Yixia Gu: Smell

How on earth do we smell? The process is simple but fascinating:

Suppose you opened the fridge one day and is overcome by a stinking sensation of moldy cheese. This particular smell is made up of special chemical cells (odorants) which when passing through our nostrils stimulate tiny cilia hairs which gather together in a small patch in the nose. In these hairs are contained special cells which receive the odours: Olfactory receptor cells. These cells are connected to the certain areas of the brain through a series of nerve pathways, and convert the detected smell as signals. Once the nerve signal reaches the brain, the brain processes these patterns so that we end up perceiving the signal as smell (in this case, the smell of moldy cheese).

Our sense of smell can add colour to our world, because what we sense through the olfactory receptors becomes perception. In addition smell also plays an active role in our emotions and memory depending what we associate each smell with.
Sources:
1) http://www.senseofsmell.org/feature/smell101/lesson1/01.php
2)http://www.blkbox.com/~rdevere/tsdc/howwork.html
3)http://health.howstuffworks.com/smell.htm

For Nov. 8th

Folks -- As discussed in class today,

A) You are to:

1. print out and bring to class hard copies of your two 'Sophie's World' assignments; be prepared to share your second assignment with another in the class at the start of next lesson; and
2. return the novel to me next lesson (unless you would like to buy it -- it could come in handy for your internal and/or external assessments).

B) You are also to answer the answer the following question on our class blog: How do the five senses work (i.e. sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell)?

• pick one;
• find out about it (consult 3 sources -- be sure to list the source in your post)
• blog about it using student-friendly language (200 words max.); and
• title your post -- e.g. Eric Jabal: Taste

Mr. J

WoK1: Sense perception quotations

• "There's more to seeing that meets the eye." (K. T. Cole)
• "There is no truth. There is only perception." (Gustave Flaubert)
• "Everyone hears only what he understands." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)
• "True science investigates and brings to human perception such truths and such knowledge as the people of a given time and society consider most important. Art transmits these truths from the region of perception."(Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy)
• "We hear and apprehend only what we already half know." (Henry David Thoreau)
• "Most of the mistakes in thinking are inadequacies of perception rather than mistakes of logic." (Edward de Bono)
• "We shall see but a little way if we require to understand what we see." (Henry David Thoreau)
• "There are things known and there are things unknown, and in between are the doors of perception." (Aldous Huxley)
• "We sometimes get all the information, but we refuse to get the message." (Cullen Hightower)
• "The eyes see only what the mind is prepared to comrehend." (Henri Bergson)
• "If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear as it is -- infinite." (William Blake)
• "It is one of the commonest of mistakes to consider that the limit of our power of perception is also the limit of all there is to perceive." (C. W. Leadbeater)
• "After sleeping through a hundred million centuries we have finally opened our eyes on a sumptuous planet, sparkling with color, bountiful with life. Within decades we must close our eyes again. Isn’t it a noble, an enlightened way of spending our brief time in the sun, to work at understanding the universe and how we have come to wake up in it? This is how I answer when I am asked—as I am surprisingly often—why I bother to get up in the mornings." (Richard Dawkins)
• "Blessed are they who see beautiful things in humble places where other people see nothing." (Camille Pissarro)
• "Only in quiet waters do things mirror themselves undistorted. Only in a quiet mind is adequate perception of the world." (Hans Margolius)
• "Science is nothing but perception." (Plato)

Ming Fung: - Knowers and Knowing

'The more you know the less you understand.' (Tao Le Ching)

The first thing that comes to my mind is that, knowledge does not seem to have an end. We never get to a point where we know everything and we can stop learning and knowing. The main message of this quote is that the more you know you come to realize the fact that how little you actually understand. Or another way to interpret it is how people have a large bank of knowledge, but not necessary going in depth in each thing. That depth is the understanding.

This is very true, as said before, learning and knowing is endless. As we proceed and accumulate more knowledge, we realize that we actually had been really stupid in the past. In my opinion, this has always happened to me. Especially when I was smaller I tend to wonder how things work. Then now when I think back now, things seem to work out more easily than before. This maybe because, I’m smarter, I have more knowledge, I am better as a knower.

