ABSTRACT

This chapter reveals that the cognitive techniques drawn on in the responsive-legality ideal type are the application of experience and verification of truth – and positively so. Decision makers justifying their decisions according to this type draw on their personal experience in a range of contexts to apply relevant and contextually specific knowledge and discernment to the task at hand. In this sense, they understand, whether explicitly or subconsciously, the importance of tacit (or experientially based) knowledge and the difference between data, information and knowledge that sets tacit knowledge users apart from those who apply more superficial stand-alone recitations of information. The chapter argues that in doing so they are better able to perceive the factual truth of a situation and, accordingly, better able to understand how to apply laws, rules, judgements, perceptions and intuitions to the unique matter at hand.