TOK Essay 3
July 14, 2012
Theory of Knowledge
“ W h a t c a n w e l e a r n f r o m a r t “W that we cannot learn from the other areas of knowledge?”
by: Daniel Paul Cheng Uy
Daniel Paul Cheng Uy
Mr. Kenneth Oneal Sy Gan
TOK Essay 3
July 14, 2012
“What can we learn from art that we cannot learn from the other areas of knowledge?” During the Spanish Civil War in the late 1930s, several bombings occurred occurred in Spain, such as the Nazi’s casual bombing practice practice on the Basque town of Guernica.
That event led Pablo Pablo Picasso to paint probably his most
famous painting known as
Guernica,
which was clearly inspired by the
tragedies of of war and the suffering it inflicted upon civilians. Pablo Picasso’s Guernica
may not be a history book, but it certainly is a part of history. history. We
may learn the timeline of events of the Spanish Civil War from historical textbooks, but we are able to learn about the devastations that the war has inflicted on the civilians from the painting that Pablo Picasso created.
(Guernica, 1937 by Pablo Picasso) Art is very difficult to define, and art may have no single definition, but in order to fully understand the discussion of the statement, it is necessary to agree that art is our perception of the natural world, the language in which we express creativity that is neither a matter of objective, universal standards, nor a matter of merely being “in the eye of the beholder,” but rather rather a little bit of of both. both.
Daniel Paul Cheng Uy
In addition addition,, to learn is to gain or or acquire acquire
Mr. Kenneth Oneal Sy Gan
TOK Essay 3
July 14, 2012
knowledge, or as Socrates defined it, justified, true, belief. Certain Certain knowledge claims arise from the statement statement itself such as we are able to learn something from art that we cannot simply learn from the other areas of knowledge.
Somehow, the statement implies that the knowledge
we gain from art is different from the knowledge that we gain gai n from the other areas of knowledge, but to what extent can art enable us to gain and perceive perceive knowledge? knowledge? To what extent can art teach teach us things that the other other areas of knowledge cannot?
To a certain extent, art enables us to learn
about the “intangible” things, the concepts and ideas that science and history cannot teach us.
To what extent then are the knowledge we gain
from art and the other areas of knowledge different? If what we learn from art and the other areas of knowledge are completely different, then how come we use art in explaining history or movies in understanding the sciences? sciences? Art enables enables us to learn the emotional emotional impact of things things and events, events, the intangible things that we cannot learn from scientific proofs or historical evidences. To some extent, we are able to learn something from art that the other areas of knowledge cannot teach us because the other areas of knowledge like the natural sciences and history would entail higher levels of certainty compared to art, and that would “hinder” the amount of knowledge we are able to gain, since uncertainty opens us to multiple possibilities and outcomes.
Hence, the knowledge that we gain from art is indeed different
from the knowledge that we gain from the other areas of knowledge. Socrates Socrates said that people take the shadows shadows to be true and echoes echoes to be real. There exists the concept of “mimesis,” “mimesis,” which is the idea that imitation is part of nature and is innate to each and every one of us, that imitation imitation is a representation of of the real world in art and literature. literature.
The natural natural sciences
are more on the rational and factual side of the spectrum of the areas of knowledge, in that they have a greater level of certainty, certainty, which enables us to Daniel Paul Cheng Uy
Mr. Kenneth Oneal Sy Gan
TOK Essay 3
July 14, 2012
learn about the hard facts and truths, while history history is more of in the middle of the spectrum. spectrum.
History History enables enables us to to learn about the the cause cause and effect effect
relationships of events, while art, which is on the more emotional and creative side of the spectrum with greater level of possibility, enables us to learn more about the impact of things, the emotional effects of certain events events and ideas. A history book book can tell us what what happened happened and how many suffered in the Spanish Sp anish Civil War, War, but a history book cannot explain expl ain to us the pain and suffering that the Spanish people underwent, but Pablo Picasso’s Guernica
was able to illustrate, first-hand, the pain and suffering they
experienced. On the contrary, Karl Popper says that scientists and artists are both alike in that they try to extend our understanding of experience by the use of creative imagination subjected to critical control, and so both use rational and irrational faculties, by explaining the unknown and trying to articulate the search and findings. findings.