The “West Wing” video I watched last lesson also showed how this quote is true. The person was given a map with a different and said to be more accurate world map. She was shocked, because it was not like what she had seen before in her life. She had just experienced gaining new knowledge, which is different to what she was always told. Here we can see she understands how little she understands and she started denying that it was the correct world map. In my world map, I could not recall the sizes and approximate shapes of the continents, but just the vague places of each chunk of land. I thought I knew the world map, but in fact I did not understand it. I think knowing, and understanding are different levels of “knowing”. You may know a person, but not understand him or her well. It is like having a large horizon, or picture. But in contrast, each object on the picture maybe small, not detailed.

The reason why you understand less when you know more, is because you know more, you have a big perspective of what is happening. However, you are lacking understanding of the depth in that knowledge, as there is more knowledge, more understandings would be needed. Knowing and understanding are positively correlated.

Zoha: Knowers and knowing

'Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.' (Martin Luther King)

The quote above by Martin Luther King implies that being ignorant and unaware with stupidity works out to be the most dangerous outlook in the world. Carrying forward an oblivious attitude preventing one to understand the various cultures, people, global issues, religions around the world will only cause, or deepen tribulations. Hence being ignorant with what is around us pays of as being the most dangerous aspect. I would have to agree with this quote, because unawareness often does lead to misunderstandings but also enhances problems. For example if more people were less ignorant about excess waste and Hong Kong landfills filling up, they would perhaps decide to recycle and produce less waste. Not knowing, in this case could be lethal. Another example would be how a common courtesy for one culture is an offense for others. These examples demonstrate how a gap in knowledge can lead to serious consequences. In the same way I do believe that my view of knowledge is rather limited.

We often blindly follow what society and figures in authority show us is right. The episode of west wing revealed how maps showed third world countries smaller than they actually were implying they were less significant. Most of us would go on to believe what a printed map would show us unintentionally surrending to conscientious stupidity. This ultimately would end up dangerous. Sharing everyone’s ‘map of the world’ I came to learn how everyone shared a varied view on their center of the world. Again with the school knowledge activity no two people interpreted their school life knowledge in the same way. This taking me to a conclusion that all of us have a different perception, and referring back to the quote, showing ignorance to other viewpoints will only wind up as dangerous. Without being aware of issues around us, and other believes that surround ones personal opinion will only work out harmful.

Chloe Chan - Knowers and Knowing

'Self-knowledge is like a garden. If it is not cultivated, it cannot be harvested.' (Ghanaian proverb)

Brainstorm:
Knowledge is only knowing
Wisdom is understanding
Learning is not enough

3 Key words:
Garden
Cultivated
Harvested

Main message:
We have to understand and not only know something. Through understanding we get the full potential of our knowledge.

Paraphrase:
We may have the basis to which knowledge can be placed and only know many things, but building on knowledge in itself is not enough. We must act to develop our knowledge further in order for it to be really successful. By doing this, knowledge will become wisdom.

Opinion:
In accordance to the west wing clips where knowledge is questioned and it is concluded that knowledge is not perfect, I think this quotation shows that perhaps the reason why knowledge is not always right, is because we do not fully understand the knowledge we acquire. By connecting the quotation to the exercises I think the action of ‘cultivating’ maybe to explore our learnt knowledge deeper and to question it. In connection to my view of knowledge (where knowledge should be accurate and it is hard to accept different theories that contradict my previous knowledge,) I think this quotation is correct in saying that knowledge isn’t much alone. This quotation suggests that what we learn in school is only the basis, where knowledge is only built and we don’t really learn how to apply the knowledge. It hints that school does not help us develop our knowledge and experiences. This in turn tells us that we can’t really be fully successful just by acquiring knowledge from school.

Yixia Gu: Response to Knowers and Knowing

'Education is learning what you didn’t even know you didn’t know.' (Daniel J. Boorstin).

This phrase is a very interesting one, because how do we acknowledge or realize that we actually don't know something if we haven't been taught to recognize this uncertainty? Once we receive education, we are simultaneously enlightened in our thoughts and how we view the world, and at this point we find that there are actually many things we haven't come across upon in experience. This quotation of Daniel J. Borrstin is suggests that the original, fundamental purpose and existence of Education is simply to open doors of the 'unknown' in a world of the apparent 'known'.

