TOK ESSAY (GRADE A)

“Do good explanations have to be true?”

Explanation is a process of propagating and processing knowledge. Faced with the question Do good explanations have to be true? ” questions that come to mind instantly is what is the definition of “good”? Would the word “ good” have the same uniform connotations for everyone? I realize that it can significantly differ from people’s perspectives. Explanations presuppose the need to answer “ why”, so what defines a “ good” answer to the “why” question? And how do we define truth or know what is true? These can manifest differently in contrasting areas of knowledge. I will argue that in History, an explanation is based upon inference, and an explanation calls upon reason to make a judgement or arrive at a conclusion which contains some degree of truths while in Natural Sciences observation and reasoning are required to arrive at a valid, reliable and logical explanation that leads to truth. Also, the truths that are perceived different by different individuals affect their judgement on concluding and accepting explanation as “good”, leading to the contrasting perspectives. Thus, I will investigate the relationship between the truths and the concept of “good” explanation to understand how they interact, and to assess to what extent the truths are determined by the quality of explanation. This will be examined through History and Natural Science.

History attempts to identify the truths of past events. However, limitations that arise from the origin, purpose and contents in evidence, easily obscure and polarize the truth, it is almost impossible to conclude an absolute truth of the past events, as suggested by Philosopher, Thomas Carlyle, “ The history is but the biography of great men.”, pointing out the prejudiced nature in the knowledge of history itself…