The Way of Knowing that is the best reflection of me as a knower is reason. I tend to approach situations with logic and reason in order to determine what to do, or what exactly is going on in the situation. An example of this as an IB student is in my Algebra class, when I was solving a problem on the midterm involving quadratics, and I did not know what to do, but I logically deduced that I should start by writing down the quadratic formula and try and plug in as many variables as I could. It turns out that I solved the problem correctly, and although I did not initially know how to solve it, I used reason and came to the conclusion that the first step is by using the formula with a near identical name to the form of equation in the problem, the quadratic formula. I use reason in TOK as well. I remember being showed a slide on the board with a picture from the Wizard of Oz, of Dorothy, the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, the Wizard, and the lion, and being asked how many people were in the picture. I used reason and decided that either they were all being counted as people, since they were technically all actors, or none of them were and they were fictional characters, which are not people, and I was correct.
The Area of Knowledge that most reflects me as a knower is ethics. I remember the topic of ethics coming up in Biology when discussing cloning and whether it is right or wrong, and I looked into my own ethical beliefs and decided that I believe there is nothing wrong with it morally because cloning happens naturally in the form of identical twins and in cells that reproduce asexually, therefore it is a natural process and not exclusively man-made. I often also look at ethics in my everyday life when trying to figure out if I am making the right decisions, for instance whether or not to cancel plans with one friend for another, or whether or not to break promises to my mother, and MOST of the time I make the right moral decision, but not always. However a strong ethical belief system guides me through life and makes it clear to me which decisions are right or wrong. In school particularly I often am faced with decisions about whether or not to finish doing my homework at night even if I am extremely tired, and most of the time I make the right decision.
The image attached to this blog demonstrates ethics in my life, as I try to always be truthful and show commitment to my schoolwork every day, with my own integrity to guide me.
Essential TOK terms;
WAYS OF KNOWLEDGE;
Emotion; subjective experience, associated with mood, temperament, personality
Reason; human mental faculty that is able to generate conclusions from assumptions or premises.
Language; language is a particular kind of system for encoding and decoding information.
Perception; perception is the process of attaining awareness or understanding of sensory information.
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