May 2025 TOK essay guide

An artist does his most difficult work when he steps back from the blank canvas and thinks about what he is going to create. -Michaelangelo

This is a guide for May 2025 IB Theory of Knowledge (TOK) prescribed essay titles. Some general guidance is provided before examining each title.

Contents

• Expectations
• Criteria
• May 2025 essay titles
• 1. Contradictory evidence
• 2. Revered knowledge
• 3. Relentless drive
• 4. Ever-improving tools
• 5. Useful models
• 6. Sense of wonder

Expectations

In the Theory of Knowledge (TOK) essay, you are to examine one of six prescribed knowledge questions. Examiners are instructed to stop reading after the first 1600 words. Examiners appreciate having the essay doubled-spaced and in 12-point font, for easier grading. The Planning and progress form (TK/PPF) form must be submitted with the essay, though it does not count towards your grade. This is different from the EE/RPPF which does contribute to the EE grade.

IB admits that there is no single essay structure suitable for all knowledge questions. Instead, your organization of the essay, while maintaining the introduction-body-conclusion format, should adapt to the chosen title to articulate the most compelling argument.

May 2022 TOK subject report:

One of the issues with the template that many students have adopted, where they define every word of the title in the introduction, is that quite often these definitions do not help the student or even suggest the context of the word in relation to the title or TOK.

The examiners appreciate a controlled number of references to the grading criteria, such as “points of view” or “implications”. Similarly, it follows that justified, careful references to the 12 TOK concepts (evidence, certainty, truth, interpretation, power, justification, explanation, objectivity, perspective, culture, values, responsibility) can facilitate discussion. But your essay should not be a word salad of buzz words.

Your TOK essay should be substantiated with ideas supported by examples. Some examples will require greater exploration than others, often depending on how nuanced the point is. Examples should highlight characteristics that allow for generalization. The driving question is whether the student provides a clear, coherent and critical exploration of the essay title.

Criteria

The following are paraphrased from the 2022 TOK teacher support material and past subject reports.

“A sustained focus on the title” means the essay explores the title, the whole title, and nothing but the title. In particular, explore every part of the title, but no need to define every word. Strong TOK essays discuss central terms (jokes on you IB doesn’t say which ones are central), consider assumptions and implications in the title, and retain a clear focus.

“Linked effectively to areas of knowledge” means the title is clearly discussed in context of two areas of knowledge (AOKs), namely history, natural sciences, human sciences, mathematics, and the arts. It is important to distinguish between the study of a subject and the application. TOK essays should primarily focus on the study of a subject, ie knowledge acquisition. For example, education or law as human sciences must be about pedagogy or jurisprudence, not ramifications of education or law in everyday context. Historiography evaluate and interpret of events of at least a decade prior. Journalists are not historians; politicians are not political scientists. Subject matter not customarily associated with an AOK should be justified as to why it belongs in the AOK.

As with all IB writing assessments, analyze, not describe, so that “arguments are effectively supported by specific examples.” You should quickly articulate the example and its relevant details, then make connections, compare and contrast the examples, and evaluate them in context of your argument. Avoid having too many examples so you can discuss some of them in depth.

May 2022 TOK subject report:

Often, the best example is not a marginal outlier, but, instead, is a central prototypical representative of its category. … Generalizing from an example is an important measurement of the effectiveness of the example. A good example clarifies or illustrates the point being made and offers evidence.

May 2023 TOK subject report:

Examples that the students draw from their own studies and their own lives are often the most effective as the student fully understands the example and writes in a way that sheds light on the point being made. If this level of familiarity is missing, the example is often just inserted and there is no analysis or no consideration of the implication of the example and how it justifies a claim.

Finally, “clear awareness and evaluation of different points of view” refers to your ability to incorporate alternative, not necessarily opposite, aspects of the essay title. These may include counterclaims, counterarguments, contrasting examples, and different perspectives. Choose alternative perspectives that allow a more complete or nuanced analysis that enhance your argument.

May 2025 essay titles

Ideas for examples are generally not given out as these depend on your strengths and understanding, and to further prevent academic dishonesty.

The following are ramblings to help you unpack the question, ideate examples and explore alternative perspectives. Your essay should be a lot more coherent and focused on the title exactly as written.

There are warm-up exercises to accustom you each title.

