TOK has been quite unusual this year in the sense that it has been quite confusing at times. Perhaps it is the difficulty to understand the TOK concepts and so I need to go back to the textbook quite often and look for resources to understand. In the beginning it was really difficult, especially what knowledge questions and statements where but gradually, through self-studying it made more sense.
TOK I guess is the course that allows me and other students to reflect on knowledge and how we know, what we know. The concepts we’ve been looking at is the Ways of Knowing and Areas of Knowledge
- Ways of knowing: (sense perception, reason, emotion, faith, imagination, intuition, memory, and language). How do we gain knowledge of the world, and what are the advantages and disadvantages of each way in which we learn of the world and our place in it.
- Areas of knowledge (mathematics, natural sciences, human sciences, history, religious knowledge systems, indigenous knowledge systems, the arts and ethics): their distinct natures and methods of gaining knowledge, the types of claim each makes and the issues to consider (e.g., “How do you know that the scientific method is a valid method of gaining knowledge?”, “What is the reason for having historical knowledge, and how is it applied in life?”).
In that, we look at the methodology of each area of knowledge, link to personal and shared knowledge, historical development, the scope/applications as well as the language and concepts.
I kind of enjoy TOK both because I find the philosophy aspect quite interesting but also because it is fun to categorise knowledge into different groups. In some ways, us humans love to categorise and make patterns and links, but of course, there is, unfortunately, a danger to categorise thinks to dangerous concepts like racial categories, or categories people into different groups that could eventually become prejudice or dehumanising these people.
I feel like with knowledge comes responsibility, similar to that with power comes responsibility. Knowledge is also power because in the sense that you have something more useful than others and you know something that others don’t know perhaps. This could be exploited and similar to people having power, one can get consumed by it and eventually has this dire consequences on others of the environment. Using knowledge for good is the key thing and so with knowledge does come to the responsibility to limit any unethical and immoral consequences on others or the environment around us. Knowledge is powerful.
Interestingly, I feel like culture has a huge part in knowledge. In my TOK presentation, he primary knowledge question that I examined is How might culture conflict with the reliability of models in the human sciences? In a way, also can models of human behaviour ever be reliable? Cultural values, which in turn has a large influence on our human behaviour, have played a large role in decision making in politics, communal activities, systems and other models. This is no different to the real life situation of Sweden’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The COVID-19 pandemic is affecting countries all around the world but each country is experiencing their own epidemic and have used certain models in order to fight back against it. Sweden has been controversial with it’s approach to the pandemic because of the government’s refusal to lock down, approaching the outbreak with a ‘mitigation’ strategy to save lives and to ease the spread. Anders Tegnell, the chief epidemiologist and in charge of the swedish strategy and model, in a quote in the Financial times, described the model as “It’s a big mistake to sit down and say ‘we should just wait for a vaccine’. It will take much longer than we think. And in the end, we don’t know how good a vaccine it will be. It’s another reason to have a sustainability policy in place.”
This is not a herd immunity approach but rather a model that aims to allow society to continue except for high-risk areas, high-risk groups and the trust to abide by social distancing rules. However with that said, Sweden stands alone in Europe in which some schools continue to remain open and restaurants and bars continue with its business apart from minor precautions. As of June the 1st, Sweden has 37,542 confirmed cases and 4,395 deaths. This is much higher than any of the neighbouring Nordic countries and also keep in mind that the number of confirmed cases may be higher as Sweden isn’t as aggressive at testing as other countries, and mainly test those who are very sick.
Sweden’s government has made a priority to protect risk groups like the elderly and have strongly encouraged them to stay home and others to not visit them. Groups of more than 50 people are not allowed and all universities and Gymnasium schools are closed. Many work from home and restaurants are ordered to close if they don’t follow social distancing rules. Sweden’s model works by placing trust in citizens to abide in social distancing practices while still being able to live freely.
The use of models through influence of human behaviour and culture is best examined through the knowledge acquisition and application in the human sciences because of the use of assumptions of human behavior and prior knowledge in the field to make models and predictions where culture can play a large role in influencing these models and assumptions. Behaviour is never a fixed thing, we can’t quantify behaviour, so these assumptions must be considered carefully.
In the human sciences, the mathematical modelling behind the creation of models that are theoretical and are to be applied in the real world which can be good representations of what is happening in the real world. All models have to have mathematical representations in order to quantity and be able to apply and predict, with assumptions such as the assumptions of human behaviour. However, some aspects of these models are assumptions where the scientists and in this case the epidemiologists have to be honest with the assumptions they make. Although some things are factual behind the models, the assumptions have to be made as no model can be applied to all contexts.
What I have learned is that the reason why the model could work in Sweden is because of perhaps three things:
- Trust. Trust is seen to be a basic component in Swedish society. Trust is mutually reciprocated: Trust in the government and trust in each other. Instead of the draconian laws established in other countries, the Swedish government has trust that citizens will follow guidelines and behave in a civil and considerate manner. About 70% of Swedes support their government’s approach. In fact, there has not been much public debate or organised opposition to the model proposed by the Swedish government.
- Responsibility and independence. Since a young age, the concept of responsibility is articulated clearly and encouraged across the home, school and workplace environment. Therefore, taking up responsibility without the need of micro-management becomes a social norm and is expected of citizens. Most young people live alone and many children are independent at a very young age. In addition, unlike many other European countries, it was assumed that swedish people meet less people on average, especially in greeting where the kisses and shaking is not as prolonged as in for instance France or Italy. However, unlike in Norway where the nursing homes are much smaller, there was a huge wave of infections in the large nursing homes in Sweden which accounted for most of the deaths, especially in the Stockholm region. This assumption was not taken in and perhaps made the model less reliable.
- Long-term thinking. Success is very much attributed to the outcome in the long term. A long term and holistic view is the attitude that Swedes have approached the COVID issue. For instance, Instead of just considering infection rates and fatalities, the total long term impact of lockdown on overall health, on the treatment of other illnesses, academic achievement, employment possibilities and other lifetime outcomes has been taken into consideration. Instead of short term personal benefits, citizens have been accustomed to thinking about what is best for the community as opposed to the individual.
In some ways I do hope that the Swedish model will work but so far it doesn’t seem so. Anyways, it seems to me that culture really does have a huge influence on knowledge.
