Today I’m joined for another session by Ms. Virginia Voigt, Psychology teacher and we discussed TOK Exhibition Prompt 12: Is Bias inevitable in the production of knowledge?

Since we’re human (and we're biased even when we try to be aware of our own biases), and knowledge is made by and for humans, the logical deduction here would be that yes, bias is inevitable. We don’t stop with this though, we unpack this question through the lens of Psychology, a field that strives to be as aware as possible and remove bias through stringent measures. 

Our conversation today reminds me very much of Thoreau’s quote I have on my refrigerator “It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see”. I’m left wondering that if bias is inevitable to some extent, is bias necessarily a bad thing? Or, if it is unavoidable, what can we do about this? Another topic we discuss is the bias of language, and the fact that we’re holding this conversation in English, and the problems that come along with this.

Kudos (my favorite granola bar as a kid) to Bernard for the music once again. Seriously, if I can find a kudos bar, it’s yours. Thank you.

Link from our discussion well worth the listen:
14 Biases (Master Class) 

In this episode, I met with one of my favourite teachers here in HK, Anastasia Stitch. She is a DP History teacher & examiner, and she holds a Masters of International and Public Affairs from University of Hong Kong, and was a DP History student herself. Looking through a Historical lens, I was really interested to hear what she had to say about Exhibition Prompt 9: Are some types of knowledge less open to interpretation than others? 

We explore the beauty of history, literature and arts as being constantly open to interpretation, and try to dig into what kinds of knowledge might not be as open to interpretation, even in these areas. We talk about the key methods of historiography, and how that plays a valuable role in interpretation of historical events, as well as the role of the historian in removing the subjective “I” and to consider a range of contrasting evidence to get a sense of what took place. We get in deep in this one about the nature of knowledge in history and the role of interpretation. Hope you enjoy it and it gets you thinking a little more about the history you know!

And again, thank you Bernard Wun for the music!