Theory of Knowledge Glossary ahimsa: the principle of doing no harm art brut: the ‘raw art’ movement began by Jean Dubuffet abductive reasoning: reasoning that infers the best (1901–1985), which recognised the value of primitive or explanation based on the evidence available low art that belonged outside the conventional tradition of fine art absent-mindedness: inattentiveness that leads to lack of memory Arte povera: An Italian art movement that used ordinary but unconventional materials to create art works absolutism: belief in absolute truth and absolute cultural, religious, political and moral standards against artificial general intelligence (AGI): also known as which all other views can be judged strong AI or full AI, the capacity of a machine to perform the same intellectual task that a human, can including abstract: conceptual, nonrepresentational, independent the full range of human cognition of concrete specific physical existence artisan, craftsman: a worker skilled in a particular trade aesthetics: the branch of philosophy that studies beauty or craft and the arts; principles concerned with beauty and artistic taste assent: an expression of agreement affiliation: having a connection with a specific group or assimilation: integration organisation astrology: a belief that the movement of the planets agnostic: a person who believes that nothing can be affects human behaviour in predictable ways known of the existence or nature of God asylum: shelter and protection; in a political context, alien: a person who is a not a citizen of the country protection granted by a state to persons who are that they live in or a species that is not native to the political refugees environment it is found in augmented reality: the technology that overlays a allegory: a text or artwork that can be interpreted to computer simulation onto the real world reveal a hidden meaning, usually moral or political in authenticity: validity, genuineness nature authoritarian: relating to a government that imposes its AlphaZero: a computer that can play the game Go and authority over people and limits their freedom beat human world champions authority: the moral or legal right to make decisions in, alternative facts: in the context of post-truth politics, and take responsibility for, and exercise power within a alternative views to more widely-accepted and verified particular field of knowledge or activity; the word can beliefs also be used to denote a person or group who has that ambiguity: when a word, statement, image or situation authority can have more than one meaning or interpretation autocracy: a government based on one person with amoral: outside the scope of morality; lacking any moral supreme authority and power framework automation: the use of robots and machine systems to anarchist: a person who believes there should be no replace human work people or organisations who rule as a matter of right autonomous: self-governing anchoring bias: where a particular concept or idea availability heuristic: a bias where recent or easily is mentioned before a question is asked – this has a remembered examples affect our judgement ‘priming effect’ which may affect the response given avant-garde: innovative ideas considered to be at anthropology (cultural and social): the study of the the forefront of new developments and techniques in development of culture and society the arts antithesis: the negation of a thesis axiom: a starting assumption, often regarded as a self- applied artificial intelligence: also known as weak AI evident truth or, more loosely, something we assume to or narrow AI, the use of software for a specific problem be true or accept as true within a particular system solving or reasoning task bacteriophage: a virus that destroys bacteria Argand diagram: a geometric representation of ballpark: estimated, rough, imprecise complex numbers that uses a real x axis to represent barbarian: Herodotus refers to the Persians as the‘real’ part of the complex number, and the real y axis barbarians. For Herodotus ‘barbarians’ denoted all non- to represent the‘imaginary’part of the complex number Greeks, and the word originally meant a speaker of an (the Argand diagram is also called the complex plane incomprehensible language. The word did not have the or z-plane) same negative connotations that people might associate arithmetic: the process of counting and calculating in it with today numbers belief: a confident opinion; something thought to censorship: the suppression or limitation of any material be true or views and beliefs that are considered to be unsuitable benevolent: kind, well-meaning or inappropriate benign: harmless, non-threatening, innocent centipede effect: over-consciousness of your performance in a way that interferes with what you are bias: prejudice, unfairness, favouritism, one-sided doing preference certain knowledge: a state of affairs when we can be bioavailability: the measure of drug absorption over definite that something is the case time certainty: the quality of having no doubt Big Bang: the theory that the universe began with an infinitely dense singularity ‘exploding’ in a rapid chatbot: a computer that simulates human conversation expansion 13.8 billion years ago cherry-picking: picking out sections of a text that big data: the vast amount of varied digital data sets, appear, at face value, to support a particular opinion, which can be analysed to identify patterns, associations while ignoring the context and other sections of the text and trends that might promote a different view bit: a binary unit of information in a computer circular reasoning: the fallacy of assuming the truth of what you are supposed to be proving bitcoin and Ethereum: types of cryptocurrency clickbait: content deliberately designed to encourage blind faith: faith without evidence, understanding or you to click on the link, which will take you to another discrimination; faith that is not open to evaluation or web page; for example a visual image or an attention- critical thought grabbing headline block chain: a decentralised distributed ledger of cognitive (knowledge) tool: the mental process transactions