Education as defined, is the power of reasoning and judgment to prepare ourselves for intellectually mature life. This, I believe is a valid point in my view of knowledge: if a person walked through a garden and didn’t know what the bunches of ‘colourful-many petalled-thing on a stalk’ was, he or she wouldn’t be able to appreciate the ‘flowers’ in the garden fully- the apparent ignorance limited their perspective, and only allowed them to see ‘flowers’ as lovely colourful things. Take sports for instance, perhaps playing basketball may seem easy enough; the players dribbling balls and passing them with agility and ease. However, once I actually had a basketball lesson, I realized that I didn’t actually have the knowledge of handling the ball or playing it properly which was reflected during the basketball games. This example ties in quite well with our lives as students. One of the reasons why there were a range of pictures of ‘school knowledge’ was because each us valued the knowledge from school environment differently. We were influenced by our preferences and we are eclectic in learning “what we didn’t know, and the things we appeared on the paper could have been due to their importance in paving the way for greater depth in understanding. Thus, Education to me is also learning to know.

Jason Herrera : Knowers & Knowing - Interpretation of Knowledge

'Shall I teach you what knowledge is? When you know a thing, to recognize that you know it; and when you do not know a thing, to recognize that you do not know it. That is knowledge.' (Confucius)

Confucius is one of the greatest minds in ancient China. He came up with influential ideas about respect and the family which people in China still see as virtues today. The quotation above is Confucius' interpretation of knowledge. He is basically saying that knowledge is one-self realizing whether you know something or not. 'When you know a thing, to recognize that you know it' means that when you know a thing, you must identify it as something you've seen before and you should stick to your own perception of the knowledge, and 'When you do not know a thing, to recognize that you do not know it.' means that when you don’t know something; you must identify it as something that you haven’t seen before, and important that you must learn from it.

From the West Wing videos I watched last lesson, the new world maps stunned me a little as it is something I’ve never seen before and it goes against what I’ve been taught at school at an early age. I do agree with Confucius’ quote from above which is to admit to something that you do not know and hence learn it. When I first saw the new maps, I thought it was ridiculous and wondered why would they change the old atlas? However, the geographers then explain why they should change the new maps; it was all because of the interpretation of knowledge. Because there are people with different interpretations of the map, they came to a thought that all countries above the equator are more developed than those below. However, I stuck to my interpretation of the atlas because I believe it is the right one. Thinking of Confucius’ quote, I came to realize that students in school have been learning this way too, that every student admits to something they don’t know and learns it and that they stick to their own perceptions of a knowledge which made us come up with unique ideas.

Norbert Poon- Knowers and Knowing

'˜Education is learning what you didn'™t even know you didn't know.'™-(Daniel J. Boorstin)

This quote explores Infinity, Existence and Limits.

This quote reminds me that education is almost infinite, because there are so many things that one can learn, and very often, you don’t even know that such things exist. This is why education always beyond what one knows and beyond what they have learnt before.

The main message here really is telling us there are a lot to learn, so much that one life time is not enough and so much that we don't even know they exist.

What this quotes really means is that education should be very fascinating to everyone, and very broad. A student is always exploring beyond what they already know, and it might also be hinting if education doesn’t interest you, you are better off not studying.

I totally agree to this. Speaking as a student and representing all students, we are always learning new aspects of everything in life that we didn’t know exist. And because we don'€™t know them, we have constantly been given information. Just like in one episode of a series '€˜The West Wing'€™, we didn'€™t know the world could have been drawn according to the power of each country, or depending on the version of the map, the history of a country or continent. We didn'€™t know the world could be different to the map, because we were told the map represents the world since we were small. This all depends on one'€™s view of knowledge, their perspective to what knowledge is. Bringing it back to the quote, we can bring up many different arguments that make us think there are many things we can explore, and that brings us to the infinity.

But how far is the infinity? We don'€™t know. This is where we need to know limits, because if we don’t then there will be so much to explore, that we don'€™t know which to explore first.

Robert Win: Knowers and Knowing

One of the quotations which stands out to me is "There are many who know many things, yet are lacking in wisdom." (Democritus). Democritus states that knowledge and wisdom are not the same thing and are two different things, which contrasts with what many people consider as wise, today and often think the two are somehow the same thing.

The 3 key words within the quote are "many", "know" and "wisdom". The main message of the quote is (as i mentioned above), knowing many things does not make one wise. It also suggests that there are many people who know many things, but if knowing many things made one wise, there would be many wise people, and what Democritus is trying to say is that there are not and may never be many wise people in the world.

