IB Theory of Knowledge - an ongoing list of interesting finds

Elizabeth Loftus, a professor at the University of California, Irvine, is the most influential female psychologist of the twentieth century ( New Yorker feature article ) "Her work helped usher in a paradigm shift, rendering obsolete the archival model of memory—the idea, dominant for much of the twentieth century, that our memories exist in some sort of mental library, as literal representations of past events. According to Loftus, who has published twenty-four books and more than six hundred papers, memories are reconstructed, not replayed." Also, check out this interview with Loftus from the American Psychological Association, where Loftus discusses  how our recollections of events and experiences may be subject to manipulation. 

"Tank Man" by Jeff Widener, 1989. On the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests (1989), authorities in China continue to go to great lengths to censor knowledge of what happened that day, where "hundreds, possibly thousands, had been shot dead."  To test the extent of the censorship, here is a video of a BBC reporter walking the streets of Beijing to find out how many people recognize the most iconic image of the protests, that of "Tank Man" - a lone man standing in front of a line of tanks a day after the massacre at Tiananmen Square.  In a testament to the strength of censorship in China, most of those interviewed claimed not to recognize the image, even if they were old enough to remember the tragic outcome of the protests.

You are leaking data, and absorbing it, says Yale historian Timothy Snyder . But for whose benefit?

He’s Sailing the World Using Just the Wind, Stars, and Waves More than 40 years ago, Nainoa Thompson joined a movement of young Hawaiians interested in reviving the traditional art of Polynesian navigation known as wayfinding. They learned to sail across open waters using just the wind, sky and waves as their guide, voyaging without modern navigation tools. Since then, Thompson has honed his craft navigating Hōkūleʻa, a traditional Polynesian double-hulled voyaging canoe. Today, Hōkūleʻa is sailing the world to spread the message that we must live sustainably and protect our earth. Over three years, the crew will travel thousands of nautical miles years to connect with communities across the world.

Here are a few pieces that look directly at  patterns in stories or storytelling . Consider some of your own storybook heroes/heroines - how well do their story lines fit  the mold ? Which  perspectives  of the world are  offered  and which are  missing ?  How do you feel about your favourite story fitting into what is essentially a skeleton  pattern of stories ? Are they each still  unique ? Are they  original ? If the perspectives are correct, and all stories carry the same patterns, what does that suggest about the ways in which we use stories to understand the world around us?  What do these specific patterns suggest about our needs as knowers?  What is it about these patterns that make so much sense to us that we keep telling them over and over again?  BBC Culture -  The 100 stories that shaped the world BBC Culture -  Every story in the world has one of these six basic plots TEDEd -...

And do we have a right, so many decades later, to reinterpret or redefine an iconic work of literature?  Can we accept that the novel is a "simple folk tale," as claimed by L. Frank Baum, the author?  Must we always attempt to interpret works of art or reason their "deeper meanings"?   Can a work of art simply stand as a piece of knowledge itself outside of our responses to it?  How valid is our personal knowledge or interpretation of a piece of art? Does it matter in the end what the artist may have "intended"? To what extent can we actually know what was "intended" by an artist without their direct input? An intriguing video that explores these questions and more. 

"Most of us will do anything to avoid being wrong. But what if we're wrong about that? 'Wrongologist' Kathryn Schulz makes a compelling case for not just admitting but embracing our fallibility." Why do we get stuck inside this feeling of being right and why is this such a problem ? An entertaining talk drawing on our own insecurities and fallibility.

Mayim Bialik (PH.D in neuroscience and star of comedy series "Big Bang Theory") explains how she is able to reconcile her devotion to scientist with her religious beliefs.