which is permanent of acquiring knowledge, for example via the senses, blocking: when there is an obstruction to your ability to memory, imagination, experience and rational thought recall information cognitive bias: when bias affects the process of bodhisattva: a Buddhist who has achieved acquiring knowledge and understanding enlightenment, but delays reaching nirvana out of cognitive science: the study of the mind and its compassion for those who are suffering processes through an interdisciplinary approach that body language: conscious or unconscious body involves philosophy, psychology, linguistics and the movements and positions that communicate our natural sciences attitudes and feelings coherence theory (of truth): the theory that a bot: an automated computer programme proposition is true if it fits in with our overall set of beliefs bourgeoisie: the middle class – Marx thought that they collaborative: produced by two or more people benefited most from a capitalist economic system working together breadth of knowledge: a span of knowledge covering communism: a social, political and economic ideology many aspects of a subject in which there are no class divisions, all property is bureaucratic: overly concerned with procedure and communally owned, and the government directs all administration at the expense of efficiency economic production canon: a collection of works considered by scholars to competency: capability; the possession of sufficient be the most important and influential; in the context of knowledge or skills religion, a body of authorised religious works accepted complex: complicated, multifaceted as authoritative within that religion complex number: in mathematics, a combination of a capitalist: employing an economic system where there real number and an imaginary number, for example 3 + 4i is limited government intervention, and the production compound interest: the addition of interest to the and distribution of resources depend on the investment principal sum of a loan or deposit to make that sum of private capital larger, and therefore make subsequent interest greater; cardinality: the number of elements in a set; for or in other words, interest on interest example, the set {0, 1, 2} has three elements and so has concept: an abstract idea or something conceived cardinality 3 conceptual: relating to abstract ideas caricature: comic exaggeration confirmation bias: the tendency to believe evidence that supports your opinions, and ignore or discount evidence that goes against what you believe conjecture: a guess or imaginative hypothesis and islands, although since 1976, it has been possible connotation: the ideas and associations a word evokes for crofters to purchase their crofts to become owner in addition to its literal meaning occupiers consensus theory (of truth): the theory that truth is cryptocurrency: a medium of exchange and store of based on a set of beliefs that the majority of people value which can be used like money agree on cubism: an artistic movement in which objects were consistent: noncontradictory, not permitting the proof analysed, broken up and reassembled in an abstracted of two statements that contradict one another form conspiracy theory: either a denial that an event took cultural appropriation: the adoption of elements of one place, or the belief in an explanation for an event based culture by members of another culture on the idea that there was a deliberate and secret culture: the shared ideas, beliefs, customs and practices agency of people or organisations of a community or society constructivism: the theory that mathematical truth and cyborg: a cybernetic organism, which combines organic proofs should be positively constructed and mechanical parts contestable: where there are different possible answers, datum (plural data): in the context of technology, opinions or views on the same question or topic; a ‘something given’ – usually any facts and statistics contestable knowledge claim or question is one that can gathered together for investigation; an unstructured be argued about, where there is more than one possible collection of facts and figures interpretation or answer decode: decrypt, decipher, translate contingency: something that is dependent upon chance deductive reasoning: reasoning from the general to the contraindication: a situation when a particular remedy particular or procedure should not be used deep learning: a technology at the centre of artificial controlled experiments: experiments that are intelligence that uses big data to predict or decide performed with carefully regulated variables to provide a deepfake: the use of artificial intelligence (AI) to create standard of comparison for similar experiments with just fake videos creating the false impression of authenticity one differing variable deism: the belief in an impersonal creator god, who is conviction: a firmly held belief evident through reason and the laws of nature, but does correspondence theory (of truth): the theory that a not intervene in human affairs statement is true if it corresponds to a fact deity (plural deities): a god or supernatural being corroborate: to confirm or support a statement or dematerialisation: when technology loses its physical theory substance corroboree: an Australian Aboriginal dance ceremony demographics: the characteristics of human cosmogony: the study of the origins of the universe populations cosmology: the study of the universe denomination: a distinct religious group within countability: in mathematics, a set is countable if it can Christianity (for example, the Anglican, Georgian be put into a one-to-one relationship with the natural Orthodox and Lutheran churches) numbers {1, 2, 3, …} denotation: the literal meaning of a word coup d’état: when a small group of people seizes power deontological ethics: the belief that ethics is by force fundamentally a matter of doing your duty and fulfilling covenant: an agreement or promise of commitment your obligations creation science: treating the theory that God created depth of knowledge: knowledge that focuses on, the universe as recorded in the Book of Genesis as a