The most interesting topic is

7. “We see and understand things not as they are but as we are.” Discuss this claim in relation to at least two ways of knowing.

I find this topic extremely interesting because I can relate to it. There have been many situations in my life time in which I have experienced this situation, in which I understand things in a different way compared to someone else. For example during our TOK retreat, where we had to interpret the multiple imaged pictures. Another example could also be how a person looks at an object, for example a wine glass. An artist might look at the glass and admire its structure while a physicist might wonder if the glass can be broken by sound (resonance). I could relate it to Sense Perception and   Emotion.

9. Discuss the claim that some areas of knowledge are discovered and others are invented

This is also a pretty interesting topic to investigate. The Areas of Knowledge include (mathematics, natural sciences, human sciences, history, the arts and ethics). Since I have had some experience in all the above subjects, this might help me with the essay. I would first investigate what is meant by a discovery and what is meant by an invention. Then ill probably go on talking about examples with each area of knowledge and maybe start differentiating which areas are invented, and which are discovered.

10. What similarities and differences are there between historical and scientific explanations?

Since I am a huge fan of Science, this topic does sound extremely fun to do. Although my historical skills aren’t top notch, I can first start by investigating what explanations are? Then I can give example of similar Historical and Scientific phenomenon and  explanation, maybe things like  the Mayans’ prediction that the world will end in 2012 (From NGC). I could compare that to other scientific theories and investigate the differences and the similarities.

Spy

Different people would have different answers to this depending on their knowledge and experience with math. Some people learn math by by hearting, while others learn it by studying the core reasons why something is done. It is important to understand the theory of math before actually using math as this will help you to use math in the correct form.

 For example, Log rules can’t be used anywhere. The theory and rules behind the rules must be thought first and then the user would use it more accurately resulting in the production of a right answer. Math, like language, has its own rules and formats. There are many ways to write the same thing in math, for example 5+6 = 11 can be written as 6+5=11. An example in language is,  “The Cat is sleeping on my car” can also be written as “My car has a cat sleeping on it”. They both get the same message out that there is a hairy cat napping on a vehicle that belongs to the person telling the sentence. He either hates cats or simply want to use his car.

 Like language, math has its jokes, for example “why was 6 afraid of 7” , “because 7 8 9”. In the written form, it doesn’t make sense, but once spoken, an English speaker would understand the meaning. Math also has its sentence structures which follow rules.

For example when using the BODMAS rules.(6+7x6+(55+44)) / 2 = 73.5. This is a proper math sentence as all symbols are used in the correct place and there is an equal sign.

 Last but not least, no matter what language you speak, you would still do the same math. I feel math is a universal language. You cannot learn math, you have to first understand it, like English or any other language. Concluding, I think Math is a language.

I can personally relate to this question because I speak 4 languages. It’s not easy to answer it because different languages use different combinations of different words to try to mean the same thing. Let’s look at translation. J’habite and “I live” mean the same thing, but they are said and written differently. If someone said the word “J’habite” and “I live”, my brain would match both the words to mean the same thing. This is because I learnt the word “J’habite” from the word “I live”. If you know one language, it is easier to learn other languages because you can understand them more easily. For example the word “Cheese” relates to a type of food that is made from milk and salt, mostly colored yellow. If I hear the word “cheese”, I automatically get the picture of an orange red glouster cube of cheese. Now If I hear the word “Formage”, I would get the picture of “Brie” cheese, not Red Glouster cheese, as Brie is a French cheese and Red Glouster is an English cheese.

Personally, I think that the language can affect the way a person thinks and responds. If someone something to me in Thai, I would respond in a Thai manner. If that person said “Sawasdi Krab”, it would be an automatic response of mine to respond with “Sawasdi Krab” along with the wai. I would do the same with English too. If someone said Hi, I would say Hi back. So to a certain extent, interactive behavior between individuals could be similar despite languages.

Back to the question, I think that it doesn’t matter what language we speak, knowledge is still the same. A Japanese engineer and an Indian Engineer can both build a plane, despite their knowledge with language. Language is just a small part of knowledge. We can learn the same thing through different languages, with just a little bit of variation.

I believe that I can fly a plane if I were ever in an emergency situation. I trust myself and believe that being a pilot is hard and tiring. I believe that flying could eventually make me a little more wealthy. I believe I can land a plane safely if the weather was good because I have done it before on a simulator I believe that I can save lives by doing this if it were ever to happen. I do also believe in luck, because there have been situations in which I have scored both low and high marks for examinations of the same level. Luck is a huge factor when it come to testing and exam preparation as if you are lucky, what you studied would have come up, if not, then the opposite. I do also believe luck is a huge factor when gambling, from past experiences while playing cards. Some games you win, some gams you loose.