35 IA Prompts

Each IA prompt needs to be explained for you to have a better understanding of

IA prompt #1
What counts as knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
This IA prompt basically asks you this simple question: what is knowledge? And
what is not? Clearly this is one of the most fundamental questions in TOK and
choosing this prompt gives you flexibility and a wide range of themes and
objects to choose.
For each of your objects, explain why and how it can (or cannot) be a good
source of knowledge and justify the inclusion of the object through your personal
connection to the object, in relation with "knowledge" that it holds.

IA prompt #2
Are some types of knowledge more useful than others?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
The keyword for this prompt is "useful". All knowledge is useful one way or
another, for different people and in different situations. However, you can
compare and contrast this "usefulness" by bringing objects from different fields
of knowledge and eras to argue your point of view about the usefulness of
different types of knowledge.
Try to keep the commentary of each object focused on the object itself and what
types of knowledge it brings and what it is useful for.
IA prompt #3
What features of knowledge have an impact on its reliability?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
This IA prompt asks the question about the reliability of knowledge, and more
interestingly, it pushes you further not only to investigate the reliability of
knowledge, also to identify and then evaluate different features of knowledge
(the age of knowledge, its source, its specificness or trendiness, being backed by
valid evidence etc.) based on their contribution to the reliability of the
knowledge.
Choose your objects wisely not to raise sensitivity over controversial topics, if
you study in a conservative society.

IA prompt #4
On what grounds might we doubt a claim?
Level of Interestingness: Interesting
This IA prompt is a paraphrase of the previous one (#3). It is still an interesting
prompt as you can develop another approach to discussing the same topic,
reliability, this time having a "negative" mindset. For IA prompt #3, you discuss
the reliability of knowledge in general, while this prompt asks you to "doubt" a
knowledge claim, and then justify your reasons.

IA prompt #5
What counts as good evidence for a claim?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
This IA prompt is very interesting as it focuses on one of the features of
knowledge that makes it reliable; evidence. Regardless of the "source" of
knowledge, being recent or widely known or any other feature that can make a
knower "count on" knowledge, the "evidence" that the claimer presents is of utter
importance. What can be accepted (or not) as evidence, for a knowledge claim?
Surely, "everybody knows" and "trust me" are not good evidences for a claim.

IA prompt #6
How does the way that we organize or classify knowledge affect what we know?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
Sometimes we organize and categorize our personal knowledge for ourselves as
individuals, at the same time, we, humans, also organize and categorize our
shared knowledge for every possible knower. You can choose two different
approaches to discuss this IA prompt: personal or shared. It is better though to
choose objects that are related to and discuss this prompt based on our shared
knowledge. The reason is that the categorization of your personal knowledge
may affect what you know, however it mostly is affected by what you already
knew. "Organize" and "classify" are terms for "labeling," "categorization" and
"stereotyping." Pay close attention that this IA prompt does not ask about
"what" and is focused on "how" of the knowledge.

IA prompt #7
What are the implications of having, or not having, knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
This IA prompt is extremely interesting as you can discuss the source of almost
all tragedies in human history connected to it. Here, having or not having
knowledge means having "half-knowledge." Whether one does not have
complete self-knowledge, personal knowledge or shared knowledge, they might
make decisions based on this lack of complete knowledge with tragic or
disastrous outcomes. In classic literature (of any culture) we read about heroes
and martyrs, who sacrificed themselves, their loved ones, or other people or
resources in their way, for the greater good. We rarely see these examples these
days, as people have become more self-aware about their abilities, and the
consequences of their actions.
You may be sure that you know, but how can you be sure that you know enough?

IA prompt #8
To what extent is certainty attainable?
Level of Interestingness: Interesting
For starters, you must know that "certainty" does not have degrees or extents, one
is either certain or not. When we say quite certain, absolutely certain or somehow
certain, we actually mean that we are certain about some aspects of an issue
and we are not certain about others. The sum total of these "certainties"
become the degree of our certainty. If you talk to a quantum physicist, they will
tell you that we cannot be certain about anything.
You may not have been completely certain about IBDP; however, you (or your
family) chose to study the program for two years. Why? Because the risks were
low, you could afford it, and the possibility of a good outcome was high. In
result, you and your family were "quite certain" that this was a good decision.