amplifies and explores specific topics scientific theory descent: as an adjective, dependent on parentage or creativity: the ability to bring something into being ancestry through the imagination; the ability to generate ideas designer baby: a baby genetically engineered in or produce objects that are original, surprising and vitro with specially selected traits, which can vary from valuable lowered disease-risk to gender selection critical: involving objective analysis and evaluation Deuteronomic cycle: a cycle of rebellion, oppression crofter: traditionally, a tenant farmer of a small and repentance as a way of interpreting historic events agricultural land holding in the Scottish Highlands diagonalisation argument: a mathematical proof empathy: the ability to imagine and understand the published by Cantor in 1891 which demonstrated feelings and viewpoint of another person that there are infinite sets which cannot be put into empirical: based on and verified by observation and one-to-one correspondence with the infinite set of experience natural numbers empiricism: a school of thought which claims that dialectics: a method of argument that involves a all knowledge must ultimately be based on sense disagreement between opposing sides perception diaspora: people who have been dispersed from their empiricist: a supporter of empiricism homeland or have spread out from their homeland, enlightenment: a state of perfect knowledge about while maintaining a close connection with it existence, perfect wisdom and infinite compassion discernment: the ability to use sharp perceptions to epidemiology: the study of the origins and spread of judge well diseases disinformation: intentionally false or inaccurate epistemic injustice: injustice that happens when information spread as an act of deception knowledge is ignored, not believed or not understood disinterested: free from bias and self-interest, which epistemology: the philosophical study of how we know may help us to make objective judgements what we know, and the exploration of the difference dissent: disagreement; nonconformity between justified belief and opinion Distributed Denial of Service: flooding the bandwidth equality: the state of being equal in terms of status, of a target (usually a web server) to prevent it from rights and opportunities conducting normal business; this is an illegal practice in equity: the quality of being fair and impartial many countries espionage: the practice of spying to obtain political or divine: something of a supernatural nature that is sacred military information or godlike; as a verb, it can also mean ‘to discover something in a supernatural way’ ethical: conforming to accepted moral standards dogmatism: a tendency to lay down principles as ethics: the branch of knowledge to do with right and undeniably true without consideration of evidence or the wrong, and the study of the moral principles that govern opinions of others our beliefs and behaviours Dunning–Kruger effect: a cognitive bias where we ethnolinguistics: a field of linguistics that studies the find it difficult to know the limit of our knowledge and relationship between language and culture expertise. If we have a little knowledge in a particular ethology: the study of animal behaviour area, we may overestimate our level of knowledge and Eucharist: a ritual in which Christians remember Jesus’s competence in that area. In this way, a little knowledge last supper and sacrifice by breaking bread and drinking may lead to an unjustified illusion of greater knowledge wine, as symbols of Jesus’s body and blood echo chamber: a space in which sound reverberates, Euclidean geometry: a system of mathematics so any sounds made are repeated over and over as attributed to the Greek mathematician, Euclid, based on they bounce from the walls; an environment in which five axioms people only encounter beliefs or opinions like their own, euphemism: a softer-sounding word or phrase used so they don’t consider alternative ideas and their own to disguise something unpleasant or not usually talked ideas are reinforced; in the context of technology, the about in polite conversation effect created by social media and news whereby people only encounter ideas that are the same as their own, evidence: signs that you can see, hear, experience or reinforcing their existing perspective read to support the truth of an assertion economic determinism: the theory that history is evolutionary epistemology: the theory that knowledge determined by economic factors evolves by natural selection efficacy: effectiveness exegesis: drawing meaning from a text in a critical way eisegesis: reading meaning into a text exegete: a person who engages in exegesis elegant: concise; stylish and graceful experiential: based on experience emotive meaning: the aura of favourable or experimental subjects: the individuals who are unfavourable feeling that hovers about a word experimented on emotivism: the view that ethical claims are an expert: a person with specialist skills and/or knowledge expression of feeling and emotion expertise: specialised skills and knowledge explanation: an account or statement that makes genre: an artistic style or type; it can apply to any of something clear; in the context of the study of history, a the arts justification or reason that makes sense of why an event Gettier case: an example of a justified true belief that or action took place does not appear to be knowledge explicit: clear, made obvious, openly expressed go native: to adopt the attitudes and behaviour of a extremism: an ideology in which people are prepared foreign group with whom one has lived for an extended to take extreme actions including the use of violence for period their religious or political causes God’s eye view: when a knower assumes that they have extrinsic religiosity: participating in social worship to access to knowledge that only an omniscient god could conform to a social norm or convention have KEY fabricate: manufacture, make up golden ratio: image a line – divide it into two unequal factual: containing facts parts in such a way that the ratio of the whole line to the big part is the