This one cataclysmic event gave rise to our entire Universe, but it seems we can never truly know what it looked like Science writer and astrophysicist Adam Becker explains why we cannot see the Big Bang to BBC Earth. Big Bang

“Is there a right length of time to look at – or engage with – an artwork?” asks Linda Kennedy in this video from Art Basel Hong Kong. “What’s worth a glance? What deserves a gaze?” How to look at a work of art

This video addresses the controversy of falsification in the sciences and why this logic does not or should not always apply. Science writer and astrophysicist Adam Becker explains how science really works. Why you should mostly trust what science tells you

Source: New York Times Excerpt from  “A Family Consents to a Medical Gift, 62 Years Later.” New York Times. August 7, 2013. Henrietta Lacks was only 31 when she died of cervical cancer in 1951 in a Baltimore hospital. Not long before her death, doctors removed some of her tumor cells. They later discovered that the cells could thrive in a lab, a feat no human cells had achieved before. Soon the cells, called HeLa cells, were being shipped from Baltimore around the world. In the 62 years since, her cells have been the subject of more than 74,000 studies, many of which have yielded profound insights into cell biology, vaccines, in vitro fertilization and cancer. But Henrietta Lacks, who was poor, black and uneducated, never consented to her cells’ being studied. For 62 years, her family has been left out of the decision-making around [and financial benefits of] that research. Excerpt from "A New Chapter in the Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks." National Geograph...

Inspired by Liora's and Jana's recent presentation, this video animation accompanies a recorded conversation between an astrophysicist and a BBC correspondent explaining what science knows, hypothesizes and is just plain uncertain about with regards to the universe. Video

"Psychologist Elizabeth Loftus studies memories. More precisely, she studies false memories, when people either remember things that didn't happen or remember them differently from the way they really were. It's more common than you might think, and Loftus shares some startling stories and statistics, and raises some important ethical questions we should all remember to consider." Elizabeth Loftus: How reliable is your memory?

"Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger, one of the founders of quantum mechanics, posed this famous question: If you put a cat in a sealed box with a device that has a 50% chance of killing the cat in the next hour, what will be the state of the cat when that time is up? Chad Orzel investigates this thought experiment." Schrödinger's cat: A thought experiment in quantum mechanics

"What's so special about Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man? With arms outstretched, the man fills the irreconcilable spaces of a circle and a square -- symbolizing the Renaissance-era belief in the mutable nature of humankind. James Earle explains the geometric, religious and philosophical significance of this deceptively simple drawing." Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man of math

"Physicist Werner Heisenberg said, “When I meet God, I am going to ask him two questions: why relativity? And why turbulence? I really believe he will have an answer for the first.” As difficult as turbulence is to understand mathematically, we can use art to depict the way it looks. Natalya St. Clair illustrates how Van Gogh captured this deep mystery of movement, fluid and light in his work ." The unexpected math behind Van Gogh's "Starry Night"

Could it be true that the greatest writer of the English language is as fictional as his plays?  A look at stylometry - characteristics of literary authorship . "Some people question whether Shakespeare really wrote the works that bear his name – or whether he even existed at all. Could it be true that the greatest writer in the English language was as fictional as his plays? Natalya St. Clair and Aaron Williams show how a linguistic tool called stylometry might shed light on the answer." Did Shakespeare write his plays?

"Michael Jordan’s legendary slam dunk from the free throw line has been calculated at 0.92 seconds of pure hang time. But how many seconds could Jordan have gotten were he doing the same jump on Mars? Or Jupiter? Andy Peterson and Zack Patterson share the math equation behind hang time." The math behind Michael Jordan’s legendary hang time

"The world turns on symmetry -- from the spin of subatomic particles to the dizzying beauty of an arabesque. But there's more to it than meets the eye. Here, Oxford mathematician Marcus du Sautoy offers a glimpse of the invisible numbers that marry all symmetrical objects. Oxford's newest science ambassador Marcus du Sautoy is also author of The Times' Sexy Maths column. He'll take you footballing with prime numbers, whopping symmetry groups, higher dimensions and other brow-furrowers." Symmetry, reality's riddle