{"id":3024,"date":"2018-06-07T20:46:11","date_gmt":"2018-06-08T03:46:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/nwcenter\/?post_type=lessonplans&#038;p=3024"},"modified":"2025-03-05T15:14:24","modified_gmt":"2025-03-05T23:14:24","slug":"epistemic-adventure-are-you-sure-that-you-know","status":"publish","type":"teachertoolkit","link":"https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/teachertoolkit\/epistemic-adventure-are-you-sure-that-you-know\/","title":{"rendered":"Epistemic Adventure: Are you sure that you know?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Materials needed<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Epistemic scavenger hunt document (at least 2 per group, one for before the discussion and the other for after)<\/li>\n<li>Orienting quotes<\/li>\n<li>Visual prompts<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Description<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: revert; color: initial;\">1. Before presenting participants with one or more of the prompts outlined above, have them gather into pairs or small groups to think about, discuss, and fill out a copy of the <strong>\u201cepistemic scavenger hunt\u201d document<\/strong> (use the link in the Lesson Attachment above). Allot 5-10 minutes for this task and ask participants not to edit their documents once this period has ended.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: revert; color: initial;\">2. Bring the group back together and distribute one or more visual prompts and orienting quotes. Give participants a few minutes for them to think about the prompts and quotes in silence before opening up space for group discussion. Encourage them to write down their thoughts during this silent period. You can also have participants turn and talk with a partner for a few minutes and then share out aspects of their conversation. Alternatively, you could collect their scavenger hunt documents and use their answers as a bridge into the conversation. Allot about 25 minutes for this part of the activity.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: revert; color: initial;\">3. As the conversation closes, ask participants to independently complete the epistemic scavenger hunt on a new unmarked sheet. Allot 5-10 minutes for this.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: revert; color: initial;\">4. Once they have filled out a new epistemic scavenger hunt, spend the last 10-15 minutes engaging in a discussion around how their answers have changed since the first time they did the scavenger hunt. If their answers did change, inquire into their thought processes. If their answers did not change, ask them to consider what evidence might sway their beliefs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><strong>Materials<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Epistemic Scavenger Hunt Document<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Orienting Quotes<\/strong><br \/><strong>Quote 1<\/strong>:\u00a0<em>\u201cThe whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are so sure of themselves while wiser people so full of doubts.\u201d<\/em> \u2013 Bertrand Russell<\/p>\n<p>This quote is intended to provoke a discussion around the roles of doubt and certainty that might stimulate thinking around what the impact of brash certainty is within the problems we face as a society. This quote also brings forth a Socratic view of wisdom, defined by awareness of one\u2019s own ignorance, potentially facilitating dialogue around the balance between wondering, humility and doubt, and decisive action in the world<\/p>\n<p><strong>Quote 2<\/strong>:\u00a0<em>\u201cMost of the greatest evils that man has inflicted upon man have come through people feeling quite certain about something which, in fact, was false.\u201d<\/em> \u2013 Bertrand Russell<\/p>\n<p>This quote invites an historical look at knowledge production and contemplation of the ills that have been produced (or reproduced) through knowledge claims that were later revised or discarded completely (e.g. craniometry, polygenism, drapetomania, miscegenation, racial typologies, etc.).<\/p>\n<p><strong>Visual Prompts<\/strong><br \/><strong>Visual 1 (Comic Strip)<\/strong>:<br \/><span style=\"color: initial; font-size: revert;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-23849 size-medium alignright\" src=\"https:\/\/www.plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CalvinandHobbes-240x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"240\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CalvinandHobbes-240x300.jpg 240w, https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CalvinandHobbes.jpg 320w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 240px) 100vw, 240px\" \/>This visual, from a popular and endearing comic strip, addresses a common theme in popular culture around the relationship of knowledge, doubt, certainty, and decision making. A core theme harkens back to Socratic views of wisdom where one becomes increasingly aware of what they do not know and a kind of \u201canalysis paralysis\u201d that might lead one to consider the possibility that \u201cignorance is bliss.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><strong>Visual 2 (Dunning and Kruger images below)<\/strong>:<br \/>This visual brings recent psychological findings to bear on the issues introduced above. Consider introducing student to this image with use of the following description.<\/p>\n<p>Dunning and Kruger\u2019s overarching hypotheses is \u201cthat people, at all performance levels, are equally poor at estimating their relative performance.\u201d The Dunning\u2013Kruger effect is a cognitive bias wherein people of low ability suffer from illusory superiority, mistakenly assessing their cognitive ability as greater than it is. This illusory superiority derives from the inability of low-ability persons to recognize their own ineptitude. Without this metacognitive self-awareness, low-ability people cannot objectively evaluate their actual competence or incompetence.<\/p>\n<p>This cognitive bias applies inversely to those of expert experience, thus persons of high ability tend to underestimate their relative competence and mistakenly presume that tasks that are easy for them to perform are also easy for other people to perform. As Dunning and Kruger articulate: &#8220;the miscalibration of the incompetent stems from an error about the self, whereas the miscalibration of the highly competent stems from an error about others.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"694\" height=\"585\" src=\"https:\/\/www.plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-23851\" srcset=\"https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed.png 694w, https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed-300x253.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 694px) 100vw, 694px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"640\" height=\"555\" src=\"https:\/\/www.plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed-1.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-23852\" srcset=\"https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed-1.png 640w, https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed-1-300x260.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1012\" height=\"791\" src=\"https:\/\/www.plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed-2.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-23853\" srcset=\"https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed-2.png 1012w, https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed-2-300x234.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1012px) 100vw, 1012px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"813\" height=\"868\" src=\"https:\/\/www.plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed-3.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-23854\" srcset=\"https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed-3.png 813w, https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/unnamed-3-281x300.png 281w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 813px) 100vw, 813px\" \/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Materials needed: Epistemic scavenger hunt document (at least 2 per group, one for before the discussion and the other for after) Orienting quotes Visual prompts Description: 1. Before presenting participants with one or more of the prompts outlined above, have them gather into pairs or small groups to think about, discuss, and fill out a <a href=\"https:\/\/plato-philosophy.org\/teachertoolkit\/epistemic-adventure-are-you-sure-that-you-know\/\" class=\"more-link\">&#8230;<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">  Epistemic Adventure: Are you sure that you know?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":3025,"template":"","toolkitcategory":[757,29],"gradelevel":[48],"topics":[310,450],"class_list":["post-3024","teachertoolkit","type-teachertoolkit","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","toolkitcategory-epistemology","toolkitcategory-history-social-studies","gradelevel-high-school-and-beyond","topics-knowledge","topics-reasoning"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Epistemic Adventure: Are you sure that you know? - PLATO - Philosophy Learning and Teaching Organization<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Epistemic Adventure: Are you sure that you know? - PLATO - Philosophy Learning and Teaching Organization\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Materials needed: Epistemic scavenger hunt document (at least 2 per group, one for before the discussion and the other for after) Orienting quotes Visual prompts Description: 1. 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