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WHAT ARE BIG THINK QUESTIONS?
• Make you think (philosophical or hypothetical)
• Difficult to answer.
• Funny.
• Debatable.
• Open-ended.
• Researchable and can be supported.
• Global (or at least applicable to many).
A PHILOSOPHICAL DISCUSSION…
I am going to show a series of five questions taken from a great website.

I want you to consider each question carefully. Don’t just come up with the first idea
to pop into your head. Most of these can be looked at in multiple ways.

My role here is to direct. I will ask questions in order to move things along, but I’d
like the majority of the discussion to come from you.
QUESTION 1

• What harsh truths do you prefer to ignore?

QUESTION #2

• Is the meaning of life the same for humans as it is for animals?

QUESTION #3

• If someone you loved were killed in front of you, but some higher power created
a perfect replica of that person, right down to the exact atom and personality,
would they be the same person and would you love them just as much?
QUESTION #4

• Which is better: living exactly 75 years, or having absolute immortality?

QUESTION #5

• Is humanity headed in the right or wrong direction?

OVER TO YOU…
• This mini-unit is going to have you create a deep-thought question of your own,
based on a topic you enjoy.
It should be open-ended
It should be something you can attempt to prove.
It should be something on which you can become an expert.
• This question should be one to which you DO NOT already have the answer. In
fact, the more original or obscure the thought, the more interesting it could be
(obviously there is a limit to this).
• This is not an activity where a simple topic = an easy assignment. Sometimes the
opposite will be true.
YOUR FIRST STEP…
• I would like you to list three topics that you find very interesting. These do NOT
need to be a daily hobby or activity (I would probably not choose ‘powerlifting’).
Rather, it should be one that you legitimately like learning about.
Example…my choices would be
Politics (ours and others)
Education
The prison system
World War 2 / Vietnam war
Marine science
Philosophy
IS THERE ‘STUFF’…?
Narrow your ideas down. Consider the following:
• Are there articles, videos, books, etc about these topics?
• Are there a wide range of opinions about this topic? Could there be ‘experts’ in
this field?
• Are there already ideas that could be controversial or even debatable?
• These are important questions questions, as I want you to get as much quality
info as you can find.
FINE TUNE IT…
• I want you to collect and skim a variety of quality resources.
Articles
TED talks
Podcasts
Documentaries and interviews

I am going to offer you a short time to go through these. Just look for the basics
and keep the good stuff.
HERE’S THE TOUGH PART…
• Use the info you’ve collected and come up with a Big Think question of your
own.
• Once you’ve decided on a general topic of interest (ie American politics), and
narrowed it down a bit (what leads to war?), you need to create a question of
your own…