IA prompt #9
Are some types of knowledge less open to interpretation than others?
Level of Interestingness: Interesting
"Types of knowledge" might make you start thinking about "knowledge by
acquaintance vs knowledge by description." Stop thinking now!
This IA prompt asks about the interpretability of knowledge that causes the
comparison between procedural and propositional types of
knowledge. Procedural knowledge is "know-how" which is (almost) not open
to interpretation. The knowledge of "how" is less interpretable than the
knowledge of "why" and "what." Propositional knowledge, that you may also
know as descriptive knowledge, is having the knowledge about a proposition. In
simple words, the procedural knowledge of knowing "how to bake a
cake," and the propositional knowledge of knowing that "Gordon can bake a
cake."

IA prompt #10
What challenges are raised by the dissemination and/or communication of
knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
"Lost in translation" is one of the most common challenges of dissemination or
communication of knowledge. "Dissemination" means to spread widely, and it
has its own challenges. You can choose all your three objects based on this most
common challenge, which is "mistranslation" or "misinterpretation." However,
you can also be more flexible and choose the objects that exhibit other challenges
raised in the process of sharing knowledge, including unforeseen problems,
logistical hardships, convincing the audience, losing reputation and many more.

IA prompt #11
Can new knowledge change established values or beliefs?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
"Neville has always been very proud of his pure-blood heritage until he found out
that he was adopted." "Hungarian romantic nationalists discovered their design
roots in ancient India." Almost every sentence that includes "findings show that"
or "findings changed the way can be the first part of your search query, and you
can add your intended topic. In this way, especially by googling through Google
News, you can find many news reports, articles, tweets and posts about "new
knowledge" that affected "established values or beliefs."
The answer to this question is: "sometimes yes, and sometime no." You can find
a mixture of objects that show the change in established values and beliefs,
alongside the objects that show no change.
IA prompt #12
Is bias inevitable in the production of knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Interesting
There are different types of bias categorized by multiple thinkers into various
categories. Each type of bias affects the production of knowledge, in a negative
or a positive way. Sometimes, bias prevents the pursuit of knowledge and stops
the process of production of knowledge, and sometimes it motivates the knower,
the expert, the scientist to pursue and produce knowledge. Whatever the object
that you choose, you must first identify the bias that motivated the pursuit of
knowledge, or stopped it, and justify the inclusion of the object, preferably
through a personal connection. Then you can discuss the role of bias in that
process.

IA prompt #13
How can we know that current knowledge is an improvement upon past
knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
To discuss this prompt, first "Improvement" should be defined. Not
any change is an improvement, or is it? Clear your position about this before
starting choosing the objects and writing the commentaries. Then there should be
a "past knowledge" related or similar to this "current knowledge." If they
share the same root, in an AOK or in a discipline, then it is possible that the root
of the current knowledge is the past knowledge, and the knowledge that we have
today is not a totally genuine innovation. Now it is time to analyze the process of
knowledge production. Discuss how, in your definition, we can identify
"current knowledge" as an "improvement."
Pay attention that you're not supposed to only prove that new knowledge was an
improvement, also you must explain how you can identify the process as
an improvement.

IA prompt #14
Does some knowledge belong only to particular communities of knowers?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
To discuss your chosen objects linked to this IA prompt, you must discuss
“personal” and “shared” knowledge. These two types of knowledge have
separate and overlapping areas in a rhetorical Venn diagram. Some knowledge is
better to be kept within its community of knowers, and some knowledge must be
shared with the global community of knowers. There is also knowledge that can
be explored by someone outside its community of knowers, but they will find it
very difficult to acquire or consume that knowledge.
A grandma may not understand a meme, or you may not get a reference made to
a 1960s movie. Should your exam mark be shared with the entire school or not?

