What does it take to become an intellect? How does knowledge building create intellects? What environmental structures contribute to the making of an intellect? Under a constructivist approach, knowledge building in scholarly circles is influenced by many variables such as learner characteristics, a balance of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, group cohesion, context, quality and accessibility to infinite pool of resources, and cooperation of the community members immersed in a stimulating environment. These variables affect what will be learnt, how it will be learned and when it will be learnt. This paper examines necessary scholarly features in building a dynamic knowledge building society, and how this intellectual community affects an individual’s creative and dynamic thought process involved in the process of building knowledge. Specifically, it will provide an overview of a historical empire built on intellectual comradeship and scholarly discourse. And finally, it will be shown how computer supported intentional learning environments (CSILE) can facilitate the re-establishment of this dynamic community that once existed. This paper addresses the following key questions: How can we build a similar, if not superior scholarly community with the computer supported intention learning environments like the web-based Knowledge Forum (WebKF)? How can the notes function, in the communal database, be utilized to capture the dynamic thinking processes of the scholars to be? In order to answer these questions, I will examine the dynamic knowledge building interactions at the cognitive as well as the community level.

The paper will commence by briefly discussing the difference between knowledge and information, and then proceed by introducing sources of knowledge and key historical figures that philosophized about its inherent value and nature. The paper will continue by providing overview on the concept of knowledge building, and summarize its principles and characteristics. Then the paper will proceed by providing an overview of knowledge-building systems such as CSILE or WebKF. It will then provide an overview of community and the social transmission of knowledge, since this is an integral component of the communal database. The paper will then proceed with a description of the community environment of a historical empire built on the knowledge building theory. Finally, it will discuss ways in which we can build a similar, if not superior scholarly community with a computer supported intentional learning environment in place. The paper will finish with a discussion on how the notes function in the web-based Knowledge Forum can be utilized to capture the dynamic thinking processes of learners.

n The Houghton Mifflin Canadian Dictionary (1980), knowledge is defined as "the state or fact of knowing, familiarity, awareness or understanding gained through experience or study" (Morris, 1980). Information on the other hand, is "usually construed as narrower in scope and implies a random collection of material rather than an orderly synthesis" (Morris, 1980). Creating knowledge, however, requires constant pushing beyond the familiar (Leonard, 1998:12). The theory of knowledge commonly referred to as "epistemology", is a term deriving from two Greek words episteme meaning knowledge and logos meaning theory or explanation (Moser et al., 1998). Constructivists feel that knowledge is both individually constructed and socially co-constructed by learners based on their interpretations of experiences in the world (Jonassen, 1994).

Thinking about knowledge is not a new topic. For centuries, Eastern and Western philosophers have been discussing epistemology, or the theory of knowledge. In Western thought, talks on knowledge trace back to the writings of Plato (c. 427 — c. 347 B.C.) and Aristotle (c. 384 — c. 322 B.C.) (Moser et al., 1998). In Plato’s book called Theaetetus, the central figure, Socrates, discusses with his friends how certain teachers know the things that distinguish them as experts (Moser et al., 1998). Plato and Kant focus on prepositional knowledge meaning, "something is the case" (Moser et al., 1998). In Aristotle’s book Posterior Analytics, the theory of descriptive knowledge is elaborated. In Eastern thought, Arabic philosophers like Avicenna and Averroes philosophy about knowledge and its nature. In fact, Armstrong feels that "Avicenna and Averroes founded the intellectual culture and helped the West to acquire: Euclid, Ptolemy, Socrates, Plato and Aristotle (Armstrong, 1991:29). Indian (Hindu) philosophy also deals extensively with questions in epistemology and logic similar to many of the topics in classical and contemporary European and American philosophy (Moser et al., 1998:4). Indian philosophers have given considerable attention to problems of gathering and assessing evidence and the role of reasoning in knowledge (Moser et al., 1998:5). Eastern thoughts on epistemology emphasize "distinguishing truth from error, wisdom from ignorance, and the path to knowledge from the path to ignorance" (Moser et al., 1998:5). Some critics of Western philosophical traditions have charged [Western philosophers] with excessive emphasis on the individual as a solitary knower. (Moser et al., 1998:5). Moser states, "if there has been an imbalance here in the history of Western epistemology, it is likely to be corrected to some extent in contemporary epistemology, owing to its contributions from many cultural and intellectual backgrounds" (Moser et al., 1998:5). Finally, feminist epistemologists have contributed extensively to the recent intellectual movements (Moser et al., 1998).

