traveller Posted February 22, 2015 Report Share Posted February 22, 2015 Hello all Im in the preliminary phases of planning out my TOK presentation. At first I thought up the question "To what extent can conspiracy theories be trusted?" , but then I thought this would be too specific.I changed the question to "To what extent should theories be trusted?" so that not only would I encompass conspiracy theories in the area of politics and history, but I could also mention theories in the areas of mathematics and natural sciences. Im also considering how I could link into ethics and religious knowledge systems, perhaps by claiming that these two are often based on theories. I plan on then elaborating on what differs a theory from a truth and when can a theory be considered a fact. What do you think of my ideas so far? Is the question TOK-appropriate? Do you think i'll be able to elaborate on it for ten minutes? Any comments/ideas/tips on changes I should make? Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vioh Posted February 22, 2015 Report Share Posted February 22, 2015 Hello all Im in the preliminary phases of planning out my TOK presentation. At first I thought up the question "To what extent can conspiracy theories be trusted?" , but then I thought this would be too specific.I changed the question to "To what extent should theories be trusted?" so that not only would I encompass conspiracy theories in the area of politics and history, but I could also mention theories in the areas of mathematics and natural sciences. Im also considering how I could link into ethics and religious knowledge systems, perhaps by claiming that these two are often based on theories. I plan on then elaborating on what differs a theory from a truth and when can a theory be considered a fact. What do you think of my ideas so far? Is the question TOK-appropriate? Do you think i'll be able to elaborate on it for ten minutes? Any comments/ideas/tips on changes I should make? I think that talking about "conspiracy theories" alone is too narrow; but talking about "theories" in general is a bit too broad. For that reason, I would recommend you to rephrase your question like this:"To what extent should we be sceptical about our theories in ........................ ?" And you fill some AOKs (two AOKs, preferably) in the dotted space. This is a much better KQ because you can explicitly incorporate AOKs inside the question itself. Besides, one WOK is also present. Scepticism is not strictly a WOK. However, it's a way of checking/verifying our knowledge; and in science, scepticism is closely related to the scientific method, hence scepticism can be considered more or less as a WOK itself. Note that this is a bit similar to the May 2014 essay title that I myself have done: "A sceptic is the one who is willing to question any knowledge claim, asking for clarity in definition, consistency in logic and adequacy of evidence (adapted from Paul Kurtz, 1994). Evaluate this approach in 2 areas of knowledge". Hence It's a completely safe topic to choose. If you have further question, feel free to ask. Good luck with your presentation Reply Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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