Theory ofKnowledge

A crash course

What is knowledge?

• Justified True Belief• You must believe it• You must be justified in your belief• Is has to be true

Truth is assumed to be public, independent and eternal

Types of knowledge

Ways of Knowing

Sense Perception

• Sight

• Smell

• Hearing

• Touch

• Taste

More senses …

• Balance, equilibrioception

• Temperature

• Kinesthetic sense

• Pain

• Direction

• Other internal senses (esophagus, bladder etc)

Sight

• Optical illusions

Smell

• Women have better noses, but there are more male scientists …

• Dogs can smell cancer

• Love at first smell (peptides)

Hearing

• Falling Bells

• Hearing and age

• Learning to speak

• Sonar

• Marine animals

• What is this?

http://cetus.ucsd.edu/voicesinthesea_org/Flash/

Touch & Taste

• Tactile illusions

• Tasting what you smell

• The power of hypnosis

• ‘Acquired’ taste

The 6th Sense

• Instinct, Belief, Faith

Emotion

• Is emotional response also a cultural one?

• Reading emotions: is a smile always a smile?

• Media evoking emotional response (e.g film music, emotive language).

• How easy is it to influence emotions?• To what extent can emotion lead to

knowledge?

Language

• The functions of language• Informative• Expressive• Directive• Ceremonial• Performative

• How do we learn language?

• Body Language

Language

• Lost in translation?• IJsberen - to pace • Baard in de keel - voice is breaking• Kruimeldief - Dust buster / Petty Thief

Language

Uniquely human (?)CommunicatesUses symbols

Judgement and Classification – once you’ve put it into words, you obstruct further thought

Language creates reality

Reason

• Logic• To define ‘correct’ reasoning• To distinguish good arguments from bad ones• To pick out flaws and weaknesses in reasoning• To create rules which enable us to test whether

our reasoning is coherent and consistent

Deductive logic (syllogism)→I need to finish this presentation by Tuesday→I only have time to work on it on Sunday→Conclusion: I will work on it on Sunday

More logic

• Inductive logic• Generalisations• Analogies• Based on experience and empirical knowledge

→ So far, all my TOK classes have been interesting→ It is likely that the next lesson will also be

interesting

Three tests:→ Sufficient number→ Varying circumstance→ exceptions

Errors in logic

• My father is on the board of directors of ISA, so if you don’t give me an A in ToK you won’t have your contract renewed next year.

• You must change my ToK mark to an A because my father is seriously ill, and it will break his heart to discover that I am not a ToK genius.

• All philosophers are eccentric and Sartre was a philosopher. (What is missing here?)

Areas of Knowledge

Maths

• Axiom: fundamental law

• Rules of inference = forming conclusion from information available (if … then ...)

• If: 1 + 6 = 7 and 5 + 4 = 9• Then: (1 + 6) + (5 + 4) = 7 + 9

• Theorems: A proposition that has been or is to be proved on the basis of explicit assumptions.

Maths

Tennis Club Problem.

• A tennis club with 1025 members decides to have a series of matches to determine who will be the champion. The procedure is for everyone to draw lots for a partner, with the odd person sitting out. In the second round, only the winners of the first round plus the one who sat out draw lots for partners and play another match. This procedure continues until the champion emerges. How many individual matches are played?

Is Maths a language?

Uniquely human CommunicatesUses symbols

The square root of two hundred and fifty divided by three plus seven

√250-------- + 7 3

√250-------- 3 + 7

50 √200 + ---- + 7 3

50 √200 + ---- 3 + 7

250----- + 7 3

Natural Sciences

Problems with Scientific Method:

• Perceptual (senses)

• Observation statement (language often carries many implications)

• Choice of what is observed

• Problems with inductive (2) and deductive (4) logic

Possible Solutions

Paradigm = overall concept, model, framework

Social Sciences

• Anthropology

• Economics

• Political Science

• Sociology

• Psychology

See and be seen

• Methods:• Experimentation • Prediction (hard to predict humans)

➙ Observation – seeing what you want to see?

➙ Being observed – behaviour change

Free Will or Determinism?

What is History?

“History is the lie commonly agreed upon.” - Voltaire

“History, real solemn history, I cannot be interested in. . . .The quarrels of popes and kings, with wars and pestilences in every page; the men all so good for nothing, and hardly any women at all.” - Jane Austen

“History is a commentary on the various and continuing incapabilities of men. What is history? History is women following behind with the bucket.” - Mrs Lintott (from: The History Boys)

“History could be divided into events which do not matter and events which probably never occurred.” - W.R. Inge

History

Why bother with History?

• Patriotism

• Intellectual Pursuit

• Societies need to understand their past

• Helps understand the present

• Explains why things happen

• Teaches us about human behaviour

• History of other countries makes us more tolerant

• Fun to investigate

Literature, Music & Art

• What is Art?How do/can we judge it?

Is Music a language?

DogAcrylic on canvas by UnknownDonated by Elizabeth and Sorn Poeckle, Copenhagen, Denmark

A remarkable fusion of ski resort and wolf puppy -- stoical in his yellow-eyed silence, frozen beneath the ice-capped peak, Dog eloquently challenges the viewer to reexamine old concepts of landscape.

http://www.museumofbadart.org/collection/landscape-6.html

8

Art according to Tolstoy

Ethics

• Utilitarianism (consequences – best for the largest number)

• Duty (principles of justice)

• Virtue (gaining happiness through living virtuously – Aristotle)

• Religious (guided by Higher Being)

Moral issues

• Death penalty (if society has agreed on it)

• Female circumcision (matter of culture?)

• Terrorists or Freedom Fighters?

• Cloning

• Eating Meat

• Etc …

Ethics in Areas of Knowledge

• What is the moral responsibility of the (natural and social) scientist?

• Should art be morally uplifting?

• Should history as a subject be value-free?

• “Mathematics education has been a tool of cultural imperialism.” - Jim Neyland, Victoria University, Wellington

Black slave traders

“Now listen to me, silly Navi, you should aim with a 10° angle …”

Sources

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