefield were trained librarians)
philosophy and taxonomy (as the phenomena of classification played an important role)
linguistics (as natural language played an importantrole as both the object and the instrument of practical work)
information theory (perhaps due to the terminologicalsimilarity)
cybernetics (since everybody at that time tried toplay with cybernetic models)mathematics(since there are always people trying toa

Pply reality to some beautiful mathematical model).

It is interesting to note that disciplines like social
sciences, science of science and communication theory enteredrather late into the discussion about "information science".
This variety of approaches led to a situation where
every participant in the discussion might agree that there
should be something like "information science", but that it
had to be his information science relying on his special
background.
The difficulties in discussing the phenomena which may
belong to "information science" are partly caused by
the different backgrounds of the participants (seeabove).
the missina historical derivation of the whole field.

Since information science emerged at a specific time
the historical processes which led to the emergenceof information science should be studied.
They could
provide a more general understanding of what we aretalking about,
the terminological differences in the use of the term
'information1.
This problem will be discussed in
section 2.
We face here a situation that many different approaches are possible to fill the term 'information' with semantic content; that all possibilities
are used but usually not expressed; but that there isno generally accepted criterion which can determine
the choice.
At this point a personal view may be expressed.
Since
in our opinion science is not something that can be justified
in itself but is always justified by some social needs which
are to be served by this science, we have to find out what
the specific reasons were that led to the development of thisscience.
The main questions to which the answers may perhaps create some common understanding are:-Why did information science emerge?
Which social needs are to be fulfilled by information
science?

In fact, it seems that more views have been expressed on
information science than people exist who have been expressing views on this topic.
A first attempt to systematize
these views could perhaps be to classify them broadly into
the following main categories:
the phenomenon-oriented viewthe means-oriented viewthe technological-oriented view
the purpose-oriented viewa)Phenomenon-oriented view
This category implies that there are a lot of people

21.

stating that there is a phenomenon called 'information1 andthat "information science" is the science concerned withthis phenomenon finformation1.
In fact, this seems to be
the largest group of people and - because of the difficultywith the term 'information1 - the group with the most divergent views on the topic.
The different possible definitionsof the basic term f information1 will be given in section 2.
k)

Means-oriented view

Some people, usually those coming from practice-oriented
areas, try to define "information science" from their viewof its application and therefore concentrate on the means
which have to be. used in practical information work.
This
is the case with people concentrating on classification
theory (eg the Ranganathan school) or with people concentrating on the design of computerized information systems (egKunz/Rittel!) or with people coming from librarianship.
c)Technological-oriented view

"Information science" is often seen only as that subset
of computer science concerned with the application of electronic data processing equipment to the storage and retrievalof data.
This, of course, is the case with people from computer science.
d)Purpose-oriented view

A few people, mostly those coming from the social sciences, define "information science" from the point of viewthat there are some social needs which have to be fulfilled
and that 'information science1 should serve and develop thepractical work related to those needs.
2.

'Information' as the possible object of information
science
The most extreme case of polysemy in the technical com-munication of information and documentation is the term,

22.

'information1.
A semantic analysis made by one of theauthors showed that there are at least six different approaches to the use and understanding of the term in the whole
field of disciplines.
Obviously each use and understandingof the term is justified but as ambiguity is one major fault
in scientific communication and theory building, a rule has
to be found to assess which understanding may be appropriate
for which purpose.
Six major types or approaches to 'information1 may becharacterized based on the general structure of relations
between humans and the world.2
a)Structure approach (matter-oriented)

The matter-oriented approach, usually leading to something that may be called STRUCTURE-definition, states thatthe structures of the world which may be perceived or not
are 'information'.
'Information' is thus independent of
whether a human being gathers it or not.
There are several
variants of this approach:
information is given by the static relations between
material objects: "We would define information as the
position of all the atoms and molecules in the universe
and of all sets and combinations of those atoms andmolecules at any time".3
information are the relations which may become perceptible if changes in the states of the physical objects
occur. **information is a characteristic of physical objects.5
It is interesting to note that this attitude is mostly
assumed by philosophers and is used both by idealists andMarxists.

