All of the other Ways of Knowing are co

Nishant Jasani TOK essay

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"All of the other Ways of Knowing are controlled by language." The author of this statement is claiming that the language we use controls all of our other ways of knowing, which are perception, emotion, and reason. This author is declaring that without language, we would not know anything. Our particular choice of language leads to a particular perception, a specific emotion, a certain reason, while a different choice of language would lead to a different perception, a separate emotion, another reason. This statement is a fair representation of the relationship between language and the other ways of knowing in that language does control the other ways of knowing in some cases; however there are other cases in which it does not.

While language controls perception in some situations, there are also other situations in which perception controls language. When my father was about eight years old, his two older brothers told him that slugs tasted like bubble gum. This choice of language, using bubble gum, a term that greatly appeals to young children the same age as my father at the time, affected my father’s perception of what slugs tasted like. Because his older brothers, a source of authority, told him that the slugs tasted like bubble gum in particular, my father