Lesson on shared vs. personal knowledge for TOK

1. TOK: A Narrative
Theory of Knowledge – a narrative
1. We can think of knowledge as simplified map of reality
2. We use knowledge to solve problems (even internal ones)
3. Knowledge can take many forms depending on the problem it is designed to solve
4. We can make a distinction between shared and personal knowledge
5. Most knowledge is shared knowledge
6. Much of this shared knowledge is organised into areas of knowledge
7. In order to examine these areas of knowledge, here is the knowledge framework. The framework
specifies: scope, applications, concepts, methods, history; and the contributions of individuals
8. Within this framework, ways of knowing occupy a part in some of the sub-sections these can be
useful in analyzing personal knowledge
ToK studies how knowledge is produced and how it is able to solve the problems that it was
designed to solve. It deals in second order questions – questions about knowledge rather than
questions within a particular area of knowledge. These questions are called Knowledge Questions.

2. MAPS AS
REPRESENTATIONS OF
KNOWLEDGE
“The Map is Not the Territory”

3. What types of Maps?
• Geographical
• Political
• Socio-Economic
• Topographic
• Subway
• Locators in Malls
• City Maps

4. Knowledge is a Simplified
Representation of a
Complex World
• Complex Real World
• Simplified Representation
• TOK Knowledge Questions

5. Is there knowledge that
mankind has lost?

6. Consider . . .
Musical Instruments: Greek Aulos
Ancient Stained Glass Windows
like this of Notre Dame

7. Consider . . .
Architecture: Roman Cement
Languages: Meroitic (a Nubian
language that is as yet untranslatable)

8. Consider . .
The lost plays of
Euripides
About 80% have been
lost
Right: A vellum codex
fragment from the 4th
and 5th centuries AD
from his play Medea
(source: Wikipedia)

9. What evidence do we
have that this knowledge
once existed?
• Existing artifacts/constructions
• Illustrations
• References in existing texts

10. What made this
knowledge vulnerable to
loss?
• Overly specified
• Loss of peoples
• Loss of need

11. What characteristics
does comparable
surviving knowledge
share?

12. Six Conditions for Shared
Knowledge
1. There are shared problems that motivate the production of shared
knowledge and an incentive for sharing the knowledge at all.
2. The required knowledge exists in a form that CAN be transported
over distance (and time)
3. There are technologies that can TRANSPORT the knowledge
over distance and time
4. There are shared concepts and conventions that allow knowledge
PRODUCED in one place to be UNDERSTOOD in another
5. There are shared METHODS for PRODUCING this shared
knowledge
6. There is some element of shared HISTORY that allows this
knowledge to have a shared significance

13. Possible Groups for Shared
Knowledge
 Family groups
 Religious groups
 Groups associated with particular academic fields such as
mathematicians
 Groups associated with particular views within an academic
field such as neo-classical economists
 Groups sharing a particular culture
 Groups sharing particular artistic knowledge such as sculptors
 Groups sharing particular interests such as fishing
 Political groups
 National groups
 Ethnic groups

14. Personal and Shared
Knowledge• SHARED KNOWLEDGE
• Knowledge that CAN be shared survives
• PURELY PERSONAL KNOWLEDGE
• Knowledge that cannot be shared (or is not
shared for some reason)

15. Will Gadd: Ice Climber Niagara Falls

16. Questions to Consider:
• What does Will Gadd know that you and I do not know?
• Do you think his experiences of the water and its
pounding, etc, count as knowledge?
• Where does this knowledge come from?

17. Interview with Will Gadd

18. Some Examples of Personal Knowledge
• Skills and abilities I gain through practice and habit
(sports, music, art, crafts, languages, etc)
• Knowledge of/about myself, including my emotions
• Knowledge about world around gained via experience
• Internal maps of practiced “sensing,” e.g. expert wine
tasters or tea-tasters, judges at competitions
• Knowledge that could be shared but isn’t for good
reasons (e.g. Antonio Stradivari keeps his secret to
protect his violin-business)

19. Characteristics of Shared
Knowledge
• Impersonal
• Shared Criteria for Evaluation
• Systematic
• Map like or Model like
• Collective Endeavor
• Self Checking
• Strongly Language Based
• Propositional Knowledge
• Global (not local to one person)
• Can be analyzed using the Knowledge Framework
• Produces group perspective

20. Characteristics of Personal
Knowledge
• Knowledge by direct “experience”
• Knowing how it “feels”
• Knowledge of self
• Personal reflection is an important part
• CAN be map like but may be more story like (narrative)
• Experiential or Procedural knowledge
• Less reliant on language
• Local to person (not global)
• Difficult to truly communicate to others
• Uses the Ways of Knowing
• Produces Personal Perspective