What is Art?

Write a personal definition of art.
A piece of art is a man-made creation made for the purpose of communicating truths, feelings, or ideas. 

What do you know via Art as an Area of Knowledge?  Give a specific example to support your response.

I think that the Knowledge Area of Art can help you to learn more about yourself. In creating art, you can take what is inside of you (feelings, thoughts, ideas...) and bring them into the material world in order to examine them. By examining your art, you can gain a lot of knowledge about how you really feel, or what you value or maybe it will trigger an idea you weren't conscious you had. For example, I once decided to paint a barn scene. As I began to sketch out my ideas, I realized that the scene I was thinking of was the view at the beginning of one of my favorite movies. Through this, I was reminded of something I valued. After the painting was completed, I was also able to look at it and learn more about myself. I liked the colors in the painting and that way that the sun came through the trees. I could tell that I liked nature. The overall tone of the piece was calm and peaceful. Because I liked the piece, I could tell that I liked peace and calm. Other people could learn about themselves in similar ways. 

Knowledge Issues in History

1.  What is historical pluralism?
I don't know what it is and I can't find any information on it.


Historical pluralism refers to the idea that multiple (even contrasting) histories may be written (attributable to differences in historial evidence used, personal perspective (bias) of the historian etc). ~Dr. Gilligan 

2. What factors influence the process by which the historian picks and chooses his/her "facts"?  Please provide a specific example for each factor.
The reliability of the sources (ex. Nazis and Jews may say different things about concentration camps), the date of the sources (ex. whether they were written at the time of the event they describe, written before it, or after it) , the number of times the fact is mentioned in the same way (ex. the more people say the same thing the more likely the historian is to believe the fact) , whether or not the fact makes sense to the historian (ex. if they were told that Americans flew cows to India during a famine for them the Indians to eat in the 1700s, a historian would be unlikely to believe it) .

3.  According to Reuben Abel: "The patterns to be found in past events are selected by the historian; like the hypothesis of the scientist, they may be suggested, but are neither imposed nor dictated, by the facts" (Man is the Measure (MIM), p. 166-7)."  Based on your experience with the Cheques Lab, how far do you agree with this explanation of history?


I agree with the statement for the most part. I guess that facts can't really dictate patterns. The conclusions we made about the Whitneys from the checks were all our own hypothesis. We don't know why things were then way were. The checks don't tell us that the Whitneys had a son, but it is strongly implied by the data in the checks.

4.  Abel also writes: "Macaulay regards history as a branch of literature (MIM, p. 174)."  How would Jill Lepore of "Just the Facts, Ma'am" respond?  Please provide to specific quote from the article to justify your claim.

Lepore would probably understand what Abel is saying. She quotes Jane Austen (a writer of fiction) and the Author of Tom Jones (a work of fiction) and they both make statements to the effect that their fictional novels are just as true as history books. Lepore says, "Fielding insisted that what flowed from his pen was “true history”; fiction was what historians wrote."

5.   What does Reuben Abel mean when he says: "No crucial experiment can test the validity of a theory of history, any more than than it can the truth of a metaphysical theory (MIM, p. 174)."?

He means that there is no way to go back in the past and prove a historical theory just like there is no  way to prove a metaphysical theory. Metaphysical theories are philosophic explanations of what things are like and why they are there. Both metaphysical theories and historical theories need some overarching authority to ultimately prove or disprove them. 

Art

Choice A. Did you know that many tribal cultures have no word for art or artist?

Without words for art is it still possible to create and appreciate art?

An example of a tribal culture without a word for Art is Bali. In Bali, activities such as painting are closely connected to religious ritual. I think that this changes the artists purposes in creating art. Rather than trying to make something for the sake of art, they are simply participating in religious ritual. Because of their purpose, I would not call the things they create as art. However, I think it is possible for us to create statues and paintings just like theirs and call them art, because our purpose would be different. Or, if we found ancient artifacts of their creations we could call them art because they would no longer be fulfilling their purposes. 

I definitely think it is possible for these tribes to appreciate art though. If they saw something man-made for the purpose of art and admired it, they would be appreciating art. Because their creations are used for specific purposes though, they may not appreciate "non-practical" art as much as their own creations. They might see our art as useless.

In such communities does art have a different function or role within the society?

Yes, in Bali it has religious functions.

To what extent then is "art" a culturally relative term?

I guess I wouldn't call art a culturally relative term.

Stanford Prison Experiment

What police procedures are used during arrests, and how do these procedures lead people to feel confused, fearful, and dehumanized?
Police take people out of their environments and forcibly take them to unfamiliar and more uncomfortable locations. Police don't talk very much, only saying what is exactly necessary in the situation. People are pushed up against a car, so they can't see what is happening to them and they have no way to escape. Handcuffs are also placed on them. 


People could feel confused because there is not much communication between themselves and the police. 
They could feel fearful because they have no control over the situation and because they are being removed from their homes.
They could feel dehumanized because of both the lack of communication and the harsh treatment.  


After the study, how do you think the prisoners and guards felt when they saw each other in the same civilian clothes again and saw their prison reconverted to a basement laboratory hallway?


The prisoners probably felt confused, and maybe they even ashamed of themselves. Seeing everything go back to normal would remind them that the whole thing had only been an experiment, and that all of the pain, humiliation, and suffering they had been through was all just a set up. They would be reminded that they did in fact have control in the situation and could have left at anytime. I think it could also make them angry, they were miss treated for no reason. They would also probably feel relieved that it was all over.


The guards who had been cruel probably felt horrified with themselves. They had become terrible people. When the prisoners were dressed in the same clothes the guards were, the guards would be reminded that the prisoners were no different than they were. They had miss treated normal people, not animals. 


