Thrisha’s TOK Blog

 How do we know if a source or a claim can be trusted?  To be able to believe and trust that a source is correct and isn't factually wrong, a thorough analysis must be done. Time period is a very important factor. When was the information published? For some topics, it’s okay if you use an older source. For example, if you want to know what DNA is, it’s okay if the source was published five years ago. But, if you’re researching what the latest DNA discoveries, a five-year-old source wouldn’t be helpful. Is the source relevant: Does this information meet your wants? For example, an article aimed at educating young children about DNA would probably not be a relevant source if you work for a tech firm and are writing a report about whether to acquire some DNA technology. It’s okay if a source isn’t perfectly relevant to your research question, since that’s where analysis comes in. For example, if you were researching the Housing Crisis in LA, you might read about how expensive c...

  What is the Role of Imagination in the Writing of History? The past is irrecoverable. We cannot go back in time and experience something firsthand again. The men and women cannot be brought back to life. The experiences that had occurred cannot occur again.   Objects of historical thought are events which have finished happening and those conditions no longer exist. As far as present experiences are concerned, the past is non-existent, the physical and mental elements of past events can only be constructed in imagination by the historian’s mind, upon what he takes to be evidence for the past, therefore, his picture of the past, is imaginary in every detail. When historians try to imagine of events of the past based on the sources, they try to justify their imagination and try to make sense of the situation logically in order to understand what had occurred. This can be considered them having multiple interpretations of what had happened in the past and try to justify...

During TOK we had a debate based on creators and whether or not they're responsible for their creations. I started wondering whether they should be held responsible for the externalities caused by their creations. The question I'll be addressing is "are scientists morally responsible for the application of their discoveries?" The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are the most well-known illustration of this problem. Shouldn't the scientists have known better than to work on the bomb's development? This subject is addressed in Frederic Brown's "The Weapon" published in 1951.  It ends with the line, “Only a madman would give a loaded gun to an idiot.” Is Brown's proposal correct? Should scientists be on a higher level than the general public and be the first to predict the catastrophic consequences of the atomic bomb? The scientists were well aware that the atomic bomb would be the ultimate weapon, and they carried out test runs with it...

 "What is good music?" Everyone has different preferences for music, whether if it is a genre, an artist, a specific emotion etc. But how do we know what is good music? In order to define ‘good’ music, we must first have a clear definition of what music is. Music is ‘a combination of sounds, melodies and rhythms’, but this definition will also require defining the words ‘melody’, because we will probably explain what a rhythm and sound is similarly’. Elements of music also includes harmony, tonality, rhythm, structure and many more. There are notes which sounds good together, some notes sound ‘okay’ together, while others is painful to hear them together. When two notes sound like they go together, they merge into one note, but when they sound they play together sounds awful, we couldn’t wait the sound to be over. But is how ‘good’ the music sound to us able to be calculated? Is the the ration between certain notes? Or the timing between the notes? Studies have found that a p...

A while ago we learnt what inductive and deductive reasoning was in TOK class. With more research, I've understood clearly that inductive reasoning is basically the act of making generalized conclusions based off of specific situations. For example, determining when to go to a get together based on the traffic, or by saying that left handed people only use left handed scissors, therefore all left handed people use left handed scissors. Whereas deductive reasoning is backing up a generalized statement with specific scenarios. An example would be a ll birds have feathers. All robins are birds. Therefore, robins have feathers.

 To what extent does metacognition help us with our life? Metacognition, the word "meta" is derived from the Greek root word meaning "beyond" and the Latin word "cognoscere" meaning "getting to know." It refers to one's ability to be able to be aware of their thoughts and feelings. It helps analyze how we think, helps us control our thoughts, and it also helps us choose helpful strategies for a given task. Metacognition is sometimes defined as "thinking about our thinking," but it's way beyond that. This is a whole new level of self awareness where you can channel your thoughts and alter behaviors to enhance fulfillment. Metacognition makes you smarter, it aides you to take full advantage of your abilities. It's an internal counsellor that knows when you slowly stop paying attention, or when your memory fails you, and so on. This might not seem like a very useful skill, but as you learn more about it, you realize how effecti...