23.

b)

Knowledge approach

The KNOWLEDGE approach states that the knowledge built
up on the basis of perception of the structure of the worldis 'information1.
To us this seems to be a very dangerbus!
approach because knowledge1 itself is a polysemic term andsometimes it seems that people who do not know how to understand 'knowledge' replace this term by 'information' andvice versa.
Again there are some variants:
the 'knowledge1 is objectively given and may be actualized or not.6
the 'knowledge' has to be acquired by at least one
subject: "Information is knowledge concerned principally with qualitative concepts or ideas11.7
the 'knowledge' serves a specific purpose: "Information is data of value in decision-making"8
the 'knowledge' must not only be acquired by available
in communicable forms: "Information is knowledge being
communicated".9
Here it is interesting to note that the approach isspread widely throughout the disciplines (perhaps becauseof the ambiguity of the term 'knowledge'); but that it ismost acceptable to people concerned with decision theory(where a decision is often seen as the process of bridging
gaps of 'knowledge' or 'information').
c)

Message approach

Due to mathematical communication theory, 'information'is often equated with 'message' (as the information content
is measured by the message).
Again some variants can be
identified:
Message as a physical process:"....I mean the physical substance, in the form ofenergy, of the idea or concept which is composed fromone mind to another, ultimately by every transference".
Message as a set of symbols:"....whereby information.... is defined as symbols being
produced by a communicator to realize his communicative
intent" (translated from 11).
Message as a unit of physical carrier and symbols
arranged on it:"Information is a unit consisting of semantic (something conceptually understandable) and a physicalcarrier" (translated from 12).
Obviously this approach is used mostly by people concernedwith mathematical communication theory.
d)

Meaning approach (characteristic of message-oriented)

Whereas the MESSAGE approach widely neglects the meaningside of the message, another type of definition, the MEANINGdefinition, accepts only the meaning of the message as
1
information1.
Typical of this approach is an American standard: "Themeaning assigned to data by known convention".13
As 'mean11
ing is at least as ambiguous as 'information one may again
suppose that people who do not know what 'information' iscall it by another name which is as unclear as the first.
Mostly, this is done by data processing people who perhaps
understanding meaning better than linguists.
On the other
hand, linguists do the same only in the reverse way: "Themeaning of a sign is the information about the designatedobject embodied, fixed and expressed by the sign", (translated from 14).
It would be interesting to listen to a discussion between linguists and computer scientists about the question"which was first - meaning or information?"

25,

e)

Effect approach(recipient-oriented)

According to the general structure of communication(and nobody doubts that 'information1 has something to dowith communication) one group of people places 'information1
with the recipient (unlike the previous approaches whichplace it with the communicator) stating that 'information'
occurs only as a specific effect of a specific (or unspecific) process.
Again some variants may be found:'Information' is the result of an unspecified process"'Information' is data produced as a result of a process upon data.

That process may simply be one oftransmission .... it may be one of selection; it may
be one of organization;

it may be one of analysis".15'Information1 is abstraction of knowledge"In fact, we say that information is that which changes
what we know. . . . " 16'Information is reduction of uncertainty"A communicative action contains

information, if

and only if by this action uncertainty is removed or
reduced for the perceiver" (translated from 17)
It is interesting to note that the last two variants
are mostly used by behavioural scientists and that the lastvariant is - although rather psychologically biassed - inaccordance with the theoretical model of mathematical communication theory (in which the amount of information carried by a symbol or group of symbols relates to the probability of occurrence of that symbol or group).
(f)

Process approach

Some people see 'information' not as one of the components of processes but as a process itself.
This may be
a process of human data processing"Information.... is a process which occurs within a humanmind when a problem and data useful for its solution arebrought into productive union" . 18

26.

a communication process with a specific purpose
11
Information. .. is a set of purpose-directed actions
covering the following elements: generation....,
transmission, storage and enquiry", (translated from
19)
This diversity of views on 'information1 is frightening,
and in fact is probably incomplete.
It would be a relief
if we could follow Fairthorne's proposal: "Clearly, 'information1 and its derivatives are words to avoid",20 but
obviously this is not possible.
Many views exist only
because of the interest in this phenomenon, and at least
this term helps to promote ideas which would otherwise need
far more effort to be conveyed to the right people.
Who ofus would like to follow an earlier proposal to call information science "Ichneutics"21 coming from the Greek "Ichneumon"(an Egyptian cat)?
If the term 'information', or one ofits derivatives like 'informatics', is unavoidable, we shouldmake it clear in every instance what is meant.
3.