Knowledge building is a theory of learning, which emphasizes the collaborative construction of knowledge by a group of learners (McLean, 1999:1). As McLean summarizes, knowledge building is an activity of the whole learning community involving sustained, in-depth inquiry focusing on specific problems. Inquiry is self-directed and driven by student questions. There are collective goals of understanding and discourse is taken seriously, focusing on explaining and articulating individual understanding. This articulation of individual understanding is publicly available to the group. The teacher serves as a facilitator rather than the traditional knowledge provider.

Knowledge building is formed through decentralized collaborative discourse that centers on explanation. Discourse is defined as "the way in which language is used to create understanding and consensus in scholarly circles as well as classroom" (Woodruff et al., 1996). As Scardamalia et al. (1993) elaborates, "progressive discourse is the medium through which our personal knowledge is formed, criticized and amended to become public knowledge." Arguments to convince others push students deeper into the meaning of the discourse. This produces explanations, discursively defined as statements that are aimed at persuading others and it invokes links between events and causes or consequences, between actions and mental states, and so on depending on the various knowledge states (Scardamalia et al., 1993b:302 in Woodruff et al., 1996).

Knowledge building systems, based on the knowledge building theory, are networked computer software systems designed to help a community of learners develop their knowledge through sustained collaborative pursuit of collective goals of understanding (McLean, 1999). Knowledge building systems like the Web-based Knowledge Forum (WebKF), was designed and developed by the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto, to facilitate learners in contributing their knowledge to a communal database which reflects the knowledge of the group members and which is an intellectual object open to collective scrutiny and elaboration by the group of learners" (McLean, 1999).

Knowledge Forum was developed and tested since 1986, eleven years before the commercial version of CSILE WebKF was released. The conceptual base of CSILE comes from research on intentional learning, process aspects of expertise and discourse in knowledge-building communities (Scardamalia et al., 1994). CSILE’s architecture is directed toward the creation of special knowledge-building environments to support sustained and convergent inquiry into problems of explanation, process and meaning (Scardamalia et al., in press a, in Scardamalia et al., 1992). CSILE is a powerful communal database or knowledge based shell capable of creating, storing, editing and co-authoring a variety of hypermedia functions authored by the users of the system. Notes are the core contents of the WebKF database, whereby the powerful hypermedia features give control to the learner and enable a space for the contribution to be recorded. This web-based shell is entirely student-driven; as the student’s create the knowledge, contribute their ideas to the database through either pictorial representation by a built-in graphics editor, by graphical illustrations, through cognitive maps, or by written messages. Every contribution is recorded and stored, and can be easily viewed and reviewed by the author as well as others in the community. The community of learners, which contribute to this pool of knowledge, can view the hierarchical nature of the discussion as it progresses, or can view the contributions by author or date. Users can also search a note or a set of notes by an author, pre-defined keyword, title, problem, scaffold, support, class, date created, date last modified and date late read.

For the student, options consist of creating pictorial or written notes, they have the power to delete or to attach their note to another note, and they can share authorship allowing the pre-authorized authors to modify the content. The borrow, add value and credit approach has served these students well in creating a culture of use and interpretation of each other’s notes (Scardamalia et al., 1992). Notes can be clustered according to their theme, author or date. Authors are also notified when their comments have been attached to their notes or changes in the database have occurred. Treaded notes are connected to each other by building on original contributions, quoting authors, sharing authorship, by adding on to a message and rising above it. These tools provide not only ways to access and manipulate information, but also methods for facilitating thinking (Scardamalia et al., 1992).