IA prompt #15
What constraints are there on the pursuit of knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
The pursuit of knowledge may be paused or stopped due to the lack of interest or
a change of heart in the pursuer, also due to external factors. Historically,
religious or patriotic beliefs have constrained scientists and artists to pursue
knowledge in their fields. Many times, political pressure caused this issue and
many times nature stopped us from knowing more. You can find many viable
examples of such constraints in the AOK that you are more interested in, and
discuss whether issue was caused due to the "scope" of knowledge,
"perspectives" of knowers, by the lack of "methods and tools" of producing
knowledge, or on the grounds of "ethics."
IA prompt #16
Should some knowledge not be sought on ethical grounds?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
Ethics is a very vague and multilateral concept that almost every individual has
an opinion about, which in fact, it’s their right. If you choose this IA prompt, you
should first define "ethics" and "ethical grounds." The definitions of the concepts
are your definitions (and those accepted by your teacher, of course.) Do you
believe that the ends justify the means? Or not? Another question that you may
want to explore is whether we should consider ethical applications of the
knowledge that we pursue beforehand, or not.
If you find your parents spying on you through your phone, by the use of (a
specific) spyware unethical, then you should specify whether you find the pursuit
of knowledge in the advancement of spyware technology unethical, or the pursuit
of knowledge about your personal life by your parents unethical. Is it the
technology or its usages?

IA prompt #17
Why do we seek knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
Curiosity, success, convenience, hunger, abandonment are only some examples
for the "driving force" behind "the need to know?" Keep in mind that you that
your exhibition is for you to manifest what you've learned in your TOK course.
You can identify what your motivation is for seeking knowledge and then expand
it to people in general. The reason(s) for every individual to seek knowledge can
be different and many individuals may share some reasons.
For this IA prompt, adequate justification for the inclusion of the objects, and
honest clear discussions about the "why" of seeking knowledge, linked to the
prompt, would be enough to get you a high mark.
IA prompt #18
Are some things unknowable?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
Some TOK "experts" who tend to get overly philosophical and forget the whole
point of TOK, may argue that the fact that something is a "thing" is "knowable."
Please do yourself a favor and do not go there at all. This IA prompt asks if there
are "questions" that we cannot answer. And of course, there are many.
Who is the actual original creator of a folk song? Who did first create some
certain meme or who did make it go viral? Who or What is God? Or where is he?
Where will we hit the wall of the universe if we go "that way?"
Make your exhibition personal and discuss "what" is unknowable to you and
"why?" You may also want to consider discussing the provisional unknowability
of things. It means that many things are unknowable for a period of time, and
later, due to the advancement of knowledge, they can be known.

IA prompt #19
What counts as a good justification for a claim?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
There are two approaches to evaluate a knowledge claim. One is "everybody
knows" justification. The other is the "evaluating sources" section of the TOK
course. None of them are suitable for discussing real-life objects linked to this IA
prompt. The first approach is not a justification at all, and the second one is too
investigative to have practical use in our real lives.
"Life coaches" and "happiness gurus" may tell you things that sound right,
however they have no justification for what they prescribe. On the other hand,
doctors prescribe medicine for their patients, and while they may not always
justify the choice of medicine, the fact that they are medical doctors should be
enough justification.
IA prompt #20
What is the relationship between personal experience and knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
The comparison between "knowledge by acquaintance" and "knowledge by
description" is a good approach for the discussions linked to this IA prompt.
However, it tells only one side of the story. Such comparison is only for
the acquisition and/or consumption of knowledge, and does not cover
the production side.
You study physics and mechanics and, theoretically, you know what the impact
of being hit in the face by a basketball is, and you can even calculate the force.
However, when through a personal experience you actually get hit by a fast-
moving basketball, in the face, your perception of everything in life changes.
In production of the knowledge, writing a story based on pure fiction is very
different from writing based on true events, experienced by the author.

