Presentation to get new IB Theory of Knowledge students to reflect.

1. Kinds of Knowledge

2. Activity
Look at the list of knowledge claims given you on the sheet.
With your neighbour(s) attempt to classify the claims into
whatever categories you can think of.
Can we agree on a set of categories?
What distinguishes each of the categories?

3. Personal or Shared Knowledge?
How may of our claims were personal?
How many were of shared knowledge?
Were any both shared and personal?

4. Kinds of knowledge (Savoir ou connaître?)
Je connais Londres
Conosco Maria
Conozco este poema de memoria
Je sais que je vais mourir
So che porto una camicia azzurra
Sé cómo resolver este problema matemático

5. Kinds of knowledge (one possible distinction)
Knowledge claims
I know that ........
Experiential Knowledge
Experience + Reflection = Knowledge
Skills
I know how to ................

6. Some limitations of experience
◦Is being told about something the same as seeing it
yourself?
◦What kind of support is required to be able to call
what you have experienced ‘knowledge’?
◦Do people ‘learn from their experience’?

7. How shall I talk of the sea to the frog
If it has never left its pond?
How shall I talk of the frost to the bird of the
Summerland
If it has never left the land of its birth?
How shall I talk of life to the sage
Chuang Tze (or Zhuangzi) If he is prisoner of his doctrine?
4th Century BC

8. I know that (that atoms have protons and
electrons)
◦ Shared or personal knowledge?
◦ How do you know? Is it experiential?
◦ What processes were used to arrive at the claim?
◦ Is it true?

9. I know that (Columbus discovered America in
1492)
◦ How do you know this? Through experience?
◦What evidence is there for it?
◦ Would everyone agree on the word ‘discovered’?
◦What does this tell us about the nature of evidence in history?
◦What does this tell us about perspectives in history?

10. I know that (chocolate brownies are delicious)
◦ Personal or shared knowledge?
◦ Is this (always) true?
◦ Does everyone agree?
◦ Can everyone agree?

11. Knowing that (God exists)
oIs this knowledge or belief?
oIs it experiential?
oIs it personal or shared?
oWhat justification is required for such a claim?
oCan such a claim be tested?

12. I know that (the sun will rise tomomorrow)
◦ Can you be sure?
◦How much observational evidence (experience) is required for
such a statement to be well founded?
◦ If a general pattern has been observed in the past, can we
predict the future with certainty?

13. I know how (to boil an egg)
◦What do we mean by knowing how to boil an egg?
◦Does everyone know how to boil an egg?
◦ How do we learn to boil an egg?
◦ Is it merely ‘information’ or is it a skill? (What might be the
difference?)