In addition to the above-mentioned features, exclusive features for teachers and students have been designed. For the teacher, various options exist. Teacher’s can add a new group (class) and subsequently editing it. The teacher can set up hot lists, which are designated essential lists for a given group. The teacher can allow student to create views in which students can track their own progress in relation to classmates. Teacher can add and edit designated keywords, scaffolds, problems, and principles. They can publish and unpublished notes as well as edit users by adding and deleting student. An interesting feature for teachers is a tracking mechanism, which allows teachers to monitor their students on an on-going basis. The tracking feature can monitor (a) the amount of productivity of each student, that is the size and number of notes and (b) the level of interactivity of each student, that is the number of searches to other’s notes, build-on’s and links. These tools provide not only ways to view information, but also traditional and non-traditional methods for on-going evaluation. Traditional outcomes are measurable by quantity of writing, depth of explanation, question asking, and through the standardized achievement test. Non-traditional educational outcomes are measurable by knowledge quality, graphic literacy and level of constructive activity (Scardamalia et al., 1992).

CSILE is grounded on the evidence from the collaborative model that states that a classroom can function well and achieve superior results educationally with greatly diminished emphasis on individual achievement and on explicit focus on public knowledge construction (Scardamalia et al., 1992). As a result of findings such as these, there is a shift from focusing on individual performance, on the mastery of a set body of subject matter, and on activities themselves, to focusing on the emerging body of knowledge represented in the database (Scardamalia et al., 1992).

CSILE is an on-line Open Ended Learning Environment (OELE) whereby the intents and purposes of the individual are uniquely established and pursued (Hannafin et al., 1994). OELEs involve the individual determination of what is to be learned, how it is to be learned, when learning goals have been met and what subsequent steps are taken (Hannafin et al., 1994). In this sense, the learners are given the power and the option to decide the content and methods in which the student-driven curriculum will be discussed. The enabling of student-centered learning is a constructivist approach placing emphasis on the social environment created by collegiality. Within this approach, knowledge is believed to evolve through social negotiation and through the evaluation of the viability of individual understandings (Savery et al., 1995: 31).

Bruner for decades has argued that "learning in most settings is a communal activity, a sharing of culture" (Bruner, 1986 in Driscoll:368). The social environment created strongly through a sense of community is argued by many constructivists to be critical to the development of our individual understanding (Savery et al., 1995). This environment helps in developing a set of propositions that are compatible with our individual constructions or understanding of the world (Savery et al., 1995). In a social environment, collaboration with the individual members of the community plays a fundamental role in progressive knowledge building. The important function of collaboration in environments such as WebKF is to provide a means to test the credibility and accuracy of our understanding, and to understand perspectives other than our own. Hearing a variety of other perspectives helps learners judge the quality of their own solutions and to learn perhaps more effective strategies for problem solving (Driscoll: 369).

What is the importance of the social environment in knowledge building? For centuries now, community’s inherent value has been commonly recognized by Eastern cultures. In knowledge building, community is an integral and central component in the collective pursuit of knowledge. Community is commonly looked upon as a group of people actively engaging in purposeful behavior, and sharing common values, ethics and interests. A community’s objectives are met through dialogue, pooling of ideas and recommendations and emanating from resource people, people with some expertise, people with concerns and people in touch with the larger community (Elliston, 1986). For this reason, many commentators, community is characterized as an essentially discursive phenomenon (Woodruff et al., 1996). Woodruff et al. (1996) note the four forces that consolidate a community are (i) function or goal of the community, (ii) identity or the sharing of an emotional bond necessary for group cohesion, (iii) discourse or the self-absorption by discourse, integral to community existence, and (iv) shared values or pluralism, the notion that diversity is strength. A powerful community has (i) a strong history of cooperation, (ii) a strong sense of community and willingness to help others, (iii) many informal and formal partnerships, (iv) many training and educational programs offered, an establishment of learning centers by the community, (v) new and innovative initiatives being studied and implemented, and (vi) a strong volunteer base (Lane, 1997:8).