same ratio as the big part to the small part. factual memory: our memory of meanings, facts and The ratio is 1:1.618; which is known as the golden ratio information Google effect (or Google amnesia): the tendency to fallacy: a mistaken belief, an invalid argument forget information that can easily be found online fallible: capable of making mistakes or being wrong Gospel: the teachings or revelations of Jesus, meaning false dichotomy: when a situation is presented ‘good news’, originally set out in the four gospels in the as having just two possible options, when other New Testament, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John perspectives are not only possible, but highly likely grammar: the rules for constructing meaningful phrases falsehood: a lie or misrepresentation; something that is and sentences out of words put forward as a fact or a truth, but it is not ‘great man’ theory of history: the belief that history is falsify: to prove something to be false driven by great individuals fantasy: the imagination of impossible or improbable Gross Domestic Product: a measure of the goods and characters, situations or narratives services produced in a country to estimate the size and fideism: reliance on faith for all knowledge; a belief that growth rate of the economy faith is superior to reason hacktivism: gaining unauthorised access to computer Fields medal: an award made every four years by the files or networks to further social or political ends International Congress of Mathematics to recognise hegemon: the dominant group, class or state that outstanding mathematical achievements; it is sometimes exercises hegemonic power and promotes hegemonic described as the equivalent of a Nobel Prize for ideas mathematics hegemony: the dominance of one group supported by filial piety: showing love, respect and support for one’s a set of ideas, or the dominance of a set of ideas that parents become the norm in a way that inhibits the circulation of forest produce: things other than timber that can be alternative ideas found in the forest, including wild honey, fruits, edible heretic: a person within a group who has plants and firewood unconventional or unorthodox beliefs formal system: in mathematics, a system used to hermeneutics: the science of interpretation deduce theorems from axioms according to a set of heterogeneous: mixed; composed of different parts logical rules heuristics: when a person finds, discovers or learns futurism: an artistic movement that began in Italy something and emphasised speed, technology, youth, violence and objects such as the car, the airplane and the hindsight bias: mistakenly thinking, after something has industrial city happened, that you had known it would happen general revelation: knowledge of God that is historiography: the study of historical perspectives discovered through natural ways, such as observing the history from above: also known as ‘top-down’ history, natural world, observing patterns in history and applying this focuses on the perspectives of the leaders, rulers reason and those in power, and the social and cultural elites of generalisation: making statements that apply to all the time cases, on the basis of some specific cases history from below: also known as ‘bottom-up’ history, this focuses on the perspectives of the ordinary people, such as the working class, women, ethnic minorities or any other voices that may have been neglected by a infallible: not capable of being wrong or making ‘top-down’ approach mistakes holism: the belief that the best way to understand some infer: to come to a conclusion reached on the basis of things is by looking at them as a whole rather than by evidence and reasoning analysing them into separate parts inference: a conclusion based on evidence and holistic: considering all factors of any situation, in the reasoning belief that all aspects are interconnected and can only infinity: something without bounds, often treated as an be understood in relation to the whole unreal number homeopathy: a system of alternative medicine that information theory: the mathematical study of the believes in treating ailments with minute concentrations coding of information, and how that information can be of substances that in larger amounts would case the quantified, stored and communicated reliably through same symptoms of the ailment; it is based on the computer circuits and telecommunications principle that ‘like cures like’ information: data that has been processed and homogeneous: consistent; of uniform structure structured, and can be used to answer who, what, when throughout and where questions; in the context of technology, facts host state: a state that governs the national territory in about something, or the process, storage and spread of which an indigenous society lives data by a computer hyperthymesia: a condition in which a person can inherent: existing in something as a permanent remember an abnormally large number of their own life characteristic experiences in detail innate: something we are born with hypothermia: unusually low body temperature instantiation: the representation of an abstraction by hypothesis (plural hypotheses): a proposed an example of the abstraction; for example, ‘apple’ is an explanation or starting point, based on limited evidence abstract idea; this particular apple is an instantiation of that can be tested in an investigation the idea icon: a symbol or representation often uncritically intangible: nonmaterial and unquantifiable venerated. In Eastern churches, these figures usually intellectual property: the ownership of knowledge or represent Christ, the Virgin Mary, or a saint unique products that have been created identity: how a person, group or nation sees themselves intellectual capital: the collective knowledge of people in relation to other people, groups, nations, ideas, and in an organisation or society the world intellectual virtues: virtues that are required for the idiom: a colloquial expression whose figurative meaning pursuit of knowledge cannot be deciphered from its literal meaning interpolate: to insert something of a different nature ignorance: lack of