Essay on What Classifies as Common Knowledge in Science and History

There has been many misunderstandings about science over the years. People be thinking that scientific knowledge is absolute and that it never changes, but it's all wrong. Scientific knowledge is never absolute. Which means that nobody can ever actually find the final proof for any scientific theory. Whenever scientists are working on any type of theory they create some type of model, which is some type of idea that they have, which in most cases is wrong, scientists then keep researching further more and if they ever get any more details or anything that lists different than what the scientists thought they go back and change it. The reason that it's always

If we refer back to Gawande’s, Mistrust of Science we can predict that not all “science” is reliable science. There have been instances where we believed that “the sun moved across the sky” and that when being out in the cold, we have a greater chance of getting sick. These are all said to be facts, and they were even said by scientists. Though, we have to look deeper into the facts and the knowledge, because these statements are just hypotheses. They have yet to be proven. So when is science factual? When can we take the word of science and use it to gain more knowledge? This article suggested that “all knowledge is just probable knowledge. A contradictory piece of evidence can always emerge.” This is, in fact, true. Knowledge is just what you find to an answer once. Just because that specific question has been answered does not mean that it is the one and the only answer, there could be and probably are much more. For example, medicine. Medicine was once said to be all we had. There was once a time where if you got cancer you were bound to pass, or if you got AIDs or even HIV, there was no chance of survival after a short amount of time. Today, these answers have changed, due to the never-ending search for more knowledge in these

Facts are statements that are indisputably true. Truthful statements are authentic because they are widely accepted to be accurate and fit reality. When answering the question “given access to the same facts , how is it possible that there can be disagreements between experts in a discipline?”, one must consider the definition of an expert. For the sake of this paper I am defining an expert as someone who excels in their field , and constantly evolves their knowledge as their field progresses. I believe that disagreements between experts when presented with the same facts, occur because of bias. Bias is a sway towards one side or view of a situation or statement. Therefore I ask , how does someone’s personal bias affect their interpretation

In today's context, science is viewed as the "correct way of thinking" and thus the genral public believes whatever that is proven true by science only. Any topic that is not justified by science would therefore be deemed as an incorrect way of thinking.

Science is tentative and can be proven wrong or right if there is evidence to support

Science is the knowledge gained by a systematic study, knowledge which then becomes facts or principles. In the systematic study; the first step is observation, the second step hypothesis, the third step experimentation to test the hypothesis, and lastly the conclusion whether or not the hypothesis holds true. These steps have been ingrained into every student of science, as the basic pathway to scientific discovery. This pathway holds not decision as to good or evil intention of the experiment. Though, there are always repercussions of scientific experiments. They range from the most simplistic realizations of the difference between acid and water to the principle that Earth is not the center of

Experts in the same discipline typically agree with one another as they have the same facts and knowledge. However, when experts disagree with one another in the same discipline, it may cause contradiction between experts. Disagreements come in many different forms such as different opinions, facts, how one perceive things and one’s standard of right or wrong. In certain disciplines, such as history and art are filled with a multitude of disagreement as the two area of discipline are bias and subjective. Thus, different experts may see things differently in one discipline which can also be called area of knowledge. In history, self-serving bias and historical revisionism can alter the interpretation of evidence and influence the perspective

Science should not be seen as a collection of facts, concepts, and useful ideas about nature, or even the organized analysis of nature, although both are common definitions of science. Science is a means of examining nature. In other words, science is a method of discovering reliable knowledge about nature. There are other ways of learning knowledge about nature; nevertheless science is the only way that results in getting hold of of reliable knowledge. Dependable knowledge is material that has high viewpoint of accuracy because its certainty has been defendable by a reliable technique. Reliable data is called standard correct idea, to distinguish reliable facts from belief that is false and unjustified. Every person has beliefs, nonetheless not all facts is steadily true and acceptable. Science is a method

When the quote states, “attempt to know the world”, it is regarding the gain of knowledge. This is because knowledge is the understanding of the physical world surrounding us and beyond. Plato defined knowledge as ‘justified, true belief, meaning that for knowledge to be legitimate, it must be justified by sources such as reason, empirical evidence or memory. Secondly, the term ‘assumptions’ in the quote should also be explored. According to the oxford dictionary, assumptions can be defined as something ‘that is accepted as true without proof’ . Therefore the quote is stating that our knowledge of the world is based on a set of assumptions. The second part of the assertion produces the knowledge issues of the inability of testing the knowledge. The oxford dictionary defines ‘tested’ as taking measurements to check the reliability of the something. Therefore, a key question that comes from this quote is: To what extent are all knowledge in the natural sciences and history based on assumptions and is it possible to test it’s reliability?