IA prompt #21
What is the relationship between knowledge and culture?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
It is common and convenient to think that culture and knowledge have a one-way
relationship, in which cultures produce knowledge. However, with a closer look,
we can find many examples of cultures that were created based on knowledge.
Mexican culture has produced Mexican cuisine and its related culinary
knowledge. At the same time, Hip Hop was an art style and movement that
produced a globally influential culture. Hip Hop has its own dialects, fashion,
street art and worldview.
IA prompt #22
What role do experts play in influencing our consumption or acquisition of
knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
Convincing, preventative, encouraging, demotivating, affirmative and guiding
are among the roles that experts play in influencing our knowledge consumption
or acquisition. Before discussing the roles, you should first define the term
"expert."
Your chemistry teacher, a real expert, gives you feedback on your IA,
highlighting your mistake and suggesting how to improve your texts/charts. In
this example, they play a guiding, and possibly encouraging role in influencing
your acquisition of scientific knowledge. On the other hand, the suggestions of a
"so-called expert" on the internet about the "detrimental impacts of sugar on
teens brain function" may cause you to cut sugar from your diet, ending up
having no brain functions at all. In this case, they have played a damaging role in
influencing your acquisition and consumption of knowledge.

IA prompt #23
How important are material tools in the production or acquisition of knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
This IA prompt is one of the simplest. It might not be extremely interesting but it
can be "safe," for those who are "busy" and want to score an A in their TOK
exhibition.
You can choose any physical and digital object that is related to knowledge. It
means one can produce knowledge by using the object, or learn something with
the help of it. Then you will discuss the degrees of importance of that object in
production or acquisition of knowledge.
IA prompt #24
How might the context in which knowledge is presented influence whether it is
accepted or rejected?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
"Context" is the setting and circumstances in which knowledge is presented, and
it can be fully acquired only by considering those circumstances and setting.
Most words have multiple and (sometimes) contrasting definitions in
dictionaries. Each of these contrasting definitions are the results of the different
contexts in which the same word is defined. "Dope" can be defined as "an illicit
drug," "a stupid person," and "anything good in life," depending on the context in
which it is used.
Explain "how" the message in the object (that you've chosen for your exhibition)
was misinterpreted, and "what" was the actual "context" in which it was
presented.
In the world of entertainment and politics you can find many examples of
statements and actions that were "taken out of context," and in results were
accepted or rejected. The examples would be less in science as the context in
which scientific statements are made is science.
In the end, it all comes to good and bad presentations, which sometimes
happen by mistake and sometimes intentionally, probably to damage an
individual or a group’s reputation.

IA prompt #25
How can we distinguish between knowledge, belief and opinion?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
“It used to be news, now it’s opin-news,” Denzel Washington said in an
interview with the BBC.
After defining the three keywords of this IA prompt, "knowledge," "belief"and
"opinion,"you should decide on your approach to discussing the objects. Finding
three objects that each successfully exhibit the differences between these three
concepts seems like a very hard task. Therefore, you may want to choose objects
that each exhibit one or two of the concepts to give you enough flexibility to
discuss their differences.
Regardless of the combination and the objects themselves, justification for the
inclusion of the objects is very important. The discussions also must be clear
enough for the reader to be able to distinguish between your chosen concepts,
and more importantly "how" you could distinguish between them; based on
definition, based on the outcomes or practicality.

IA prompt #26
Does our knowledge depend on our interactions with other knowers?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
The short answer to this question is "not necessarily." Unfortunately, the prompt
does not specify "what" of knowledge the student should discuss. You should
also both discuss personal and shared knowledge. In the case of shared
knowledge, the production of knowledge depends on our interaction with other
knowers, depending on the AOK. For the acquisition of knowledge more
interaction seems to be necessary, as for the consumption of knowledge.
The important points not to miss in creation of your exhibition are clear
justifications for the inclusion of the objects, and straightforward discussion
about the dependency of knowledge that the objects exhibit on the interaction
with other knowers, or lack of it.
Reading someone’s journal, or watching a chef’s YouTube video are also ways
of interacting with other knowers. Studying the behavior of a mountain lion for 3
months in solitude, is creating knowledge without interaction with any human
being (knower).
IA prompt #27
Does all knowledge impose ethical obligations on those who know it?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
Pay close attention to this IA prompt. The question is not about the "ethics in the
production of knowledge." Do not mistake this prompt with the KQs about
unethical experiments and such. If one wants to complete the prompt’s question,
the full version would be "Does all knowledge impose ethical obligations on
those who know it, such as whether to share what they know or not?"
If you know something, do you have to share it with others, or are you obliged to
keep it to yourself?