knowledge into something else illusion of explanatory depth: the illusion that you interpretation: an explanation of the meaning understand something in detail when you do not intrinsic religiosity: where religion is the organising implicit: implied, hidden principle of an individual’s life; a central and personal in vitro fertilisation: a laboratory procedure in which experience an egg is fertilised outside the body; the term in vitro introspective: looking inside oneself means ‘in glass’. In the past, IVF babies have been called intuitionism: the theory that mathematical objects ‘test-tube babies’ are mental constructions, and that as we create inadvertent: not deliberate, happening without design mathematical objects, so we create the reality of them or intention invalid: an argument that does not follow logically from indigenous people: literally, ‘people belonging to a the premises place’, the term is used to refer to people who inherit irony: a figure of speech in which words are used to say and practise unique cultures and ways of relating to one thing and mean the opposite people and their environment irrational number: any number that cannot be written indigenous rights: the rights of native people who as a fraction with one integer over another (e.g. 2, π) originate from a particular place judiciary: the system of courts and collection of judges inductivism: the use of and preference for inductive in a country methods of reasoning to develop natural laws justification: in the context of truth, a reason or reasons mental map: a personal mental picture of what is true for a belief or support for a truth claim and false, reasonable and unreasonable, right and justify: to show that a belief or decision is well-founded wrong, beautiful and ugly and reasonable meta-analysis: analysis of data to establish trends based key concept: in the context of a TOK essay, the central on various different studies TOK idea specified in the essay title, for example metacognitive: relating to your own thought processes ‘certainty’, ‘justification’, ‘interpretation’ etc. metaphor: a figure of speech which describes kitsch: derivative, cliched art something using words that are not literally true, law of large numbers: a statistical principle which for example, ‘she is an angel’, ‘he is a book-worm’ or says that random variations tend to cancel out when a ‘knowledge is a map’ population is large enough metaphysical: abstract, beyond physical, supernatural, law: a generalised description of observations about a independent of physical reality relationship between two or more things in the natural mimetic: from mimesis, the Greek word for ‘imitation’, world; often the description is mathematical associated with the idea that art copies reality layperson: a person not from the profession; in a misattribution: when credit is given to the wrong religious context, a person without professional or person or source, whether deliberately or mistakenly specialised knowledge in their religion misinformation: incorrect information, unintentionally legitimate: genuine; conforming to acknowledged false information standards modifier words: words that qualify a seemingly clear liberalism: an ideology that regards protecting and and precise statement, and make it vague or ambiguous enhancing individual freedoms to be a central issue for monarchy: a form of government that has a monarch politics, and strives towards social changes that bring (king, queen or emperor) as the supreme authority about equality and freedom for all monolithic: relating to one large, unchanging entity linguistic determinism: the idea that our language and monotheistic: having one personal god its structures limit and determine what and how we think, and what we can know moral: following one’s personal principles of what is right or wrong linguistic relativity: the idea that language shapes and influences the way we think and what we can know moral absolutism: the belief that there is at least one universal moral principle, which should always logic: the principles of – or a system of – rules that be followed, irrespective of the context or their govern reason, and a branch of philosophy consequences logical empiricism: the belief that all human knowledge mother tongue: the first language that you were should be reduced to logical and scientific foundations brought up to speak (it is often regarded as synonymous with logical positivism) myth: an ancient, traditional story about gods, heroes or groups of people, usually concerning the history of a logical positivism: the belief that all knowledge comes people or explaining a phenomenon. Myths often, but from logical inferences based on observable facts, and not always, involve supernatural beings that a statement can only be meaningful if it can be determined to be true or false mythology: a collection of traditional stories usually belonging to a particular religious or cultural tradition logicism: the theory that mathematics can be derived from logic, without the need of any specifically nanotechnology: a branch of technology that mathematical concepts manipulates individual atoms and molecules manifest: as an adjective, clear or obvious; as a verb, to narrative: a story that tells about a series of events. It become clear, obvious, visible, evident or noticeable can be factual, fictitious or a blend of both mathematical empiricism: a form of realism that natural number: often called the counting numbers, says that we discover mathematical facts by empirical they go from 1, 2, 3 … infinity (∞) research, just like facts in any of the other sciences neutral: unbiased, impartial, not supporting either side mathematicism: the theory that everything in the of an argument universe is ultimately mathematical neutrino: an uncharged sub-atomic particle with zero matrilineal: passed down through the mother mass when at rest noise: unwanted disturbances in electrical signals; phenomenon (plural phenomena): an event, meaningless data, including data that cannot be experience or occurrence understood or interpreted by machines phlogiston: a hypothetical component of combustible non-putrifying bacteria: bacteria that do not help to substances decompose dead or decaying matter place-value system: a numerical system in which the non-theistic: having no personal god or no gods at all position of a digit indicates its value as well as the digit nuance: subtle difference or shades of meaning itself; therefore in ‘9’, the digit 9 denotes only ‘nine’; in ‘90’ because its place has shifted left, it denotes ‘ninety’ objectivity: a detached way of looking at the world, in a decimal system largely independent of personal feelings or opinions, that expects to be corroborated by a knowledge plagiarism: passing off someone else’s idea or work as community your own observer effect: in the natural sciences, the observer plane: a flat surface that extends forever in two effect refers to the principle that the act of observing dimensions but has no thickness a phenomenon changes the phenomenon being Platonist: relating to the ideas of the Greek philosopher, observed (in the human sciences the observer effect Plato (c 427–348 BCE) refers to the tendency of people to behave differently pluralist theory (of truth): the theory that there are when they are being observed) multiple truths, and various meanings of the word ‘truth’ ochlocracy: mob rule, majoritarianism pluralistic: relating to a system in which multiple groups, omnipotent: all-powerful ideas, or practices coexist. In the context of religion, omnipresent: present everywhere and at all times having many different beliefs and practices omniscient: all-knowing; having an intuitive, immediate pluralistic history: accepting that there are various awareness of all truth different perspectives that may be justified, and multiple possible accounts of the past optical telescope: a telescope that gathers and focuses light, mostly from the visible light spectrum, to create a polarising: in this context, dividing people into two magnified image that can be viewed directly main groups with opposite views outlier: a value or datum very different from others political science: the scientific study of the state, governments, power and political activity outrage: intense anger and shock political spectrum (plural spectra): a system of panacea: a solution or remedy for all difficulties classifying different political positions in relation to pantheon: an overview of a culture’s gods and different political values goddesses that reflects the culture’s values political values: abstract ideas about the needs of paradigm: a pattern, model or example that provides a the people that drive political positions, for example, framework of understanding equality, freedom, tradition, progress, etc pathogen: a virus, bacterium or other micro-organism polymath: a person with expertise in several different that can cause disease fields of knowledge patrilineal: passed down through the father polytheistic: having many gods peer: a person of equal standing, usually a member of population: in the context of mathematics, the entire your own tribe group of objects, measurements or events from which a peer review: the evaluation of academic or scientific sample is drawn work by experts working in the same field portrait: a painting, photograph, or other artistic percept: what we notice via the process of sense representation of a person which tries to show the perception personality of the person portrayed perception: an awareness of something in and through positivism: the belief that the only authentic knowledge the mind is that which can be scientifically verified or proven personal memory: the internal recollection of the through logic or mathematics various events that make up our lives post hoc ergo propter hoc: the fallacy of confusing a perspective: point of view, a particular way of seeing or correlation with a causal connection considering something post-colonial age: the period of time after colonial rule pharmaceutical: related to drugs has ended post-modern: a movement of 20th-century thinkers who Purchasing Power Parity: a standard of measurement thought that knowledge, reason, ethics and truth are a used to compare the economic productivity and social, cultural and political construction standards of living of different countries post-truth: relating to or denoting circumstances in quaint: pleasantly, amusingly or interestingly strange which objective facts are less influential in shaping public qualitative: relating to, measuring or measured by the opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief quality of something, rather than its quantity; qualitative postulate: a statement underlying a theory; something studies use a method to give a detailed narrative about assumed to be true (they are slightly different to a human phenomenon that describes a culture or shares axioms but the two words are frequently used a story interchangeably) quantitative: relating to, measuring or measured by the power: control, influence, strength; the capacity to quantity of something, rather than its quality control and influence situations and people quantum mechanics: a branch of mechanics describing practical memory: the remembered ability to know how the motion and interaction of subatomic particles to do something, such as playing the piano quantum theory: a theory in physics which explains the practical or material (knowledge) tool: the device behaviour of subatomic particles used to complement or enhance cognition, such as a radicalism: a political desire to change social structures microscope or an iPad in radical ways pragmatic theory (of truth): the theory that a radio telescope: a telescope that detects radio waves proposition is true if it is useful or works in practice and microwaves which lie outside the visible spectrum precession: a slow and continuous change in the rational number: any number that can be written as a orientation of the axis of a rotating body pre-colonial (to fraction, that is, a ratio of integers be added at first proof of Decoding?) rationalist: a supporter of rationalism, a school of premise: assumption on which an argument is based, or thought which relies on deduction rather than sensory from which a conclusion is drawn perception to