Throughout the course of history, scientific discoveries have led to the birth of new knowledge. Humanity’s increase in knowledge has helped to achieve new heights of understanding in a variety of fields such as medicine, nuclear power, and nuclear weapons. While some of these achievements in science can generate much prosperity, some technology has created significant amounts of controversy. The Honors 2400 class entitled The Chernobyl Incident has granted me over the course of the semester the opportunity to analyze these scenarios and understand the challenging questions that are associated with the pursuit of knowledge. From many examples discussed in class, I understand the importance of limiting knowledge, the discoveries that humanity should or should not pursue, how individuals pursue confined questions, and who is ultimately responsible for approving or disapproving of these scientific questions.

Knowledge can be accepted or refuted, hence what determines accepted knowledge? I believe ‘accepted knowledge’ is that which has been tested whereby sufficient evidence has been collected to support certain knowledge claims. However, it is important to consider times when knowledge has been refuted. Despite strong belief that we possess objective facts, through research and technological progresses, such facts become re-interpreted in light of new evidence and discoveries. Personally, discarded knowledge refers to theories or laws being dismissed as new-found information proves more accurate. However, knowledge can also be amended as it is evolves. Knowledge is often discarded or amended due to technological progresses or changing social trends. Taking both a natural and a human science in IB, I feel that knowledge is more readily discarded in the natural sciences whereas in the human sciences knowledge is amended as certain theories evolve. This suggests that knowledge is not static hence leading to the main knowledge issue which will be explored: “To what extent is knowledge within the human and natural sciences provisional?

Knowledge can be defined as information gained through sense perception, emotion, language and reason, while it is defined by Plato as “justified true belief.” The claim that knowledge takes the form of a combination of stories and facts is however not accurate in history and biology. First, it brings up the questions of what are stories and what are facts. Stories are accounts of past events from somebody’s perspective, while a fact is the truth. When looking at the two areas of knowledge, they each favour one side of the combination over the other. For example, knowledge from history mostly takes the form of stories, while knowledge from biology mostly takes the form of facts. This distinction between the different types of knowledge leads to the knowledge questions of “How do we obtain knowledge in the different areas of knowing?” and “To what extend is knowledge in certain areas of knowledge subjective or objective?”

I chose this question since it has actually stayed with me for the whole TOK course. I found it very difficult to find a link, for example, of perception in math or how reason could fit into art. A network suggests that more than one way of knowing can collaborate within another in order to gain knowledge in a particular Area of knowing. The statement implies that not using a network of WOK to gain knowledge is unwise. Thus, I wish to examine how we best acquire knowledge in Natural Sciences and History. My two central knowledge questions are, how reliable is it to use only one way of knowing in one Area of knowledge in order to gain knowledge? and Is it essential to use a network of ways of knowing to acquire good knowledge?

In general, traditional knowledge adopt a more holistic approach, and do not separate observations into different disciplines as does Western science (Iaccarino, 2003). Moreover, traditional knowledge systems do not interpret reality on the basis of a direct cause and effect, but rather as a world made up of complex web of interactions (Freeman, 1992). The problem is how to study and analyze traditional knowledge and belief systems.

Disagreement may aid the pursuit of knowledge in the natural and human sciences because disagreement leads to new discoveries. Disagreement is about gathering reliable knowledge as well as using this newfound knowledge, and occurs when a group fails to reach a consensus over the logic of an argument. Knowledge is composed of facts, information, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education. Two areas of knowledge that are impacted by disagreement are human science and natural science. Human science is the study of human behavior and how humans gather information. Natural science is a branch of science that deals with the physical world. In order for a disagreement to occur, one must be familiar with the subject and have his or her own prediction that is different from the norm. Therefore, to advance knowledge in the areas of human and natural science, people must disagree. The roles of logic, reason, and emotion will be investigated to see how they are used to help gain new knowledge in both human and natural science.