Certainty relates to the belief that what we hold is truly the case

regarding some thing be it an object, situation or condition, and that what

it is is its actuality or reality. Certainty relates to the correspondence
theory of truth and its establishment and grounding through the principle
of reason. For certainty to be held, that about which an assertion is
“certain” about must be shared or “rendered” to others i.e. experiments
must be repeatable, hypotheses must be supported by evidence and
handed over to others. This rendering has been called logos from which
the concept of “logic” is derived. Reason is, and has been, understood as
logic. Certainty results when the reasons are considered sufficient reasons
for some thing being as it is and they are are handed over to others.
Without the handing over, verification cannot take place and so the
assertion remains merely “subjective” as an assertion.

Culture: The word “culture” is a relatively new word in our language

arriving in the 19th century. As with all words, their meaning is to be
determined from the social contexts and conditions from which they
arose. Why and of what are we speaking when we use the word “culture”?
Culture is a very general term and indicates the thinking and actions that
social groups share and these, in turn, determine the thoughts and
actions of the individuals within those groups. In some instances, it is
referred to as a “mindset”. What are these “mindsets” and from where do
they originate?

A world-view may be personal, individual, expressing one’s own particular

life experiences and opinions or it may be total, extinguishing all personal
opinions. We can see variations of these among populist movements
operating in various countries throughout the world.

Culture and civilization are two words that are used interchangeably at
times. They are not the same. A culture provides the open space that
allows the artefacts of civilization to come into being. We speak of the
ancient Egyptian civilization and we can recognize the artefacts that have
come down to us from it. Archeologists then search for the ‘culture’ that
allowed the civilization to come into being, Egyptian mathematics, religion
and politics for instance.

Experience: We believe we know that what we have ‘experienced’ in our

privacy is true for us, and we seek verification from others to justify our
interpretation and understanding of those events from others whether in
formal settings such as controlled experiments or in the informal settings
of social chat groups. But those interpretations are based on an
interpretation of the world and the events in it that is prior to our own
personal experience and knowledge.

There are many different types and kinds of events that we call
“experience”. For example, many Americans might say “that was quite an
experience” when they speak about the Trump administration in the
future and this would be referring to their own internal ‘feelings’ with
regard to various events that occurred in their country. The strife and
divisiveness brought about by different world views will produce quite
different interpretations of the experience of the last few years.

Experience can refer to things/events both internal and external.

Externally we can ‘go forth’ and travel, or learn, hear of, find out. We can
also undergo something similar to the example provided above and learn
from such an experience. We usually call such knowledge learned from
experience “common sense” and this type of knowledge is distinguished
from the knowledge gained by “theoretical experience” or science. The
Greeks called theoretical knowledge episteme and they distinguished it
from techne or “know how” or “knowing one’s way in and around”
something. The knowledge gained from everyday experience was
called phronesis and this kind of knowledge assisted in living within
communities among other human beings. Mature individuals have
knowledge from phronesis; those who are not mature do not. This
knowledge has evolved into what we call “emotional intelligence” today,
but the Greeks saw “emotion” as the way in which we disclose the world
about us and not as something primarily subjective and individual.

Explanation: An explanation is a statement to others which describes the

“how” and the “why” of things, their causes, conditions and contexts, and
the results or consequences of what we have determined to be “facts”.
The statement or account must make something clear, bring it to light;
and because it deals with “truth” by bringing to light, it may establish
rules or laws or bring to light already established rules and laws in relation
to the object or phenomenon under discussion or examination.

In dealing with the question of “how”, an explanation makes something

clear or easy to understand. It is a ‘telling’ and ‘a showing’ or a reason for
or a cause of something. It is related to the Greek logos or speech. You
use it in your Exhibition; and the word “ex-hibition” itself means “a
showing forth”, a “bringing out of hiding” and that which is responsible for
the bringing out of hiding. To bring something out of hiding is to reveal it
and this is what the Greeks meant by “truth”.

