Theory of Knowledge Essay

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Recommended: Similarities between history and science

This essay will be considering the question: to what extent can history and the natural sciences be used to understand the relationship between common belief and truth? Looking at the natural sciences this can be seen through the disproof and refinement of human theories. Through the lens of history ideas and ideals held by the majority can or cannot be as they are perceived. Looking at history and the natural sciences one can see that uncertainty it presents in many aspects of human existence and that humanity can only come close to attaining truth through the passing of time passing and search for truth.
Firstly, new scientific discoveries can lead to the disproof of previously believed scientific theories. The discovery of new information can always lead to the destruction of a previously held idea. This is because this information was not available to those in the past and as such can disprove what was previously theorized. One example of this is an example taken from physics. Originally scientists believed that all structures were made out of atoms, differentiated by the periodic table of elements. The original model for the atom was a malleable sphere of mostly positively charged with some points of negative charge spread throughout the sphere. This model, the Thomson model (plumb-pudding model), was disproved by the Geiger–Marsden experiment which set out to verify this idea of the atom. The experiment was rather simple; a large number of Alfa particles (two protons and two neutrons) were directed at a sheet of gold foil and the number of particles was counted at different angles. It was hypothesized that all of the positive Alfa particles would pass through the positively charged sphere of the gold atoms due to their we...

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...eople rather than oppress it. The idea that the founding fathers believed in came to fruition with the ideas of the populous driving the government rather than that of a ruling class. The democratic government gave people far more freedom than had the monarchal governments that had come before. The ideas of democracy did what they were supposed to when they were put into practice thus proving the perceived good of the idea true.
Many in the past have theorized and come up with ideas for what they believe to be true or what could be true. However, those theories and the ideas of the outcomes of those theories have either proved themselves closer or further from truth than originally believed. As seen through history and the natural sciences whether these ideas are truer than false can only be determined by those who continue to search for truth as time progresses.

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