I agree with Democritus' statement, that knowledge is not wisdom and that there are not many wise people in the world. I believe that knowledge is something one learns, finds out, or is told by another person. This makes it information which is not discovered or experienced directly by ones self. Wisdom on the other hand, is information one discovers purely by themselves, or by doing and finding out something, with no influence from others, or if one were to challenge what one has been taught since birthand what others say and believe is correct, making it very difficult for one to be truly 'wise'.

During the 1st TOK lesson we had, we watched a clip about the different possible maps that the US public schools could adopt, in the TV series 'The West Wing'. These maps of the world were all different, and showed the sizes, shapes and locations of countries and the world differently. The creators of each map, one could say, were 'wise', as they came up with their own view of what the world actually looks like. Although they may have based their view on information provided by others, they have shown wisdom by unaccepting what others have taught them about what the world looks like. One map which showed the Southern hemisphere on top, and the Northern hemisphere at the bottom, sparked a discussion between the characters in the video about which hemisphere should be at the top of the map. One of the characters mentioned that the map was "wrong" as the top of the world (in her view) is north and has always been north. However, her opinion of the map suggests that she has only considered what is correct from what she has been taught since childhood, thus she accepts that North is 'at the top' and rules out any other ideas which may show that what she has been taught is not quite correct.

This character demonstrates knowledge, which is a contrasts to the the creator of the 'upside down map' who shows wisdom as he/she (the map creator) would have also been brought up and taught that North is at the top, but has created his/her own theory and view of what the world map should look like, showing that he/she has challenged what he/she has been taught, and what others think is correct.

Jacqui.W - Knowers & Knowing

'The more you know the less you understand.' (Tao Le Ching)

I think that what Tao Le Ching means is that the more we know about something, meaning the opinions and thoughts from other people about that thing, the less we'll understand the original concept of that thing and the original message it's conveying as well as our own personal thoughts and opinions of that thing. Or another way to think of it is, by knowing more, you don't necessarily become wiser and understand more about life.

"The more you know the less you understand" - This quote explores knowledge and wisdom. I think what Tao Le Ching is talking about is that, if we know more data, this does not necessarily mean we gain more knowledge and understand life more. The whole point of gaining knowledge is to understand life more and live our life. Some think that by knowing the most means they are 'the smartest'. But what correlation does this have to understanding life and living life? Just by being smart and getting a good job doesnt show that they understand even the simplest things of life like who they are and why they're here.

Here is a way to interpret the quote:
There is a person in a poor, starving country who wants to be the president and he tells people that if he becomes the president, he'll give everyone food for free. At this point, he knows the people are starving and need food therefore using his knowledge he says he'll give them food to solve the problem. But this shows he doesn't understand the whole situation yet. He hasn't realised that the way to get food is to have resources and grow food, or to buy food, and in the condition the country is in now, it's hard to get resources as everyone is starving with no energy to farm food. If they had energy to farm food, they don't have the resources needed in order to farm food and without the resources, it's simply impossible to farm. Whereas if this person was not aiming to be the next president a just a normal, struggling, starving to death citizen, he would realise and understand that in order to fill up his stomach and survive, he'd have to get resources and grow food. To reach this understanding, he didn't have to 'know more' to reach it.

This shows exactly what the quote means and what Tao Le Ching is trying to show the reader. By knowing more, it doesn't mean you become wiser and understand more. Overall, this is what I think Tao Le Ching means by his quote. This shows that Tao Le Ching thinks of knowledge not by its quantity but by the quality of it. I think by applying this to life as a student it shows that students don't have to be the one that can list out every president's name, or be the one that knows the dictionary off by heart to be the wisest.

Hey Tou Chiu: Response to Knowers & Knowing quotation

'Never assume the obvious is true.' (William Safire)
The meaning of the quote above is self explanatory. It basically means that we should not take what seems to be the ‘obvious’ as the correct answer. I think the message behind that it is trying to convey how humans normally accept the ‘knowledge’ given to them without really asking or investigating whether the ‘knowledge’ is genuine, definite, or true.