1. Contradictory evidence

Title 1: Do historians and human scientists have an ethical obligation to follow the directive: “do not ignore contradictory evidence”? Discuss with reference to history and the human sciences.

As with all knowledge questions involving ethics, be sure to remain focused on the TOK concepts and not the ethical issues. For example, consider who impose ethical obligations on historians and human scientists, and how they are imposed. What kind of directives come from these obligations? Have these obligations changed? How are the researchers restricted or guided by such obligations?

Consider the researcher’s interactions with various evidence. Explore how historians and human scientists have different methods of collecting and analyzing evidence, and apply different standards to weighing evidence. In each AOK, when do researchers ignore a piece of evidence? What are some examples of contradictory evidence? How different must the evidence be to be called contradictory?

Connect the ethical obligations to the specific methodologies of considering evidence. Broadly speaking with contradictory evidence, researchers could update or replace the existing framework, set the evidence aside, or outright ignore it. A key issue is how long or with what seriousness to analyze or consider contradictory evidence before “ignoring” it. How can this form of ignoring be similar to or different from cherry-picking data? How is bias involved when ignoring evidence, and can the bias ever be constructive?

The stronger essays will remain on topic by looking at formation and reshaping of ethical obligations to treat contradictory evidence. Simply using examples that are consistent with certain ethical obligations may be insufficient for high marks.

2. Revered knowledge

Title 2: Is our most revered knowledge more fragile than we assume it to be? Discuss with reference to the arts and one other area of knowledge.

A central issue is the values that we attach or otherwise get attached to knowledge. It is best to look for examples that fit many different interpretations of “revered” knowledge, so you can continue to work with them despite changes in the arguments or perspectives you want to examine. One way to identify reverence in the arts is to look for that common fondness or awe across authors when they write about art, ie most revered knowledge may be what gets repeated.

The most revered knowledge can be contextualized in roles affecting the scope, perspectives, tools/methods, and even ethics within the subject. These four aspects together form the approach to a subject. So, another way to characterize reverence is through its impact on the approach of the subject, ie the most revered knowledge may be the most transformative.

Certain other formulations of revered knowledge, such as one with most evidence, may be problematic in this title when fragility is somewhat used in the definition of reverence. These tend to get into circular arguments and semantics that are for the most part uninteresting or inappropriate.

Once you have a good sense of revered knowledge, list some of their attributes, and identify candidates for the most universally revered knowledge in each subject. How much of the value is intrinsically present and how much is externally applied? How do these candidates for “most revered knowledge” affect the generation and interpretation of lesser revered knowledge? How can these most revered knowledge affect knowledge that came before or have come after?

It would be good to identify very revered knowledge from the past that are no longer revered. This allows for a more substantiated discussion of fragility, as opposed to more hypothetical ones. Focus on how the formerly revered knowledge was replaced or updated, rather than what replaced it. The “we”, when looking at historically revered knowledge, refer to knowers at the time when the knowledge was revered. This allows for evidence regarding their assumptions of the fragility.

You may want to also consider a singular “we”, regarding your previously most revered knowledge, and your assumptions of its fragility. Examiners encourage use of personal examples, though it is the ability to generalize from the examples that are graded. Be sure to use examples that clearly belong to the chosen AOKs. In this approach, explore more about you as the knower, rather than what you know.

In either treatment of “we”, see if there are knowledge that remained revered, and compare and contrast what was revered only at a point in time and what has always been revered. Fragility could mean either tendency to be replaced, fragmented, or updated. The same revered knowledge may be fragile in one aspect but not in another. Does adding or changing details make it fragile or strong? Does finding out about restraints or clarifying knowledge make it fragile or strong? If knowledge is fragile, what is not fragile? Which pieces of knowledge are more fragile than others?

The stronger essays will consistently connect reverence and fragility to the generation and validation of such knowledge, with assumptions backed by examples.

3. Relentless drive

Title 3: How can we reconcile the relentless drive to pursue knowledge with the finite resources we have available? Discuss with reference to the natural sciences and one other area of knowledge.

When the title includes an explicit assumption, such as the existence of a “relentless drive”, this generally has to be at least briefly justified or characterized in the essay. It is often very difficult to write the essay when you mostly disagree with the assumption. It may be beneficial to voice minor reservations you have about the assumption, especially when backed with brief yet articulate examples.

