IB Philosophy HL key terms

The core theme asking what distinguishes human existence: the relation between mind and body, freedom and determinism, selfhood, reason and emotion, and what a person is across time.

The view that a person consists of two distinct kinds of thing, typically an immaterial mind or soul and a physical body, so that mental states are not identical with bodily states.

The view that reality, or at least the human being, consists of only one kind of substance or property, so mind and body are not two separate entities but one.

The position that everything that exists is physical, or that mental states are ultimately physical states of the brain, leaving no separate non-physical mind.

The subjective, felt character of an experience, such as the particular redness of a red patch or the sting of pain, which seems hard to capture in purely physical descriptions.

The question of what makes a person the same person over time, whether continuity of body, memory, psychological traits, or an unchanging soul.

The debate over whether human choices are genuinely free or are caused by prior events, and whether moral responsibility survives if actions are determined.

The claim that free will and determinism are compatible: an action can count as free if it flows from the agent's own desires without external coercion, even if those desires were caused.

The view that at least some human actions are not determined by prior causes, so agents could genuinely have done otherwise and are the ultimate origin of their choices.

The condition under which an agent is rightly praised, blamed, or held accountable for an action, usually requiring that the agent acted knowingly and freely.

The branch of philosophy concerned with beauty, art, aesthetic experience, and the nature of judgements about taste and artistic value.

A claim that something is beautiful, elegant, or artistically good, which raises the question of whether such judgements are subjective preferences or can claim universal validity.

An aesthetic experience of overwhelming greatness or power, such as a vast landscape or storm, which exceeds imagination and produces awe mingled with unease rather than simple pleasure.

A mode of aesthetic attention in which one responds to an object's appearance without practical desire, personal interest, or concern for ownership, said to ground pure judgements of taste.

The issue of whether artworks imitate or depict reality, and whether depiction, expression, or formal qualities are what make something art.

The claim that an artwork's meaning should not be identified with the artist's intentions, since those intentions are unavailable and the work must be interpreted on its own terms.

The study of knowledge: what knowledge is, how it differs from belief and opinion, what justifies belief, and what the limits of human knowing are.

The traditional analysis of knowledge as belief that is true and supported by adequate justification, challenged by cases where justified true belief seems to fall short of knowledge.

The difficulty that justified true belief may not be sufficient for knowledge, since a belief can be true and well justified yet true only through luck or accident.

The position that knowledge, or knowledge of some domain, is impossible or cannot be justified, often supported by arguments that our evidence cannot rule out error.

A distinction between knowledge or justification independent of experience (a priori, such as mathematics) and knowledge that depends on experience or observation (a posteriori).

Two accounts of the source of knowledge: rationalism holds that reason can yield substantial knowledge independently of experience, while empiricism holds that all knowledge derives from experience.

An imagined scenario constructed to test a philosophical claim by isolating relevant features, such as a brain in a vat or a person divided into two halves.

The branch of philosophy examining moral concepts such as right, wrong, good, duty, and virtue, and the theories that try to systematise moral judgement.

A consequentialist theory holding that an action is right insofar as it maximises overall welfare or happiness, weighing the interests of everyone affected equally.

A theory holding that the rightness of an action depends on duties or rules rather than consequences, so some acts may be forbidden even if they produce good outcomes.

An approach that centres on the character traits of a good person, such as courage and honesty, asking what a virtuous agent would do rather than applying rules or calculating outcomes.

The family of theories judging actions solely by their outcomes, so that the morally right act is the one producing the best overall state of affairs.

The phenomenon that factors beyond an agent's control can affect the moral assessment of what they did, raising the question of whether praise and blame are ever fully fair.

The optional theme examining philosophical questions raised by current social and technological life, including media, globalisation, work, identity, and the distribution of power.

The idea that legitimate political authority rests on an implicit agreement among members of a society to accept shared rules in exchange for protection and order.

The question of how goods, resources, and opportunities should be shared fairly across a society, and on what basis equality, need, merit, or liberty should guide distribution.

The philosophical examination of religious claims and practices, including arguments for and against God's existence, the nature of faith, and the problem of evil.

The argument that the existence of suffering is hard to reconcile with an all-powerful, all-knowing, and perfectly good God, threatening belief in such a deity.

An argument that the apparent order, purpose, or fine-tuning of the universe points to an intelligent designer, often illustrated by analogy with a designed object such as a watch.

The debate over whether statements about God can be literally true, are analogical or symbolic, or merely express attitudes, given that their subject cannot be observed.

The study of the nature, methods, and limits of science, including what makes a theory scientific, how evidence confirms hypotheses, and whether science approaches truth.

The criterion that a claim is scientific only if it rules out some possible observation, so a theory is tested by risky predictions that could show it to be false.

A fundamental change in the assumptions, methods, and standards of a scientific field, in which an old framework is replaced rather than merely extended by new evidence.

Two criteria of meaningfulness or scientific status: verification requires a claim to be confirmable by experience, while falsification requires it to be refutable by possible evidence.

The assessment component in which candidates study one set philosophical text closely, analysing its arguments, structure, and context rather than relying on summaries or secondary surveys.

The internal assessment task of identifying and critically examining the philosophical issues raised by a non-philosophical stimulus, such as an advertisement, news story, or film clip.