Knowledge Transfer the Ancient Way

There is an old saying in this part of the world that that goes something like, ‘in order to be able to understand the present you must first understand the past’.

I recently came across an example which on first reading appeared to be an early example of a community at work. However on second reading I began to wonder if it really was a community or just individuals acting within the system that had been established for the behaviour. Either way, let me recall the story and you can decide for yourself.

The story goes that a long time ago the Babylonians had a very few physicians so they relied on an alternative strategy for tackling illness. The story goes on to recall how anyone who was sick would be placed in the town square and under penalty of the law no one was allowed to pass the sick person without offering them advice that could treat their sickness if they themselves had suffered from that sickness or had known someone who had suffered from that sickness are. Although the story doesn't explicitly say it, it would appear that if you knew nothing about the sickness you are allowed to walk on past unhindered.

It was then left to the ill person to decide which treatment they would utilise to cure the illness.

Unfortunately the story does not have a feedback loop so is difficult to know whether this method of knowledge transfer was successful or not. Presumably it was successful if there were lots of people passing through the town square telling the ill person the same thing.

This story also illustrates for me that knowledge transfer works best when it is Pull involved, that's to say someone wants the knowledge. In this example the sick person wants the knowledge and presumably by standing in the town square is proactively seeking that knowledge.

I guess this is the modern equivalent of ‘phone a friend’ or ‘twitter a friend’.

Knoco Ltd