Both are seekers seekers of the truth, who make
indispensable use of intuition. On the topic of love, for example, scientists would try to explain how the process of love works, by discussing the different hormones involved and the different stages of attraction, while art would explain how love feels and how powerful love is, through words, pictures, and movies. In this case, both try to extend our understanding of love, but they they explain in different manners. Hence, we learn different things about love. Looking at the different ways of knowing, we constantly gain knowledge from our senses and use reason to validate that perceived data and information, so we get different different perspectives from others. It’s what we see that matters. We constantly validate data, and we always try to agree with the rationale, rationale, using our our emotions. Albert Einstein himself said, “We “We search for highly universal laws from which a picture of the world can be obtained by pure deduction. There is no logical path leading to these laws. They can Daniel Paul Cheng Uy
Mr. Kenneth Oneal Sy Gan
TOK Essay 3
July 14, 2012
only be reached by intuition, based upon something like an intellectual love.” While the areas of knowledge concerned with certainty, like the natural sciences, sciences, would focus on reason to help us learn about something something like love, art would make us of language and emotion to appeal to our senses in explaining explaining something so sensual and emotional emotional such as love, enabling us to learn. I, myself, am one who constantly gains justified, true, belief through art. Recently in history class, we learned about the Korean Korean War War,, how it was affected by the Cold War, War, about how difference in political ideologies between the north and the south were what caused the war, including the timeline of events, but what we didn’t learn through the books were the pains and sufferings that each soldier and civilian underwent throughout the war. war. It was only in the historical films from BBC that we saw how difficult it was for the Americans, under General Douglas Macarthur, to regain the capital city of South Korea and Pyongyang. We also learned about the longterm effects the Korean War has on the Koreans themselves up until today, through the sharing of Brother Mincheol, who through language, was able to share the emotional struggles each Korean experiences until today, especially especially the separa separation tion of families. families.
These intangib intangible le concepts concepts and ideas ideas
are the things that art is able to teach us. The area of natural science tries to be convincing since it has to be convincing. convincing.
There There is a determina determination tion to have have full full proofs proofs to make make the
populous believe.
To a certain extent, natural science enables us to learn
the process of how things happen, happen, how love occurs for example, but science science cannot teach us the power of love, or how love moves us to do crazy things. On a similar note, the subject area of history enables us to observe patterns, to learn from from our mistakes. To a certain extent, history would help us analyze and learn about the causes and effects effects of why things occur, occur, why war starts and how it ends, but history on its own cannot explain the longDaniel Paul Cheng Uy
Mr. Kenneth Oneal Sy Gan
TOK Essay 3
July 14, 2012
term effects of a war, war, such as the Korean War War.. History still makes use of art to enable us to learn on that matter. matter.
Paintin gs, journa ls, and
documentaries, for example are types of art that we use in history to learn about the emotional impacts of war, the intangible things that history on its own cannot teach us. The means of gaining access to knowledge does not fall into a particular particular level of certainty alone, but falls into the two levels of certainty, namely the levels of being certain and uncertain. Just like in natural natural science and history, history, certain pieces of information help us gain knowledge, but uncertainty our doubt pushes us to dig deeper and gain access to more justified, true, beliefs. Art enables us to learn the emotional impact of things and events because art is able to evoke emotional responses from us, “catharsis,” which is a deep purgation purgation of emotion. emotion. Pablo Picasso Picasso himself himself said “art “art is a lie that brings us nearer nearer to to the truth. truth.””
It is through through imitation imitation that that we are able to to
learn. Babies don’t learn how to walk, talk, eat, and read by reading books books or doing laboratory experiments, but by imitating us adults. The areas of knowledge of both certainty and uncertainty lead to the gain and access of knowledge. The natural natural sciences my my help us learn about the reason of how things happen, the truths behind why, for example, we feel pain, love, and hope, but the natural sciences cannot teach us the emotional impact certain feelings have on us as persons. History may help us learn about the cause and effect relationship of events, the statistics of wars, but history cannot teach us the damages that war brings upon the people.
To a certain extent, the other areas of knowledge helps us learn
about the what, when, where, and why of things, but art helps us learn about how people feel. We learn from the different areas of knowledge, but art specifically enables us to learn the emotional impact of things and
Daniel Paul Cheng Uy
Mr. Kenneth Oneal Sy Gan
TOK Essay 3
July 14, 2012
events, the intangible things that scientific evidences or historical textbooks cannot teach us.
WORD COUNT: 1,600
Daniel Paul Cheng Uy
Mr. Kenneth Oneal Sy Gan
TOK Essay 3
July 14, 2012
BIBLIOGRAPHY BibMe: Fast & Easy Bibliography Maker - MLA, APA, Chicago, Turabian - Free. (n.d.). BibMe: Fast & Easy Bibliography Maker - MLA, APA, Chicago, Turabian Free. Retrieved July 23, 2011, from http://www.bibme.org / Guernica by Pablo Picasso. (n.d.).Pablo Picasso paintings, biography, and quotes. Retrieved July 14, 2012, from http://www.pablopicasso.org/ guernica.jsp Remembering the Korean War, 60 years ago - The Big Picture - Boston.com. (2010, June 23).Boston.com - Boston, MA news, breaking news, sports, video . Retrieved July 14, 2012, from http:// www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/06/ remembering_the_korean_war_60.html
Daniel Paul Cheng Uy
Mr. Kenneth Oneal Sy Gan