A influential community understands (a) understands the concept of establishing and maintaining readily available and accessible learning opportunities within a community, (b) its components are determined by the community, (c) it involves partnerships for the betterment and empowerment of all, (d) the willingness of the participants to accept involvement, and (e) to collective provide inexhaustible resources for the community to benefit (Lane, 1997:10).

In examining a citizen’s role and participation in community, one must ask oneself: Under what political atmosphere? If citizen participation is allowed, it has to be viewed in light of that political reality of that society; otherwise, the citizen’s role will be that of citizen’s struggle and not of participation (Ng, 1986:65). In a civil society, citizens are the active participants instead of the politicians in making decisions and deciding programs, policies and strategies to be implemented. Participate in taking part in, and in reciprocal sharing of community initiatives (Ng, 1986:65). Strength lies in the individuals in the community. Ng states, "within our community, we have to generate more interest and discussions at the grassroots level. Our strength lies in the people". She continues stating that "a citizen’s role is to get involved through participation to influence, to change and to involve the community". Social responsibility through cooperation is a an essential component in establishing a strong community which can then better serve the interest of the community at large.

In summary, many constructivist researchers in social psychology have for decades now, emphasized the superior role of the social environment in learning over individual knowledge construction. These constructivists share the following seven views on collaboration: (i) personal autonomy, (ii) generativity, (iii) reflexivity, (iv) active engagement, (v) personal relevance, and (vi) pluralism (Lebow, 1993 in Savery et al, 1995). In Web KF, there is personal autonomy, as learners do possess independence and responsibility over their learning. There is also generativity, as learners are encouraged to and do generate hypothesis, questions, arguments, perspectives and opinions in a common pursuit of knowledge. The notes function promotes reflexivity as it records thoughts as they are added to the database for learners to reflect back on, reconsider and revamp if they choose. WebKF is student-driven and actively calls for participation of all its individuals if it is to be effective. Because it is student-driven, there is personal relevant, as student contributions reflect what is personally relevant and interesting to them. Lastly, there is pluralism. The students come from different backgrounds, bring a different knowledge base, perspective and expertise to the pool of learners, and build on this diversity. In a social learning environment, the knowledge-building forum solicits problems serving as cognitive puzzlements, from the learners and uses those as the stimulus for learning activities. In this sense the cognition is distributed in that what each individual understands and therefore constructs is a function of the content, the context, the activity of the learner, what the learner attends to, what prior experiences the learner brings and the goals of the learner (Savery et al., 1995).

If we realize how community involves depending on others for even much of our mundane knowledge we have of the world, then we can realize the greatly increased power of a collective social pursuit of knowledge, reaching far beyond what any individual human could accomplish (Moser et al., 1998:122). Social dependence of knowledge helps us greatly in acquiring significant truths (Moser et al., 1998:122). The recognition that epistemologically relevant expertise or reliability is domain relative has prompted renewed attention to the social and cultural influences on justification (Moser et al., 1998:118).

As seen community and the social environment, which nurtures the intellect, is crucial in progressive knowledge building. In examining how WebKF can be maximized to create learning community which breed’s scholars and great thinkers, we have to examine if an intellectual community built on the knowledge building theory existed in the past. The research concluded that there was in fact, not only a scholarly community instead an empire that was built on this foundation. In conducting an assessment of this learning community built on furthering the intellect, it was clear that the promotion of learning and scholarship was a planned premeditated policy, which the intellects of this empire pursued vigorously from the onset of their rule. As it will be shown, the institutional features of the community, greatly contributed to its creativity and dynamism, structure and organization, its pedagogy of instruction and training, and the personal and intellectual qualities required of the teachers (Ivanov, 1939).

