3 replies to this topic

[Zirek]

Hey everyone,

I was just wondering if this is a feasible ToK topic: 'To what extent is the information acquired through torture reliable?'

Any feedback would be awesome!

Thanks in advance

[marauder7]

It sounds interesting.. but how are you planning to prove it?
With that topic I would suggest that you talk about ethics, like "is it possible to ethically justify torture?" or something like that, and an argument could be that the information obtained by torture may or may not be reliable.

[Keel]

I don't think either of the topics above are able to give rise to strong ToK content. What I think you should do is to look at torture itself as there are many ways of torturing people which actually all relate to our Ways of Knowing. The conventional way of torturing people relies on sense perception e.g. delivery of pain or the forced viewing of horrible visual images or unbearable sounds (repetition of water dripping). But how about emotional torture, verbal torture or setting up props to spark an illogical cycle that will overload the brain? I think it can be seen that torture relies on our Ways of Knowing and I think you will do very well in exploring that.

[Keel]

Hi,

I'm quite suprised at the change in topic and was rather hoping that you would stick to the theme of tourture as I though it was a really interesting issue with respect to the ways of knowing. It's a shame but as you've made up your mind let's deal with the current question.

The first thing you must clarify is 'what is intuition?' Secondly, what are you trying to show or deal with in this presentation i.e. why 'intuition' and why the 'natural sciences'? In other words, is there a particular idea that you wish to convey? The reason why I'm asking these questions is because if you are able to answer the first question, in my opinion, the question becomes redundant. I view intuition as an advanced form of inductive reasoning, but nevermind that; the point of the matter is that intuition is not measurable, so its almost impossible to state what kind of 'role' it should play.

Did you think of this question by yourself? Because if you did then try to answer question 2 and rephrase the question to really convey what you are trying to explore. If you were 'guided' to this question then I suggest you start from scratch because doing a presentation on something not intuative to you is a very difficult job indeed.