Proposals for the interpretation of 'information' in"information science"
3.1

Societal responsibility

I suppose we all call ourselves "information scientists".
A young English lady one of the authors met
last year who had taken a course of several weeks andis now working as an information officer, called herself
an "information scientist".
Should and could we dosomething to counter this misuse?
If not, it does notmatter, because we could all be called "information
scientists" by other people based on the simple factthat we all take part in a meeting concerned with
"information science".
Our hypothesis would be that ona first view nothing more connects us than a common
characteristic of being at the same meeting or being
called by the same name.
But we do not think that thisis true.
Of course, we all have divergent views on thetheoretical foundation of what we call "information science" and this is perhaps a situation where this diver-27.

On the contrary, we think that there have beensocial developments which have created comparable
languages, discussing common problems, in common terms.
It is only possible now to outline these developments
briefly.
Perhaps the problem started when Gutenberg invented a new communication technology which made it possible to transfer pieces of knowledge to a larger
public.
In the 17th and 18th century it was felt thatoriginal publications of scientific value could not be
distributed to the interested community (scientific andnon-scientific) so secondary publications emerged (infact the first technical journals were abstract journals;
the movement of the encyclopaedists could be considered
under the same label; later on 'Moralische Wochenschriften' and 'Intelligenzblatter' in Germany and theirequivalents in other European countries followed similarlines).
With the increasing relevance of science for industrial development in the 19th century (first industrial
revolution) specialization of science began, more sciences were produced and needed, and scientific communication grew and grew.
This process is still under way.
Briefly stated, this led to a situation where an 'anonymous 1 group emerged between the producers of data,
findings and discoveries on the one hand and thosepeople needing the data, findings and discoveries on theother.
Consequently, in the process of the divisionof labour a new field of practical activity emerged andan older profession started to change its definition.
The information people appeared - with different titles
in different countries, but similar in function.
And
this function is - again described very simply - toensure that those people needing some piece of knowledge
for their scientific and technical work (not now restricted to science and technology but including 'occupational roles' or roles even less restricted) will getit or not.

This is not a widespread philosophy but asocial function derivable from historical development.
At first they tried to solve their problem by doing
practical work but as
information needs changed and grew
the social communication processes became more andmore complicatedscientific and technical communication reached aqualitatively new stage by the 'scientifictechnical revolution1 and a worldwide dimension
new and complicated communication and information
technoloigies developed,
the purely practical approach with traditional, mostly
library, methods proved to be inefficient in solving theunderlying problem.
Out of the needs of a practicewhich grew and became more and more complicated, scientific work emerged and by and by a set of people appeared,
a new terminology was used, and specialized communication
took place.
Thus a new discipline developed - notbecause of a specific phenomenon which had always existed
and which now became an object of study - but because of
a new necessity to study a problem which had completelychanged its relevance for society.
Nowadays the problem of transmitting knowledge to those who need it is asocial responsibility, and this social responsibility
seems to be the real background of "information science".
By this 'credo1 we do not deny the possibility ofworking scientifically for pleasure, or of pursuinginformation science in the search for truth.
But theindividual feelings of information scientists do not add
up to a discipline which society should be expected tosupport.
3.2

The place of the discipline

The development of an "information science" which
has to attempt to overcome some of the effects of specialization in science and technology, is itself a29.

phenomenon of the differentiation of disciplines. Therefore one of the main questions we have to face is how
this new discipline fits into the century-old web ofdisciplines.
In looking at this problem two different
answers have to be given.
First: Gathering, arranging, rearranging, and evaluating pieces of knowledge is an integral part of every
scientific or technical discipline.
Therefore, regardless of how the discipline under consideration is defined,
every discipline concerned with methods and techniques ofhandling these pieces of knowledge will serve as an
auxilliary discipline for every other discipline (likemathematics as a discipline providing tools for a specific kind of representation and transformation of
messages).
Second: Unlike mathematics, information science isbased on a specific social need and its object - again
regardless of how it is defined - has to include thesesocial processes.
Therefore information science is adiscipline which has to define its boundaries vis-a-vis
other object-oriented disciplines.
Many proposals havebeen made, to which we will not add, but we will present
some alternatives from which the proposal should be chosen which best allows the fulfilment of the social needs
underlying the development of this discipline.
Other
alternatives may be possible but those presented here
are based on an analysis of the practicability of different proposals:a)

The broad solution

The broad solution may be based on the STRUCTURE
approach to information.
If every structure of theobjective world is 'information1 then a science concerned with the methods of discovering this information,of representing it, and of transforming it into otherrepresentations which permit further conclusions, will
be possible and helpful for all kinds of scientificwork.

