The Map Theory

What does the metaphor of the map mean to you? How might this be helpful for us in this course?

The metaphor of the map holds meaning to me in the form of the need to be a critical thinker. Often times, it is much easier to just settle for accepting a truth presented by something that is already accepted by the wider community– in this case the world map. By not questioning this 'truth', and accepting that what is suggested by it is correct, we start to make further unconscious assumptions. For instance, many of our unconscious assumptions are related to size and how our brain instantly considers that something bigger is more important or more powerful. This way of thinking has long existed and I will rely on an ancient Egypt art example to justify my point. In art that would be used to decorated buildings and monuments, a pharaoh would often be depicted bigger than the people shown around him and that is because in Ancient Egyptian society, the pharaoh was a deified ruler who had complete political and religious power over Egypt and its people. This led to his veneration and glorification in Ancient Egyptian society. Going back to the map metaphor, the fact that some countries are shown larger or centered in the map makes us unconsciously think that they are more important and more powerful. To an extent, this can lead to judging goods, people and cultures based on those already existing judgements that we have acquired from simple things like maps. (nevertheless, the map is only a small factor in the aforementioned assumption as personal prejudices from cultural upbringing may also be an influential factor). Personally, the map metaphor is stressing to me how important it is to question even the simplest things that society has traditionally established as 'true' and 'accurate' because they may want us to think that way for a underlying purpose that we don't come across unless we stop to think critically. 

This may help us in our course because it is a stimulant metaphor for critical thinking. Theory of Knowledge is all about questioning ourselves, others and everything that surrounds us to reach a critical analysis. By being critical thinkers, we avoid being manipulated by those corrupt 'truths' and become full owners of our own perceptions and thoughts.

What other "maps" (concepts) from your life can you now question the certainty of? Does this mean that they are less helpful than you once thought? 

Another concept that is similar in its meaning to the metaphor of the map is mass media communication (news). News are something that we need to approach critically because news chains almost all of the time have a political bias. Things like word choice and the type of visual content they decide to show lead to drastically shaping how we interpret current events, and if we don't question the content it is easy to fall into the trap of corrupt truths. There is a big difference between presenting facts and presenting opinions. What we need to do is stop to look at the content, filter out the biases to reach the fact and then based on the facts (and with the help of other sources) come to our own personal conclusion and interpretation of the events. To an extent, news may have becomes less useful than I originally thought them to be. We rely on news to get information quickly, to understand what is going on around the world as fast as possible and the speed of this process is slowed down by all the filtering of the biases that as critical thinkers, we need to fulfill. Nevertheless, news can still serve a useful purpose which is to provide the audience with facts and visuals– facts and visuals that should still be questioned critically.