Tom Moritz

Background

About Tom Moritz

Tom Moritz is a scholar and knowledge manager. His recent work is focused on the problems of "big data" and "data as evidence". This means consideration of all aspects of data as the primary resource for science and for evidence-based policy formation and decision making. Data must be rigorously defined by scientific logic and must be precisely managed at all stages of processing and transformation entailing careful documentation of scientific work-flow and of lineage and provenance. The required standards of proof in applying data to policy formation are different from standards required for convincing scientific argument. In politics, the standard of "reasonable doubt" applies to assessment of data as evidence creating a very different burden of exposition and knowledge representation. At the The Getty Research Institute, he served as Chief, Knowledge Management (and Associate Director for Administration). At GRI, he led successful efforts to develop a comprehensive digital strategy. At the American Museum of Natural History, he was Director of Library Services and oversaw scientific publishing. He has worked in the public sector and the non-profit private sector, has successfully won grants from the Mellon and Sloan Foundations and the US National Science Foundation a well as from private donors. In Fall, 2005, he served as Visiting Assoc. Prof. at the Pratt Institute Graduate School of Library and Info. Science. He has served as an adviser to the US Office of Personnel Management on "big data". He is has worked world-wide as an adviser on knowledge management and led in the formation of the Biodiversity Heritage Library and the UNEP-based Conservation Commons (which work included release of the first World Database on Protected Areas) and serves on numerous advisory bodies and is author of many publications and presentations. Specialties: Knowledge Management, Design for Knowledge Equity, Strategic Program Planning and Development