From this quote, I realize that this situation of accepting ‘knowledge’ always happen around our daily lives. For example, if we see someone crying, the first thing we assume is that the person is traumatized and very unhappy because that is the obvious reason. However, even though the person may be crying, they may be crying because of joy, which contradicts to what we actually assumed earlier. I also think that this quote relates perfectly to what we actually discussed in class about the world map. In this situation, most of us assumed that the world map we see everyday is ‘true’ yet we find ourselves unable to answer which is the ‘top’ of the world and which is the ‘bottom’, which area, or country is the centre of earth? Without pointing out this in class, or seeing the ‘West Wing’ clip, I would probably have never realized or questioned myself - ‘Where do we live? Where exactly are we on earth?’

Looking back at the ‘West Wing’ clip, I begin to wonder whether maps are really drawn according to the strength of countries in the world, i.e those who are strong are at the ‘top’ of the world. If this was true, then the map that we have would be biased and inaccurate! Another example supporting the quote above - ‘Never to assume the obvious is true’.

For Friday, October 12th

As discussed in class, please complete the following before Friday, October 12th:

1. Pick one of the 21 ‘Knowers & Knowing quotations (see below).
2. Brainstorm anything it brings to mind.
3. Pick-out three key words.
4. Decide what you think its main message is.
5. Paraphrase the quotation's message (in about 50 words) and blog your opinion of it (in about 200 words), connecting the quotation's relevance and applicability to your view of knowledge (think back to your map of the world and our class discussions about it, the West Wing episodes); and life as a student (think back to our class discussions about your picture of 'school knowledge').

Please title your blog with your name.

For Lesson 2

If you wish to watch again the two 'West Wing' mapping clips we looked at in class, select them below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efjcrbNcW6s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRtN4UK1wHk

Please remember that for Lesson 2, you are to:

1. spend an additional 15 minutes writing your ToK Journal entry #1 (preferably in a black ToK notebook… or else file paper) in response to the following prompt – i.e. How have today’s mapping activity, discussion/debrief, and West Wing clips challenged your view of knowledge? your understanding of what you know/don’t know? your own picture(s) of knowledge?
2. draw a picture of the ‘school knowledge’ you’ve acquired in your pre-school, primary, and secondary school days (be prepared to show and discuss your ‘school knowledge’ picture with others); and
3. complete the VARK questionnaire (http://www.vark-learn.com/english/page.asp?p=younger) and bring a hard-copy of the results.

Knowers & Knowing

1. 'Shall I teach you what knowledge is? When you know a thing, to recognise that you know it; and when you do not know a thing, to recognise that you do not know it. That is knowledge.' (Confucius)



2. 'Where there is shouting there is no true knowledge.' (Leonardo da Vinci)



3. 'Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.' (Martin Luther King)



4. 'Mediocre minds usually dismiss anything which reaches beyond their own understanding.' (Francois de La Rochefoucald)



5. 'Education is learning what you didn’t even know you didn’t know.' (Daniel J. Boorstin)



6. 'It is very good for a man to talk about what he does not understand; as long as he understands that he does not understand it.' (G. K. Chesterton)



7. 'Those who are convinced they have a monopoly on The Truth always feel that they are only saving the world when they slaughter the heretics.' (Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.)



8. 'A very popular error – having the courage of one’s convictions; rather it is a matter of having the courage for an attack upon one’s convictions.' (Anon)



9. 'There are many who know many things, yet are lacking in wisdom.' (Democritus)



10. 'The most important truths are likely to be those which… society at that time least wants to hear.' (W. H. Auden)



11. 'Never assume the obvious is true.' (William Safire)



12. 'The criterion of truth is that it works even if nobody is prepared to acknowledge it.' (Ludwig von Mises)



13. 'The possession of knowledge does not kill the sense of wonder and mystery. There is always more mystery.' (Anais Nin)



14. 'If one is estranged from oneself, then one is estranged from others too. If one is out of touch with oneself, then one cannot touch others.' (Anne Morrow Lindbergh)



15. 'Now there is one outstandingly important fact regarding Spaceship Earth, and that is that no instruction book came with it.' (Buckminster Fuller)



16. 'Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside, awakens.' (Carl Jung)



17. 'The universe is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.' (Eden Phillpotts)



18. 'The dumbest people I know are those who know it all.' (Malcolm Forbes)



19. 'Self-knowledge is like a garden. If it is not cultivated, it cannot be harvested.' (Ghanaian proverb)



20. 'In times of drastic change it is the learners who inherit the future: the learned find themselves equipped to live in a world that no longer exists.' (Eric Hoffer)



21. 'The more you know the less you understand.' (Tao Le Ching)