Shared knowledge
Shared knowledge is assembled by a group of people. Most of the subject disciplines studied in the Diploma Programme are good examples of shared knowledge. For example, chemistry is a vast discipline built up over centuries by a large number of people working together. Individual chemists can contribute to this knowledge base by performing experiments. The results of this research are then written in the form of research papers and presented to peers for review. If there is enough corroboration of the results according to standards set by the chemistry community, they are accepted and become part of the corpus of chemistry knowledge. This knowledge is passed on through technical articles written in specialist chemistry journals.
Let us now turn our attention to the group sharing the knowledge. By participating in the ownership of shared knowledge, an individual belongs to a particular group possessing a particular perspective on the world. The TOK guide states that we belong to many such groups. Examples include:
The TOK guide also suggests that shared knowledge is not static. As our methods of inquiry change and develop, so the knowledge they produce changes. These changes might be gradual, but there are occasions when they might be sudden shifts in thinking. These sudden shifts are sometimes described as paradigm shifts.
Examples of these types of sudden shifts in thinking/paradigm shifts include:
Let us now turn our attention to the group sharing the knowledge. By participating in the ownership of shared knowledge, an individual belongs to a particular group possessing a particular perspective on the world. The TOK guide states that we belong to many such groups. Examples include:
- family groups
- religious groups
- groups associated with particular academic fields, such as mathematicians
- groups associated with particular views within an academic field, such as neo-classical economists
- groups sharing a particular culture
- groups sharing particular artistic knowledge, such as sculptors
- groups sharing particular interests, such as fishing
- political groups
- national groups
- ethnic groups.
The TOK guide also suggests that shared knowledge is not static. As our methods of inquiry change and develop, so the knowledge they produce changes. These changes might be gradual, but there are occasions when they might be sudden shifts in thinking. These sudden shifts are sometimes described as paradigm shifts.
Examples of these types of sudden shifts in thinking/paradigm shifts include:
- shifts in the visual arts from representational Western art of the 19th century to impressionism to cubism to abstract expressionism
- the paradigm shifts in economics from the classical economics of the 19th and 20th centuries, stressing the rationality of the individual, to the behavioural economics of the late 20th and 21st centuries, stressing the systematic irrationality of the individual
- the paradigm shift from deterministic physics of Newton and Galileo to the indeterminacy of quantum theory
- the paradigm shift from Freudian views of mental processes to the modern cognitive perspective.
Personal knowledge
Personal knowledge, on the other hand, is not so easily shared. This might be because it is not so easily put into words. The TOK subject guide stresses that this type of knowledge depends crucially on the experiences of the individual whereas shared knowledge does not.
Examples of personal knowledge include:
Examples of personal knowledge include:
- knowledge I gain through practice and habituation, such as the ability to play football, ski, play the piano, dance, paint portraits and so on
- knowledge of my own personal biography through my memory
- knowledge of my feelings and emotions
- knowledge of the world around me gained through my senses
- unique knowledge that I have constructed as a result of a detailed exploration into an aspect of an existing AOK.
Relationship between shared and personal knowledge
Here are some examples of how personal knowledge can contribute to shared knowledge.
- Individual research can contribute to advances in the natural sciences. Paul Dirac’s personal insight led to his discovery of the equation for the electron. The form of the equation suggested the existence of a particle that was the counterpart of the electron bearing a positive charge. But Dirac’s work had to be validated by the established procedures in theoretical physics first before it was accepted as knowledge by the scientific community.
- Individual artists can contribute to the development of a genre. Steve Reich’s accidental discovery of the effect of two recordings of a violin going out of phase with each other led him to use this technique in his creation of minimal music. This technique is now widely used in many different musical genres.
- Adam Smith’s perceptive realization that the market was a mechanism that, under certain conditions, could transform the self-interest of producers and consumers into a socially optimal allocator of scarce resources became a standard method of analysis in classical economics. His insight may have been intuitive and triggered by his own highly individual style of thinking, but it passed the test of peer scrutiny and is now economic orthodoxy.
- Exposure to current artistic trends might influence the thinking and imagination of an individual artist (or musician or novelist).
- Immersion in the biological sciences and medicine might enable one to understand better one's own medical conditions.
- Access to the fundamentals of psychology might allow an individual to develop a deeper understanding of his/her own states of mind.
- A course in ethics or moral theory might allow a student better insight into his/her own ethical and moral outlook.
- Reading a history of one’s own nation might give a deeper understanding of one’s own past.
How AOKs can be linked to personal knowledge.
This element of the framework makes the important link between personal and shared knowledge mentioned earlier. It is useful to get students thinking about “what does this mean for me personally?” when exploring a particular AOK.
- Why is this area significant to the individual?
- What is the nature of the contribution of individuals to this area?
- What responsibilities rest upon the individual knower by virtue of his or her knowledge in this area? (Perhaps the access to shared knowledge brings personal responsibilities. It is conceivable that a doctor carries extra responsibilities through his or her training and could be obliged to act in situations that require his or her expertise. The doctor might be called upon while off duty to attend to someone requiring assistance after an accident, whereas those without medical training might be exempt.)
- What are the implications of this shared AOK for one's own individual perspective?
- What assumptions underlie the individual's own approach to this knowledge?