Information is like bricks while knowledge is like buildings.
One can make his own bricks from the available mud and then proceed to build his own hut.
Inevitable all bricks made by man will have something in common – after all they are made from the same material, for the same purpose, by individuals belonging to the same species, but will also vary considerably – depending, among others, on the skills of the makers and on the quality of the available mud.
Inevitably the houses will also have something in common – again, they are made for the same broad purpose by individuals belonging to the same species – but they will vary more widely than the bricks do because they have to fulfill a wider selection of purposes in a variety of climates. (All bricks are made to be used as building blocks but buildings are used for many more purposes than simply sleeping in them.)
In conclusion information is something that was gleaned by an individual from his environment while knowledge is a patchwork put together by the same individual using the pieces of information he has acquired previously.
Also please note that while all information is gleaned using one’s senses this process can be a direct one – the senses probe the reality in a direct mode, the observer watches birds in his back yard, or it can be mediated by an information source – the passionate reads, using the ‘same’ eyes as the observer, a book about the same birds.
And any consideration about the difference between information and knowledge would be incomplete if we forget to mention ‘sensations’.
Which are nothing but the raw material – the mud, if you like – from where our brain extracts what we call ‘information’ – which, in its turn, will end up being attached, by the same brain, to the patchwork commonly known as knowledge.
nicichiarasa 