IA prompt #28
To what extent is objectivity possible in the production or acquisition of
knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Interesting
This prompt is a paraphrase of IA prompt #12, which is focused on bias. You can
follow the same guidelines and consider the same suggestions, only with an
approach from the point of "objectivity" rather than "bias."

IA prompt #29
Who owns knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
What actually this IA prompt asks is "who owns "the rights" to knowledge?" Can
they demand money in exchange for their knowledge? Does a community of
knowers have the rights to file legal complaints if their knowledge is "learned" by
knowers outside the community? Should Aboriginals keep their knowledge to
themselves because they "own" it, while their knowledge can solve or help solve
global environmental issues?
The approaches that you choose should be toward the rights of ownership of
knowledge and whether the current knowers of the knowledge have all the rights
over keeping or sharing of the knowledge, or does some knowledge "belong" to
the entire humanity?

IA prompt #30
What role does imagination play in producing knowledge about the world?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
This IA prompt is extremely interesting as it points out one of the most important
factors involved in the production of knowledge; imagination.
In The Natural Sciences, hypothesis is when the scientist imagines a possible
explanation or a suggested correlation. In History, historians have no other
choice than imagining the missing links between primary and secondary
sources, to complete the narrative, and produce historical knowledge. You can
also study more about artistic imagination as a type of imagination, to find
better objects and discuss them more efficiently in the Arts.
Keep in mind that you cannot choose theories and methods as your TOK
exhibition objects.

IA prompt #31
How can we judge when evidence is adequate?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
This prompt is a paraphrase of IA prompt #19 with a twist. The only difference
that you should consider is in your approach to the discussions. Instead of
focusing on whether the evidence is "justified," you must focus on the
"adequacy" of the evidence for a knowledge claim. Finding out if there’s enough
evidence, and at the same time explaining "how" can we announce that the
justified evidence is adequate.
IA prompt #32
What makes a good explanation?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
What is a good explanation? The one that is convincing and backed by evidence.
In other words, the explanation must make sense and rely on some facts,
witnesses and/or sources. "Just because," or "I can’t tell you now" are definitely
not good explanations. On the other hand, "because I like the way it looks," can
be a very good explanation, in some situations.
Finding viable and relatable personal objects for this prompt may be a little bit
time consuming, however it will be worth it. You can also justify the inclusion of
a "less personal" object by explaining how you came across or get to know about
the object.

IA prompt #33
How is current knowledge shaped by its historical development?
Level of Interestingness: Interesting
This prompt is very similar to the IA prompt #13 with a minor difference. For the
prompt #13 the student must discuss "how to recognize" the improvement of
knowledge, as for this prompt, assuming that current knowledge is indeed an
improvement upon past knowledge, you should discuss "the process of shaping"
current knowledge. With this tweak in the approach the rest should be the same.

IA prompt #34
In what ways do our values affect our acquisition of knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Very Interesting
This is another paraphrase prompt. IA prompt #11 asks about the end of the
process, while this prompt asks about the process itself. If we have established
values we might resist or welcome new knowledge, depending on whether new
knowledge and our beliefs are aligned or not. Your job is to discuss this
acquisition process through objects linked to the prompt.

IA prompt #35
In what ways do our values affect our production of knowledge?
Level of Interestingness: Extremely Interesting
Although this prompt looks like another paraphrase, it is not. The only difference
between this last IA prompt and prompt #34 is the replacement of the word
"acquisition" with "production," and this small change makes a big difference. It
is mostly about "confirmation bias."
You can find numerous examples of scientists and other knowledge producers
who let their values, or as we call it "confirmation bias," get the best of them. In
the process of production of knowledge, when results seem to match the
individual’s value, they tend to reach a conclusion without doubting the "methods
and tools" or the results. The opposite happens when the results do not match the
values and they tend to reject the results or the process.
There is also another approach to this prompt that cannot be neglected. The
objects can be chosen and discussed, based on the interpretation
that values can encourage, promote, enforce or support the production of
knowledge.