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Welcome to our collaborative Padlet for the TOK Essay Prescribed Titles (May 2026).
Each column corresponds to one of the six prescribed titles. Please add:
– TOK connections from your subject area
– Real-life examples and case studies
– Questions for classroom discussion
– Insights on student misconceptions or pitfalls

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In the production of knowledge, does it matter that observation is an essential but flawed tool? Discuss with reference to the natural sciences and one other area of knowledge.

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To what extent do you agree that doubt is central to the pursuit of knowledge? Answer with reference to two areas of knowledge.

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Is the power of knowledge determined by the way in which the knowledge is conveyed? Discuss with reference to mathematics and one other area of knowledge.

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In the acquisition of knowledge, can we only understand something to the extent that we understand its context? Discuss with reference to two areas of knowledge.

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To what extent do you agree with the claim that “all things are numbers” (Pythagoras)? Answer with reference to the arts and the human sciences.

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To what extent is interpretation a reliable tool in the production of knowledge? Answer with reference to history and one other area of knowledge.

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Title interpretation: When producing a piece of work, can we rely on our personal understanding and perspective when transmitting the knowledge and its meaning.

Real life situations:

Psychology: reliability of bathroom scale vs reliability of personality tests

Historians interpret same events differently and therefore may blame different nations/countries (Example: In world wars)

Potential knowledge issues:

Reliability of interpretation in psychology depends on the method used when collecting data as the method should allow for replication. The replication need to higher reliability;

Our interpretations are influenced by our cultural, personal, temporal and other backgrounds.

Connection to subjects:

History: Different interpretations may arise depending on the evidence available or the person's perspective.

Psychology: Reliability depends on contexts and research methods.

In support of reliability: Antonova, Newcomer, Ronay von Hippel (Biological Approach, experiments, DP2) or Bransford and Johnson (Cognitive Approach, DP1) Asch, Martin & Halverson (Sociocultural Approach, DP1)

Against reliability: case studies, HM, EP

TOK-style questions:

How does reliability affect production of knowledge differently in History and Psychology?

What role does bias play in psychological interpretations of human behavior?

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Assuming that everything can be expressed in terms of numbers, patterns, measurement. If meaning is fixed OR is based on context.

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Natural Sciences: Binary expression in terms of Computer Science, all the information(text, image) can be represented as binary.

English: Denotation/connotation - for example, denotation would be a dictionary entry of a term, the literal meaning of the term, and then connotation would be the meaning of the term based on context and the idea which a term invokes.

Human Sciences: Qualitative vs. quantitative research methodology - to what extent can we rely on quantitative research methodology?

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Observation is essential because it is necessary for the initial production of knowledge (the first step in the scientific method).

It is flawed if the expert brings biases to the observation.

DP2

"How does our perception of 'contamination' or 'purity' in food reflect cultural biases in the acquisition and acceptance of scientific knowledge?" (Do cherries produce worms?)

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Art: Movies, for instance, Darren Aronofsky’s Pi, which relates numbers to the mysticism of the Jewish Torah and focuses on the universality of numbers.

Natural sciences: how the AI models can transform and represent emotions in social media platforms, even language expressions of creativity, images, etc, into vectors and numbers.

Human sciences: IQ testing, for instance, is represented in numbers; however, it heavily relies on context, such as culture, time, etc. It may be reductionist to consider only the data represented in numbers.

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Key concepts:

* "power of knowledge": Ability to persuade;

improve understanding; accurate communication of information/data; realability/trustworthiness of the source

* "determined by": a sense of causality between form and content: is the impact of form shaped or controlled by how it is communicated?

* "the way in which the knowledge is presented": present a clear/concise reasoning

medium: spoken, written, visual, digital

style: rhetorical persuasion, storytelling, graphs/diagrams.

Math: the applicability of a math concept across multiple math topics

Real-life example: the prices on the market are not only decided by using statistics/graphs but also by means of matrixes that affect the decision-making.

YES: confirmation bias( you do not present the full picture)

Human sciences: Economics - prices are not necessarily derived from statistical calculations and modeling, but also reflect the non-price determinants such as consumer behaviour, expectations, natural disasters

Natural sciences:

The power of knowledge: ethical presentation of scientific discoveries.

Messi was given growth hormone as a child beacuse he was diagnosed with lower levels of growth hormones

The Arts:

Literature: Factual information vs. emotional truth (biography/memoir writing/autofiction)

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Science : it's centralised. hypothesis need to be tested ,usually tested empirically. The doubt leads us in science to paradigm shift.

Art:Artistic Representation of reality in literature creates doubt and challenges our conventional believes about society and human nature.

TOK question:How does doubt function differently in natural sciences compared to Art?

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- Moving from ignorance to knowledge

To what extent are the contextual considerations of a literary/historical/mathematical work essential in order to understand their meaning and implications?

Is the context always crucial in the understanding of knowledge?

Can there be understanding without context?

"The Death of the Author" - Roland Barthes (Les Plaisirs du Texte)

Margaret Atwood - "The Handmaid's Tale" (context is the be-all and the end-all)

Can there be knowledge of the COVID-19 spread without understanding of the demographic context? (logistic regression mathematical modeling)

Deciphering the Nazi Enigma machine - without the historical context of WWII, would the cryptanalysis of enciphered radio signals be attainable?

In terms of the collective subject in the title, is there a difference between experts and non-experts in a particular area of knowledge?

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Human Sciences: Can cherry picking and framing when representing statistical significance impose bias in the results of a study?

Natural Sciences: To what extent can machine learning algorithms be said to know or understand the information they process?

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"How do our methods of observation and classification influence what we consider to be natural or unnatural phenomena in the biological world?"

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From Julija:

Literature: In what ways is observation essential, yet unreliable in understanding fictional characters?

Example: The reader of the short story “The Tell-Tale-Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe, observes the narrator’s detailed description of the old man, especially his “vulture eye”.

This observation is flawed because it is distorted and reveals more about narrator’s own psychological state than about the fictional character himself.