determine truth prescriptivism: the view that ethical claims are rationality: the ability to reason and think clearly, imperatives sensibly or logically primary emotions: universal emotions which are usually reactance: the tendency of people to react against said to comprise happiness, sadness, anger, fear, disgust advice, rules and regulations perceived as a threat to and surprise their freedom primary source: Any object or written source from the real number: any number that can represent a position time or based on the time being studied, for example on a number line; real numbers include all rational and the eyewitness account of a soldier fighting in the irrational numbers Second World War would be a primary source even if it realistic imagination: imagination which is informed was written fifty years after the event and guided by the relevant facts procedural: related to actions reductionism: the belief that some subjects can be proof: generally refers to conclusive evidence, leaving explained in terms of other more fundamental ones little place for doubt; however, a mathematical proof reductive fallacy: the fallacy of saying that just because is more than just a general proof – it is a conclusive A is composed of B, it follows that A is nothing but B deduction from axioms that leaves no room for doubt or argument redundancy theory (of truth): the theory that truth has no essential property, and the word can be substituted propaganda: the deliberate manipulation, distortion for another or left out altogether and spreading of information in order to influence what people think, usually for political purposes refute: to prove a statement or theory wrong proselytising: evangelising, persuading others to join a relativity: recognising that knowledge claims are particular group or religion dependent on contextual factors or frames of reference pseudoscience: a system of beliefs and practices that religious experience: a temporary experience that are claimed to be scientific but which are incompatible defies normal description, in which the person having with the scientific method the experience feels that a power from outside themself is acting to reveal a truth that could not be reached by psychology: the scientific study of the human mind and reason alone behaviour pulsar: a small, dense, spinning neutron star religious fundamentalism: a belief in the absolute secular humanism: a system of belief that believes in authority of a particular sacred text, religious leader and/ human values, consequentialist ethics based on reason, or god and a commitment to science, democracy and freedom replication: the process of repeating secular: not concerned with religion response bias: the tendency to try and please a person semantic: relating to the meaning of language interviewing us or a person carrying out a questionnaire, sentient: conscious, capable of feeling by choosing the answer we feel will please them shaman: a priest or priestess who uses magic to cure the responsibility: a duty or moral obligation sick, divine the hidden and control events retaliatory killings: killings made in revenge for killing Shulba Sutras: a body of Hindu writings regarded as people or livestock appendices to the Vedas; they are arguably Hinduism’s retribution: punishment inflicted in response to an most authoritative scriptures action singularity: in the context of AI, the point when revelation: something that has been revealed or computer intelligence will surpass human intelligence; a disclosed, usually by God or God’s representatives or moment of irreversible change for humans and human messengers knowledge rigour: strictness; the quality of being extremely social contract: an actual or implicit agreement thorough and careful between rulers and the people they rule, that defines the ritual: a prescribed ceremonial action or set of actions rights and responsibilities of each that have a symbolic meaning for the individual and the social justice: the idea that all people should have equal community access to – and opportunities for – wealth, education, rule of thumb: an approximation based on experience health, and justice rule worship: blindly following moral rules irrespective social media: websites and apps that allow people to of whether or not they are appropriate form a network, and create and share digital content and information with one another, such as Facebook™, sacrament: a special ritual which is said to impart Twitter™, WhatsApp™ or Instagram™ God’s grace socialism: a social system based on public ownership of sacred: holy; entitled to reverence and respect; set apart the means of production, and an equitable distribution for the worship of a god or gods of wealth sacrifice: to give up something valuable to help others, sociology: the study of the structure and function of or to appease a god or spirit society sage: a wise person sound: the property of a syllogism that contains two true Sapir–Whorf hypothesis: the claim that the language premises and a valid argument you speak influences or determines the way you see the special revelation: knowledge of God that is not world available through reason; knowledge of God that is scepticism: an attitude of doubt; a method of obtaining revealed in a supernatural way knowledge through systematic doubt and continual spin doctor: a person whose role it is to portray a testing political party in a favourable light, especially to present scholasticism: a method of learning characteristic of the the media with a positive interpretation of a particular Middle Ages, and based on logic and traditional beliefs event about what is true spirituality: a concern with the human spirit or soul, scientific method: a method of procedure for the way rather than with material or physical things scientific investigations are conducted state: a legal entity that has one central government, scientific paradigm: a worldview that underlies which is sovereign over a defined territory and a the theories and methodology in a particular field permanent population of science stereotype: a fixed, oversimplified and often negative scientism: an exaggerated trust in the efficacy of