Such a science will then include
part of mathematics
logic
philosophy of sciencephilosophy of languagetransformational grammar
mathematical communication theory
Such a discipline will, of course, be a metascience,
but will not solve the problems which led originally tothe development of information science as far as they
are contained in this paper.
Questions particularly raised by using this approach
may bewhat are objective structures of STRUCTURE, ie ofrealitywhat is the nature of STRUCTURE, ie of reality
how can the STRUCTURES be discovered
what is the nature of scientific discovery
what is the nature of the relation between mind
and reality
how may discoveries be described in an adequate
way, ie how is reality as reflected by the humanmind objectively describablehow may different forms of description of reality
be interpreted in an adequate way (hermeneutics)
how may different forms of description be used togain new insights or discoveries (secondary
discoveries).
Obviously, the main relation underlying this approach
would be the relation between man as the discoverer andreality.
This would lead unavoidably to a more philosophical "information science", being to some extent a
metascience for all other sciences.
It is interesting
to note that this solution is only phenonmenon-oriented

31.

(according to our previous classification) as all means,technologies and purposes are allowed as objects ofstudy.
b)

The medium solution

The medium solution may be based on the combinationof the KNOWLEDGE and the MESSAGE approach.
It could be
described as follows^ The basic notion is 'information'
as recorded knowledge.
Then information science will
be concerned with studying
knowledge structures
the relation between knowledge structures andmodes of recording themthe methods, means and structures of recordingknowledge elements
the methods, means and effects of transferring
recorded statements
the methods of interpreting recorded statements
for their knowledge content (again a variant ofhermeneutics)
the effects that recorded statements of knowledge
can have on those receiving and decoding them
the relations between recorded statement of knowledge and behaviour
the purposes for which recorded statements of knowledge may be produced, transmitted and used.
At a first glance this medium solution is only phenomenonoriented but may produce variants by combination with-the technological-oriented approach (eg if thephenomenon is looked at only from the point ofview of processing recorded statements of knowledge by EDP as in some areas of applied information science)the purpose-oriented approach (eg if only thoserecorded statements of knowledge are consideredwhich are used for a specific purpose in decisionmaking22 or in transforming a state of knowledge23 ) .
The following disciplines will contribute to such an"information science":
psychology, particularly, cognitive psychology andpsycho Unguis tics
mathematical information theory, particularly coding theory
communication theory
computer sciencelinguistics, especially semantics and pragmaticsc)

The narrow solution

The broad and medium solutions were similar inhaving no limitation of the area in which informationis considered but did differ in the generality of thebasic concept of information.
The narrow solution (asit is proposed here) does not give a narrow understanding of 'information1 but of the area in which 'information1 is considered.
This is, of course, the solution
which is not (like the broad and the medium solution)
based on abstract, theoretical interests but on practical problems which have to be solved.
There are different possible limitations of the area
in which information problems are considered.
The traditional limitation of science and technology is the one
mostly used (eg Michailov/Cernyi/Giljarevsky21+ ) and which
has recently been criticized as being too narrow.
This
is an approach which is rather phenomenon-oriented as
only the phenomenon of information, usually defined asrecorded knowledge in the context of scientific andtechnological work, is considered.
But there is somecombination with the purpose-oriented approach because
scientific and technological information is not studied
for its content but to see how it might be collected,
organized and distributed.

33.

A way of limiting the area more broadly may beoffered by the following sequence^
there are scientists and technicians who produce data (recorded knowledge which are needed by themselves but need other kinds of data (notproduced by scientists or technicians).
We could state that information science in thissense has to see thatscientists and technicians get all data (scientific/technological or not)scientific or technological produced data are
distributed to all people needing them.
This would equate with the purpose-oriented approach.
Even this limitation seems to be too narrow though apurpose-oriented approach needs some limitation in order
to serve a practical purpose.
A proposal which could
be made, allowing a practical purpose approach while
being still broad enough for practical applications (eginformation systems in public administration) would havethe following constraints:-

a distinction is made between organized and nonorganized social communication, and the area ofinterest restricted to organized communication.
a distinction is made between socially and individually justifiable information needs, and thearea of interest restricted to those which aresocially justifiable.
a distinction is made between information needs
related to social service and those which are not,the area of interest being restricted to thoserelated to social service.

