Totally Awesome Renaissance Mind Maps

Instructions:
1. Get yourselves into groups of two.
2. Focus your attention on the epistemological theories we have looked at in class
(i.e., how you know what you know). Use your notes, the class website and the Internet. You
need to cover the important information and you will be presenting to the class
3. It is your responsibility to create a Mind Map on these epistemological theories. Select from the
list below (at least 4 main ideas)
4. First create a rough copy. Choose your central image/idea wisely.
5. Begin planning your key words and images to go with each of your main ideas.
6. Create your Mind Map.
7. Create your linking words within the realm of epistemology.
8. Be creative but remember, the information is most important!

Consider the following guidelines for creating your Mind Maps:

1. Start in the center with an image of the topic, using at least 3 colors.
2. Use images, symbols, codes, and dimensions throughout your Mind Map.
3. Select key words and print using upper or lower case letters.
4. Each word/image is best alone and sitting on its own line.
5. The lines should be connected, starting from the central image. The central lines are thicker,
organic and thinner as they radiate out from the centre.
6. Make the lines the same length as the word/image they support.
7. Use multiple colors throughout the Mind Map, for visual stimulation and also to encode or
group.
8. Develop your own personal style of Mind Mapping.
9. Use emphasis and show associations in your Mind Map.
10. Keep the Mind Map clear by using radial hierarchy (most important stuff moving from the
inside out), numerical order or outlines to embrace your branches.

Main epistemological ideas to help you: (You must choose at least 4 ideas or
develop your own categories)

Skepticism doubt, How Do We Know Anything article, optical illusions, flawed senses,
Descartes, I think therefore I am, The Truman Show, language ambiguities
Rationalism reason, Plato's cave allegory, Plato's realms of knowledge (forms, intelligible
realm, mathematical thought, objects, reflections), Socrates, Socratic Method, the Phaedo and
the theory of recollection, the theory of immortality of the soul, Meno (Socrates teaching the
boy on the beach), a priori, innate ideas
Empiricism the senses (touch, taste, smell, sight, sound); experience; Locke, Berkley, Hume,
tabula rasa; a posteriori; simple and complex ideas; primary and secondary qualities; empirical
knowledge: intuitive/demonstrative/sensitive; to be is to be perceived, sense data perceptions
and internal impressions
 Constructivism Kant, accessible reality, phenomenal reality, noumenal reality, limited senses,
the world as a construct
Relativism perspectives, interpretations, reconstructions, insticnt, no universal knowledge, no
reality outside human belief ystems,

Your Mind Maps will be evaluated using the following criteria:

I. Thoroughness
- Show all major concepts covered in unit

II. Organization / Clarity

-Symbols are arranged logically and are easily understood

III. Creativity
-Create symbols that are unique and visually appealing