Evidence: Evidence is the requirement of the principle of sufficient

reason to “justify”, “explain” or “render an account of ” things, conditions
and situations in order to establish and ground their truth or their
correspondence to “reality” for being what, how and why they are as they
are. Evidence is the demand that things give an account of themselves for
being what and as they are in order to justify assertions and judgements
made regarding them. Whether it is the assertions and judgements you
make regarding the objects in your Exhibition, or your assertions or thesis
statements of your essay, your demands of your teachers or your parents,
‘sufficient reasons’ have to be given to account for things and situations
as they are given to you in your day-to-day lives.

Evidence provides for us our interpretation of what we call facts.

Interpretation: What we commonly mean by “interpretation” is to

provide an “explanation” for some thing that appeals to reason and to
common sense. An interpretation is meant to bring some thing
to presence in order for it to show what, how and why it is as it is. In
Group 1 and Group 6 subjects, you are asked to provide an
“interpretation” of a work of art, whether a novel, a poem or painting for
instance, and in doing so name it as “such-and-such” or “so-and-so”. In
the Human Sciences attempts are made to find fixed, permanent
interpretations of social life which attempt to understand what is present
at all times and in all places when living in communities, while in the
Natural Sciences “explanations” are looked for through experiments.

Our lives are pervaded by interpretations both of ourselves and of other

entities and things. Our “Core Theme” seeks to interpret how we
understand ourselves, while our “Optional Themes” seek to understand
other entities in the world around us. Our everyday interpretations or
awareness of things is prior to our systematic interpretations undertaken
in the Human Sciences and prior to our explanations provided by and
given in the Natural Sciences. You need to find your way to the library or
the science lab and interpret the contents in those places as books or
science equipment before doing any science or reading. When you walk
into a classroom, you do not first see uninterpreted black marks on the
white board or hear the sounds of your classmates arriving. You perceive
these things right away as printed or spoken words even if you cannot
understand them. That you understand speech as speech or a textbook as
a book does not mean that your interpretation is unreliable nor that it
creates the meaning of what is interpreted. Your understanding of what
the things are about you is bound together with your interpretation of
them. Understanding is global and general; interpretation is local and
particular.

Justification: The requirements of the principle of sufficient reason

necessitate that reasons be rendered to others for assertions made
regarding the “reality” or “facts” of an object, situation or condition.
Human beings are the “rational animals”; to be “irrational” is, by
definition, to be less than human. We believe that we can “justify” our
scientific observations of the world through mathematical calculation, and
from these calculations make “predictions” of events that will occur in the
future. It is this “pre-dictive” power (lit. before “speech”) that gives
calculative reasoning its dominance since the predictive power provides
security and certainty with regard to the way thing are. This security and
certainty enhances our “preservation of life” and allows us to empower
ourselves towards “enhancement of life” through a recognition of life’s
potentialities.

To “justify” clearly has relations to its root word “justice”. How does our
understanding of the word “justice” relate to justifying and justification?
With the modern view of what human beings are given to us by Descartes
and Kant, human being is that being before whom all other beings are
brought before and required to give their reasons for being what they are
as beings. This is the domineering, commanding stance of human being
before whom all other beings are brought before and “justified” as to what
they are as beings. This “justification” is that which is responsible for
something being defined as what it is, how it stands in its truth. To justify
is to argue for or defend. Our reasons for justifying our mathematical
calculations, for instance, are that these calculations give the best
explanation of our observations and experiences (experiments).

Objectivity: At the core of the questioning regarding the IB’s approach to

knowledge is the question of “objectivity”. Our ideas
regarding objectivity and of our environment as object is central to how
we have come to understand ourselves and our world around us. The
division of our being-in-the-world into one apprehended as subject-object
through the thinking of the French philosopher Rene Descartes, marking
that point where human beings become the centre of their worlds. is the
great paradigm shift in the history of thought in the West. When we
consider the nature that is the object of natural sciences and of
technological exploitation, we believe that we have some knowledge
regarding beings and things. Is this the case? Philosophers and thinkers
have argued that we do not have knowledge of the things themselves;
what we have knowledge of is our own representations of those things.
The dominance of technology and its rationalism is held together in our
modern world with a susceptibility to superstition for human beings seem
to desire more than what is given to them in their rationalism and
technology.