It should be obvious to the recipients of thispaper that the authors are very much in favour of thenarrow solution as it seems to be the only one thatallows a solution to the concrete problem we have to face.
Of course, it would be possible to call this science by aname other than "information science", but as this science
we are talking about is already connected with the term
"information science" we would prefer to go on callingit "information science", particularly in view of thebroad and medium solutions which are nothing other thanfields of study already.
3.3

A proposal25

From a combination of historical evolution, thedevelopment of specific societal needs and the development of new methodologies and technologies a new dis^-'cipline has emerged which is sometimes called "information science" (or by other derivatives of the term
'information').
This science is based on the notionof the information needs of certain people involved insocial labour, and of concern with the study of methodsof organization of communication processes in a way
which meets these information needs.
The basic term
'information' can be understood only if it is definedin relation to these information needs
either as reduction of uncertainty caused bycommunicated dataor as data used for reducing uncertainty
This science is concerned with the organization of communication processes aimed at information for a specificclientele.
This is a science somewhat similar to masscommunication aimed at the fulfilment of the sociallyand individually justifiable information needs of alarge public.
After this, similar disciplines are library science, museology, archivistics, education (allFIGURE 1 : The systemj

Cybernetics|

Semiotics
System1of information

sciencesr

Information Sciences

Information Science (Informati
Library

theoryScienceCommunication theory

Archivistics

Philosophy

Museology

Science of Science

Mass

Mathematics

Education

Communication

^
•

1

" *

Linguistics
Law
Computer

Science
1
1
1
t

1I

GeneralInformation
TheoryL

psycho- sociolo- Econo- Inform
mics
tion
logy
gy
of
of
of J
[informa- informa- informa- politics
tion
tion
tion

36.

catering for different clienteles according to different
information needs).
On the other hand there are a lot of intersectionsof these disciplines with other traditional disciplines,eg
psychology (psychology of information)sociology (sociology of information)
economics (economy of information)
political science (politics of information)technology (information technology)
All these disciplines concentrate on the study of information processes (ie communication processes aimed at
the reduction of uncertainty) or components of them.
Therefore it is possible to call all of them "information
science" (the whole system of "information sciences" isgiven in Figure 1 overleaf).
There is a common subset of these disciplines andsome other disciplines (eg those which would contributeto the broad or medium solution) which contribute to theinformation sciences.
This subset is the whole set ofefforts made to study 'information1 in all of its facets(including all approaches specified in section 2 ) . This
field of scientific activity to which a lot of disciplines contribute could then be understood as 'General
Information Theory' (of which statistical information
theory forms a specialization).
In all theoretical
discussions on "information science" it should therefore
clearly be stated whether the speaker or writer is discussing the phenomena, characteristics or methods ofinformation science
the information sciences, orGeneral Information Theory

37.

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1.

W. Kunz, H. Rittel:

Die Informationswissenschaften.

Miinchen-Wien (19 72) .
2.

see G. Wersig:
Pullach.

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(1974).

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E.G. Montgomery:

Four 'new1 sciences.

4.

V.A. Polushkin:

On the determination of the concept

1

AGARD. (1968).

(Origl. Russ.) Nauckno-Techn.

'Information

Inform.

No. 9, p.6-8. (1963).
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eg H. Vogel:

Materie und 'Information1.

Dt.Zs.Philos.

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T. Kinder:

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Munchen.

12.

dtv-Worterbuch zur Publizistik.

(1969).

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Kybernetik

und Informationssysteme.

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ZIID-Zs.

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USASX3 12-1966.

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Erkenntnistheoretische Fragen der

Semiotok.

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R.M. Hayes:
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Amer.

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The logic

behind a probabilistic interpretation:
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In: M.E. Stevens,

Statistical associ-ation methods for mechanized documentation.

Washington

p.9-13. (1965)
H. Hormann:

Psychologie der Sprache.

Berlin.

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Its

Information transfer.

Proc.ASIS, Vol.5, New York. (1968).
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Information

und Dokumentation- als

Teilgebiet der wissenschaftlichen Information.

ZIID-Zs.

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M.C. Yovits:

A theoretical framework for the developmentof information science.
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Paper presented at the FID/RI meeting 1974 in Moscow.

39.

24.

A.I. Mikhailov, A.I. Chernyi, R.S. Giljarevskij:
Osnowy informatiki. Koln-Opladen. (19 70)

25.

G. Wersig:

Informationssoziologie.

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