the picture of an individual or group, based on their methods of the natural sciences applied to any and all membership of that group areas of investigation subjectivity: looking at the world from a personal point scriptures: sacred writings; religious texts of view, under the influence of feelings and emotions secondary emotions: complex emotions which can be subliminal: subconscious thought of as mixtures of primary emotions subtle: precise and delicate distinctions surrealism: an artistic movement that tried to release the traditional medicine: the indigenous knowledge, creative potential of the unconscious mind by expressing practices and skills used by indigenous peoples (and imaginative dreams and visions others) to diagnose and treat illnesses and injuries, and syllogism: a deductive argument with two premises and to maintain health a conclusion transcendental power: supernatural power; in this case, syntax: the arrangement of words to form sentences or the power of art to take us anywhere, show us anything phrases – an example of syntax in toddlers might be a including past lives and let us see into the minds of word pair such as ‘my bed’ or ‘biscuits gone’ others synthesis: the placing together of different parts or transient: temporary, fleeting elements (evidence) to form a connected whole; in the trans-theistic: beyond theism and atheism context of dialectics, a connected whole, a resolution, treatise: a detailed written account or a new idea which resolves the conflict between thesis tribalism: the behaviours and attitudes that arise out of and antithesis membership of or loyalty to a social group tacit: unspoken; implicit but not expressed trickle-down theory: the theory that lowering taxes tally: to keep count (of things or events) for wealthy corporations and high-income earners will Talmud: the book of Jewish law and theology lead to greater investments, and will expand economic tautology: saying the same thing in two different but prosperity. The benefits of the expanded economy will completely equivalent ways; repeating something then ‘trickle down’ to the workers already implied Triptika: a set of three texts that are said to record the taxonomy: classification system, categorisation words of the Buddha tenet: principle, important truth truth: in accord with fact or reality, a belief accepted as true, or faithfulness to a standard terrorism: the use of violence, especially against civilians, intended to create a climate of fear in the Turing Test: a test put forward by Alan Turing where pursuit of political aims if a computer can pass itself off as a human, it would constitute intelligence on the part of the computer textual analysis: a data-gathering process that analyses choices of words and the ways in which they are used, to universal grammar: the idea that all human languages, try to develop a greater understanding of the meaning no matter how different they appear, share some of a text and the culture in which it was written fundamental similarities theist: a person who believes in a god or gods who universals: qualities that can be shared by different interact with people and the world individuals at the same time, for example redness, roundness, beauty theocracy: literally ‘government by God’ in which God is seen as the supreme leader, acting through religious utilitarian approach: a perspective that values authorities; in other words, government by religious usefulness above all other considerations authorities utilitarianism: the belief that ethics can ultimately theologian: a person who studies the nature of God be reduced to the principle that we should maximise and religious beliefs, usually within a particular religious happiness tradition vagueness: when something is not clear or has no theorem: a principle or statement that can be distinct boundaries, is imprecise and defies exact demonstrated or proved using logic, but is not definition self-evident validity: the property of an argument in which the theory: an interconnected system of ideas intended to conclusion follows logically from the premises explain something in depth values: standards of behaviour; regard for things of tolerance: acceptance of different perspectives and important moral worth behaviours, even if you disagree with them veneration: the act of worship or showing great respect totalitarian state: a state in which the ruling authorities verification: the process of establishing the validity or have total political, social and cultural control over those accuracy of something living in the state Verstehen position: the belief that the main aim of the traditional knowledge: a body of knowledge that is human sciences is to understand the meaning of various developed, sustained and passed on over generations social practices as they are understood by the agents within a community themselves vigilante: a citizen who enforces the law in their community without legal authority, and often breaks the law when doing so viral: spreading widely and quickly virtual reality: the technology that generates a computer simulation of an environment, such as a headset that shows images of a ‘virtual’ world virtue ethics: the theory that an ethical action is one performed by a virtuous person for the right reason wabi-sabi (侘寂): finding beauty in the imperfect, impermanent and incomplete wallet: in terms of cryptocurrency, a software program that allows users to send and receive digital currency and monitor their balance weak artificial intelligence: also known as applied AI or narrow AI, the use of software for a specific problem solving or reasoning task whistleblowing: when a person or group makes public or passes on information about wrongdoing usually by or within an organisation wisdom of repugnance: the claim that we can validly appeal to our feelings of disgust to justify our moral beliefs wise nature fallacy: the false assumption that because something is natural it is therefore good worldview: an overarching theory about the nature of the universe and human beings’ place in it Scan the code to go to our Theory of Knowledge resources cambridge.org/education/subject/humanities/theory-knowledge