TOK Essay Title May 2025

TOK Essay Title 2: Is our most revered knowledge more fragile than we assume it to be? Discuss with reference to the arts and one other area of knowledge.

The term “knowledge more fragile than we assume” suggests that knowledge seemingly stable or enduring because of the strong foundational paradigm, may become vulnerable to fragility due to dynamic evolution of knowledge. Is our assumed revered knowledge exposed to certain element of unprecedented vulnerability? Overwhelming questions like this may arise in this TOK essay title 2.

The fragility of revered knowledge becomes apparent when examined through the lenses of the arts and mathematics.In the arts, devaluation of knowledge might be seen due to shifts in cultural interpretations and evolving aesthetic values. Though mathematical knowledge banks on long-established truths and certainty, questions may arise whether new theoretical developments might challenge the established knwledge to be reconsidered.

In the arts, the interpretive knowledge, initially revered, may encounter challenge in its theoretical assumptions by new perspectives through cultural changes. Revered knowledge like abstract expressionism or the symbolism in Renaissance paintings have been fragile due to shifts in cultural contexts.

On the other hand, the knowledge produced in Mathematics is logically validated with certainty and objectivity; making it resistant to reinterpretation. For example, Pythagorean Theorem or Euclidean Geometry have been consistent and universally valid across time and cultures.