Rough Draft of TOK Essay

Laura Fenney
Theory of Knowledge Rough Draft

Theory of Knowledge prescribed titles:

2. When should we trust our senses to give us truth?

Senses have been relied on too often to give us truth. Unfortunately it is regularly forgotten that much can be lost through relying on sensory perceptions. This is because senses are not reliable at all times, since we can miss things in just the blink of an eye. When people are under pressure or extreme stress they may think that they are seeing something for what it is, but there are often holes in what they perceive. Therefore senses provide a first account of an event, but should not be only used to determine truth. Instead, truth should be sought through not only senses, but also through logic and reason.
In Seven Seconds in the Bronx: The Delicate Art of Mind Reading, the case of sensory perception regarding Amadou Diallo is addressed. In this case, three men in the special division of the New York Police Apartment spotted Diallo, a black male suspiciously sitting on a porch area in the middle of the night. The police officers were certain that Diallo was up to something, so they decided to go after him. Diallo did not speak English and figured that the undercover police officers were trying to rob him in his apartment, so he ran. When Diallo reached into his pocket for his wallet, attempting to either pay the robbers or to identify himself, the police officers assumed that he had a gun and began shooting.
The undercover officers might have used their priori knowledge, knowledge based on previous experience and decided that they should shoot Diallo to defend themselves. They claimed that they singled out Diallo, since he fit the description of a rapist in the area of the Bronx. The officers probably thought that he was acting as a lookout, since he was standing out on the porch late into the night. The officers also thought that Diallo was brazen and so he appeared dangerous as he reached for his wallet. Their senses had dictated to them that he was reaching for his gun because they did not have time to wait around to find out if he was armed or not. Diallo said nothing because he spoke no English. Therefore, the officers reacted by shooting to defend themselves.
The actions of the police officers cannot be fully justified, since they shot Diallo with forty one rounds. It was not one police officer who was in a pressured situation, but it was three police officers. Even if they all believed that Diallo was armed with a gun, forty one rounds would not be necessary to defend themselves. Their reaction goes far beyond thinking that someone was dangerous, since Diallo did not ever show a weapon.
Another explanation for the officers’ reactions is found in the section titled “Arguing with a Dog,” which describes the idea of “temporary autism.” When extreme stress ensues under high pressured situations the results can be tunnel vision, extreme visual clarity, diminished sound, and the feeling that time is actually slowing down. These symptoms are described as a form of “temporary autism,” which shows how sound, memory, and broader social understanding are sacrificed for heightened awareness of the threat directly in front of us.
Dave Grossman states that at the optimal state of arousal, stress improves performance when our heart rate is between 115 and 145 beats per minute. However after 145 beats per minute, complex motor skills deteriorate. Furthermore at 175 the forebrain and the mid-brain, the same part of your brain as a dog’s, shuts down. Therefore, this gives some credibility to why after a police chase officers go into dangerous states of arousal. For example, three of the major race riots have been caused by what the cops did at the end of the chase. This reflects the theory that heightened arousal leaves us mind blind with “temporary autism.”
Senses are not meant to be the only element to prove truth. They serve as great importance and help determine what exactly history and other events are dictated as. However as is shown through the case of Amadou Diallo, sensory perception can prove to be fatal. The police officers’ thought that they Diallo pulling a gun out and reacted without a second thought. If they had time to reason out everything, then this case might not have proved to be so disastrous. Therefore when people are trying to determine truth, they should use their senses, but should try to think before they act. Moreover, thinking before executing a form of defense will always prove difficult for police officers, since they do not have the time to plan their moves. However for people not under dangerously high levels of stress, they have the chance to perceive, reason out, and then decide what to do. Logic and perception are two elements that should go together in regard to determining truth.
There should never be recorded historical truth or any established truth that is based solely on senses. Humans are limited to their five senses, which can be deceiving. Primary sources have been praised to be the most valuable sources of information, but are limited. Biased viewpoints, information left out, and things not perceived are all issues that surround primary sources. Reliability is a key issue to finding truth, but it is difficult to determine what exactly makes a source “reliable” for truth. Therefore, it is important to take first hand accounts written by people with their empirical knowledge and combine them with logical reasoning. Even though truth is nearly impossible to determine, it is easier to reach a conclusion when information has been analyzed from all sides of an issue.