TOK Presentation - AI's and religion

[Vegar Andreas Bergum]

Hi.

 

I am working on a mock for my TOK presentation.

I think I found a topic I want to tackle, but I am somewhat unsure wether it is a good idea.

 

I want to use the knowledge question: "How do we know wether we are controlled by a greater power or not?" and link it to a real-life situation where AI's take over the world. And focus on how mathematics and science could be a greater power. Link it to religion and everything.

 

Any ideas?

[Tom Hiddleston]

I personally think that your topic is good as it does indeed fulfill the guidelines for it to be a TOK q.

[Vioh]

Hi.

 

I am working on a mock for my TOK presentation.

I think I found a topic I want to tackle, but I am somewhat unsure wether it is a good idea.

 

I want to use the knowledge question: "How do we know wether we are controlled by a greater power or not?" and link it to a real-life situation where AI's take over the world. And focus on how mathematics and science could be a greater power. Link it to religion and everything.

 

Any ideas?

 

 

 

It’s certainly a valid point to bring up AI into your discussion. However, notice that AI’s revolution to take over the world is obviously not happening at the moment. We are still in control of it. Besides, it’s not a very good idea to talk about some sci-fi speculation in a TOK presentation; it’s clear that AI hasn’t taken over the world (AI is certainly not advanced enough to do that yet); and we don’t know what the future of AI-technology will hold. So AI may not be suitable for your topic.

 

Now, I am slightly a bit confused with what you really mean by “a greater power”. How can mathematics and science be seen as the greater power? We are not being controlled by them, but we use them as our tools to aid our quest of understanding the nature & developing our own civilization. AI is probably the best example in science for the ‘greater’ power that you’re talking about; but as I have explained above, it’s not very TOK-like to use AI as an example for this topic.

 

I honestly don’t want to throw lots of criticisms. It’s just the way I feel about your current topic. Hence, I’d recommend you to take a different approach. My suggestion (which is kinda similar to what you have now) is to rephrase the question like this: “To what extent are we imprisoned/controlled by the greater power of authority?” Here, you can bring up many stuff; like how our education is encouraging the students to repeat stuff told to us by the authority of the teachers (I’m glad that this is not happening in IB though); or like how religious people are forcing themselves to be imprisoned by the authority of their own imaginary man-made God; or like how religion imprisons the mind of the believers to believe in some scriptures, written thousands of years ago. It seems that there is something about us that makes us vulnerable against the power of authority. This has happened throughout the course of history; some people in China, in Soviet Union, or in North Korea (which is still happening nowadays) seem to be obsessed with the idea of being controlled by some higher power. They worship their leaders like some kind of gods; and have fought strongly to support the dictatorship regimes. Note that this is not only happening in authoritarian countries; it is also very apparent in democratic countries. I have seen plenty of cases where people say something like: “The Pope said it, so it must be right”; or “he’s from Harvard, so he must be right”, etc. All of these made me wonder why we tend to listen to what the authority says without carefully examining the facts. Is it because of our ignorance that leads us to think that we’re incapable of controlling ourselves? Or is it because we are too afraid of freedom? Or is it because we can seek comfort when relying on some form of authority? I don’t know, but I think it’s a fascinating question.

 

On the contrary, science works in a totally opposite way. It equips itself with self-correcting mechanism, together with anti-authority & anti-dogmatism characteristics. There is one and only one authority in science; and it is the nature itself! Hence, I think it might be nice for you to compare and contrast the difference between the scientific & religious approach regarding issues about authority.

 

Maybe you don’t like the idea that I suggested; but I hope this post is useful to you somehow. Good luck with your presentation!

Edited March 1, 2015 by Vioh