As the reader will recall, knowledge-building theory is a theory of learning, which emphasizes the collaborative construction of knowledge by a group of learners (McLean, 1999:1). The knowledge building activity involves the whole learning community through sustained, in-depth inquiry of specific issues. The inquiry is self-directed and driven by the learners. There are collective goals of understanding and discourse is taken seriously, focusing on explaining and articulating individual understanding McLean, 1999:1). This articulation of individual understanding is publicly available to the group.

Between 909 A.D. and 1171 A.D., Northern Africa, Southern Europe and Asia were intellectually blooming (Halm, 1997). Cairo was the capital of this empire and the single greatest intellectual training center in the world as well as the metropolis of the world (Ivanov, 1939). The fame of this period attracted many scholars, poets, artists and scientists like Maimonides (1135 — 1187), the famous Jewish philosopher and physician, and Avicenna (980 —1037 A.D.), the famous physician and philosopher who witnessed the establishment of this era (Halm, 1997). Similar to our multicultural society today, different religious groups like Christians, Jews and Muslims lived together peacefully in these countries (Halm, 1997:34). To these intellects, religion and learning were inseparably connected. Knowledge meant life, and learning meant resurrection from the death of ignorance; Knowledge was good entrusted by God to human beings who must not selfishly keep it to themselves, but instead pass it on (Halm, 1997:20).

The process of acquiring knowledge was more precious than anything else (Halm, 1997:22). In 970 A.D. that the first university of the world, Al-Azhar University was built and inaugurated (Halm, 1997). It was also during this period that the first encyclopedia of the world, ‘The Epistles of Brethren of Purity" was complied (Halm, 1997). The word "epistles" was derived from the Greek word "episteme" meaning knowledge. This encyclopedia drew on a wide variety of Judeo-Christian, Platonic and Hellenic, Iranian and Indian sources and traditions.

There were also public libraries and learning centers were at every street corner and there was an open door policy to every piece of literature written in the library. Libraries in total contained approximately 500, 000 books (Halm, 1997). The main library in Cairo, "The House of Knowledge", contained over 18,000 volumes on the antique sciences and thousands of manuscripts in all the domains of science and culture with 2,400 of those imprinted with gold and silver illumination (Ivanov, 1939). The libraries also had a live-in residence, and invited all people to visit. People from all walks of life were allowed to access this knowledge. Some came to read books, others to copy something that interested them, and others to study. Ink, writing reeds, paper and ink stands were also provided (Ivanov, 1939).

Public forums called "Sessions of Wisdom" were also the norm, and were held in special facilities within the learning centers every week. Special forums were held for community members, for females and for visitors to the community by astronomers, grammarians, philologists, and physicians. Since all were invited to these intellectual discussions, the session’s objective was to invite those interested in discussing their perspectives about a given topic. It did not matter if the whole of the audience was unable to understand everything: as each individual would retain from the lecturers whatever their mental capacity could grasp (Halm, 1997:29).

The women intellectually participated and contributed significantly to the development of the empire. In private forums, women would collaborate and discuss the antique sciences, philosophy, astronomy, poetry and literature. Women studied at the university, became philosophers, physicians and poets.

This empire demanded high intellectual and moral capabilities, extraordinary skill, as well as subtle political intuition on the part of the leader (Ivanov, 1939). The leader of the community encouraged stirring the intellect by studying as he says, "Study in order to acquire learning, and to adorn yourself with it; cultivate dignity and goodwill; treat with respect those who teach you, and those you teach; Do not make learning oppressive to anyone and do not permit your vanity to destroy the effects of what is really good in you" (Ivanov, 1939:61). As a result, the teacher was the most distinguished figure that demanded solidarity of the community (Halm, 1997:64). Under the direct guidance and direction of the leader, the teacher’s role was to pass on the leader’s teachings and ensure that the various scholarly communities within the empire implemented the teachings.