Consider how knowers and researchers exhibit relentless drive in your chosen subjects. Consider the differences at the individual level, at the academia level, and/or at the broad humanity level. How does this relentless drive manifest at the big picture, and at the frontier of the subjects? How does the relentless drive shape the overall approach to the subjects? How has this relentless drive responded to, or been impacted by, past breakthroughs or challenges? Why has the relentless drive persisted, and in what ways?

It is worth noting that the title has finite resources that are available but not “finite resources” or “available resources”. So, it is about resources with two properties. Consider the ways in which resources are finite or available in quantity, accessibility, time, locale, and other ways. Consider materials, equipment, skills, time, people, funding, technology, and preexisting knowledge as resources. Look for ways to group resources abstractly into fewer groups, to allow generalization from a handful of examples. This may necessitate examples that involve a wider range of finite resources that are available. By implication, most such examples are likely to have consumed a lot of resources.

Consider the decision process by people in charge of resource allocation. This could be people from within the field, such as faculty heads, or those outside, such as governments. Compare and contrast the decision processes. How are different leaders’ priorities different? How much of it is ideological, and how of it is practical? To what extent is the relentless drive ideological and practical? Is resource allocation as simple as an ideology vs practicality matchup? In what ways do the finiteness of the resources make it easier or harder to allocate resources? How does the nature of the resources (beyond quantity and availability) affect the allocation or use of resources? How can resources be shared, and how have they been shared?

If possible, consider finite resources that are available, but not allocated. In what ways are such resources competed for and consumed differently than ones that are allocated?

Stronger essays will be able to categorize resources and find examples that allow for generalization. Focus on the processes behind the decision making of how resource allocation or sharing, rather than the result of these decisions.

4. Ever-improving tools

Title 4: Do the ever-improving tools of an area of knowledge always result in improved knowledge? Discuss with reference to two areas of knowledge.

When the title includes an explicit assumption, such as tools are always improving, this generally has to be at least briefly justified or characterized in the essay. It is often very difficult to write the essay when you mostly disagree with the assumption. It may be beneficial to voice minor reservations you have about the assumption, especially when backed with brief yet articulate examples.

In the broadest interpretation of the title, it is quite feasible that ever-improving tools of an AOK result in improved knowledge of another subject or AOK. It is unclear if IB will accept this approach. This certainly requires better writing skills as to not confuse the reader.

Consider the timescales and rates at which technology (which are not the same as tools) are ever-improving, such as how exactly it improved over last 500 years. Then at major breakthroughs, see if there are corresponding changes or developments in the tools of your AOKs. Consider other major improvements in the tools. Take account both improved and new tools (and decide if entirely new tools are included in “ever-improving tools”). What metrics do we use to evaluate whether a tool has improved or not? How and when do we call a newer version of a tool, an “improved” version? In what ways can the older version be better, and how to reconcile that to say the new version is improved? Using examples, what are the processes from starting to improve a tool to widely using the new version of the tool? Examples should be chosen so they correspond to improved knowledge, for which the same examples can be reused in the essay.

Compare and contrast the improvement of knowledge with the improvement of tools. Any key differences in these two “improve”s should be noted and justified in the essay. In particular, consider the criteria for improvements, and the rates at which they improve.

Consider the immediate and long-term relationships between the process of improving a tool and knowledge acquisition. Note that the title is focused on how tools affect knowledge. Also consider how improved tool may be at odds with existing knowledge, and what was done to reconcile them. There are minor differences between tools and methods. Discuss how tools affect, or can affect, methods and the overall approach to the subject.

The knowledge question hinges on the word “always”. You could approach it by considering an improved tool eventually always result in improved knowledge, or an eventual version of a tool result in improved knowledge. When disagreeing with the title, specify a particular condition that tends to not result in improved knowledge. Examples and any counterexamples should be generalizable.

Stronger essays will characterize the processes of how ever-improving tools impact characteristics of knowledge, and be able to definitively answer the knowledge question in the affirmative or negative.

5. Useful models

Title 5: To what extent do you agree with the claim “all models are wrong, but some are useful” (attributed to George Box)? Discuss with reference to mathematics and one other area of knowledge.