Some of the guards might feel angry because their power and authority had been taken away.

ToK Presentation Ideas

Real-life situation/contemporary problem: Crime

Knowledge issues: What was his crime? Who decides? Can people be punished for their plans? Should it be as serious as punishment for crimes?

Format: Look at news articles to see how some crimes were punished and compare them. Answer the questions: Are people punished for crimes they didn’t carry out? Is this ethical? What do law enforcers seem to think?

Knower’s (student’s) point of view: It doesn’t see as ethical to punish people for crimes they did not actually commit, but sometimes it is beneficial and necessary. For example, terrorist attacks.

Additional notes: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/28/us/28portland.html?_r=1&hp

Real-life situation/contemporary problem: Art Programs in Schools

Knowledge issues: Who decides what should be thought in schools? Can art programs really benefit kids in ways that other programs can’t?

Format: Look at and compare experiments and opinions of experts. School Board format maybe, with different characters talking about different knowledge issues

Knower’s (student’s) point of view: I’m not sure yet, I need to read some more articles.

Additional notes: http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2007/09/02/art_for_our_sake/

Hard and Soft Sciences

3. What aspects of the dispute between Lang and Huntington are "political?" How does the author feel about Academic Freedom?

One aspect comes from the fact that Huntington seems way more accredited and worthy of a position in the NAS than Lang, however, “Lang had previously assumed for himself ‘the role of a sheriff of scholarship, leading a posse of academics on a hunt for error,’ especially in the political and social sciences.” This seems much more political than scientific. Also, “Huntington had done several things that are now anathema in U.S. academia: he received CIA support for some research; he did a study for the State Department in 1967 on political stability in South Vietnam; and he's said to have been an early supporter of the Vietnam war.” Huntington’s “role in Vietnam” was frequently discussed I the NAS debates. The author is worried that, “Academic freedom means that outsiders can't raise the issue of a scholar's politics but other scholars can.”

5. Why does Diamond find fault in the traditional perceptions of the hard sciences?

He believes that science is not just, “defined by decimal places and controlled experiments,” but is also, “ the enterprise of explaining and predicting -- gaining knowledge of -- natural phenomena, by continually testing one's theories against empirical evidence.” He also says, “The world is full of phenomena that are intellectually challenging and important to understand, but that can't be measured to several decimal places in labs. They constitute much of ecology, evolution, and animal behavior; much of psychology and human behavior; and all the phenomena of human societies, including cultural anthropology, economics, history, and government.”

6. Why are soft sciences difficult to study?

They are more difficult because the things studied are a lot less controllable. “You can't start it and stop it whenever you choose. You can't control all the variables; perhaps you can't control any variable. You may even find it hard to decide what a variable is. You can still use empirical tests to gain knowledge, but the types of tests used in the hard sciences must be modified. ”

9. Briefly describe how Diamond illustrates operationalization in:

Math – Comparing amounts of things, like bananas

Chem – To measure the amount of an ingredient or the degree of something in relation to ingredients

Ecology – To measure habitat complexity

Psych – To decide why some doctors act the way they do

12. Why does Diamond believe that Lang might be ignorant of the measurements taken by social scientists like Huntington? 

Because he asks the question, ''How does Huntington measure things like social frustration? Does he have a social-frustration meter?''

14. Does Diamond believe the soft sciences to be more valuable than hard sciences? Do you agree? Explain.

He says, “As to the relative importance of soft and hard science for humanity's future, there can be no comparison. It matters little whether we progress with understanding the diophantine approximation. Our survival depends on whether we progress with understanding how people behave, why some societies become frustrated, whether their governments tend to become unstable, and how political leaders make decisions like whether to press a red button.” If he believes that our survival depends on the soft sciences, he obviously thinks that they’re important.

The End of Science

4. Why did Karl Popper find the use of observation in scientific inquiry as 'ludicrous?'  According to Popper, what should begin a scientific investigation?
He says, "Observation is always selective. It needs a chosen object, a definite task, an interest, a point of view, a problem." Popper suggests that a scientific investigation should begin instead with a hypothesis, "for without a hypothesis to guide research, scientists would have no way of distinguishing relevant from irrelevant data.

5. Why did Popper view Science as an "attempt to falsify rather than verify hypotheses?"
He thinks this becuase, "NO universal generalization can be conclusively confirmed, for we can never be sure that we have examined all the relevant data. It is always possible that we will discover something that will overturn even the most well established theory.

7. What were some criticisms of Popper?
Hypotheses can no more be conclusively falsified than they can be conclusively verified, for a hypothesis cannot be tested in isolation. If a test fails, it is always possible to maintain the hypothesis in question by rejecting one or more of the background assumptions. Popper's demarcation criterion is too weak to distinguish science from pseudoscience. If a theory is scientific as long as there is some possible state of affairs whose actual occurrence would refute the theory, then many seeming non-scientific theories would gain, :scientific status."

9. What does Kuhn mean by a 'paradigm shift?'
"Kuhn and Feyerabend see science primarily as a puzzle-solving exercise. The rules for solving particular puzzles are contained in a paradigm. A paradigm defines for scientists what sorts of puzzles are worth solving and what sorts of methods will solve them. From time to time, however, certain puzzles or "anomalies" arise that cannot be solved with the existing paradigm. When the cognitive dissonance created by these puzzles becomes too great, the scientific community undergoes a "paradigm shift." 

10. What are the implications of the statement: "There is no truth with a capital T" in Science?
It means that nothing in science is certain, things can never been depended upon because they can easily change. It suggests that maybe people should look to other AoK for Truth.