George Box was a renowned statistician. You do not have to discuss statistics in your essay. But if you take AI HL or a stats-heavy course, it can be fruitful to tie in statistics. However, this knowledge question is not about author’s intent, but rather your own interpretations across fields of study in mathematics and another AOK.

A key aspect of this title is the objectivity of “wrongness”. Because the pragmatic theory defines truth by what is useful, it can lead to circular argument. Hence, alternative formulation of truth can allow for easier writing and more interesting discussion.

For ease of reading, “wrongness” will be replaced by “errors”. Have in mind a more encompassing and broad interpretation of errors, as opposed to the more technical definitions in your AOKs.

Remember to analyze formulations or definitions of errors that are typical of the AOKs you choose. Consider the extent to which you can call a model wrong or correct. Comment on the absoluteness of “all models are wrong”. This goes back to the purposes of the models, and the extent to which models fulfill their purposes. Consider the different and overlapping aims between the constructors or designers of a model, and the users of that model. To further illustrate the differences, consider models that are formulated by a small group of people, but are used by a much wider audience. Consider the types of compromises that model authors have to make, if any. Consider whether different users have different demands for the model, and how model authors make the model useful for different groups of users.

Consider the specific ways to determine, categorize, and quantify the errors. Consider how knowing the details about such errors positively or negatively impact the use. and whether it makes the model more or less useful. Consider which errors are tolerated and which are not. Evaluate how the use cases affect the toleration.

Consider “wrong” and “useful” as scales. Explore whether the “usefulness” of a model correlates with its “correctness”. In other words, you can explore the relationship between these two attributes. The title specifies that only “some” wrong models are useful. It would be appropriate to identify common features in useful models and how they are lacking in certain wrong models.

The wrong “but” useful aspect in the quote should merit some discussion. It implies that it can be unexpected for a wrong model to be useful. This could come up as you discuss the relationship between the correctness and usefulness.

Stronger essays will be able to systematically characterize the ways models are wrong, the prevalence of wrong models, and the contexts and use cases in which wrong models can be useful or not useful.

6. Sense of wonder

Title 6: Does acquiring knowledge destroy our sense of wonder? Discuss with reference to two areas of knowledge.

This title asks you to discuss the impacts of acquiring knowledge on the knowers’ sense of wonder. Each Area of Knowledge often requires a systematic methodology to acquire new knowledge. However, different AOKs allow varying level of creative freedom in the methodology. Remember that TOK is less about impacts of knowledge itself and more about the generation of knowledge. The most important aspect of this question is the process of acquiring knowledge, and of course its impact to sense of wonder.

Consider general characteristics of knowledge acquisition in each AOK, including similarities and differences between learning existing knowledge, and generating new knowledge. Consider the ways methodologies restrict and facilitate knowledge acquisition. Consider the role a researcher or knower plays under such frameworks. Consider across AOKs the stages in which the researcher dominates the process, and when the established frameworks dominate. Compare and contrast among the chosen AOKs.

For each step in the knowledge acquisition process (in each AOK), consider how it impacts the knower’s sense of wonder. How to reconcile the adventurousness with the rigid knowledge acquisition process? Consider the emotional and psychological impacts on the sense of wonder from going through the process of acquiring knowledge. How does the challenge of acquiring knowledge impacts the knower and their sense of wonder?

In your classes, consider how schooling shaped your sense of wonder in various subjects. Characterize the relationships, if any, between subjects in which you acquired the most knowledge, and the ones you have the greatest sense of wonder.

Consider the changes on a knower’s sense of wonder from wanting to learn about the topic to finally understanding the topic. Discuss how knowledge acquisition as a whole impacted this. Compare and contrast the effects of knowledge acquisition on sense of wonder in the current topic, and the sense of wonder in future topics.

With examples, comment on the pessimism behind “destroy”. Decide if “destroy” is the most apt verb to describe how knowledge acquisition impacts sense of wonder. If not, suggest a more suitable verb and justify your position.

Stronger essays will be able to justify their characterization of how knowledge acquisition affects sense of wonder with examples. Be sure to not sidetrack into effects of knowledge. Avoid examples, such as magic, that are very different from traditional AOKs. Because this title requires discussion of knowledge acquisition as a whole and not in any particular aspect, the writer must succinctly capture the essence of each AOK in relatively few words.