Locke And Descartes Argument Analysis

After reading the analysis of innate ideas of the two philosophers. I tend to agree with Locke’s argument that there is no such innate ideas. First, Descartes does not proving enough about how can we born with innate ideas? This major flaw eventually get to Locke’s tension and give us a strong evident of the young children should aware of truth if they have innate ideas in them. Second, I believe in Locke’s criticism about ideas only gain through our experiences and situations. Thus the more experience we have, the vivid picture about our external world we can perceived.

The empiricist following throughout Western philosophy was started by John Locke. In spreading this new idea of learning, he saw his mission as clearing away the metaphysical rubbish left by rationalists which was hindering the path to knowledge. Locke rejected many of the ideas which Descartes fought for. Rationalists claimed there to be two fundamental innate ideas, the logical principles of identity and non-contradiction. Locke argued that for any innate ideas to exist they must be approved by everyone. He decided that a test should be created, thus determining if these ideas reside in the minds of everyone regardless of age or education. In his study he found that these principles, as he suspected, failed to be universally assented.

John Locke and David Hume, both great empiricist philosophers who radically changed the way people view ideas and how they come about. Although similar in their beliefs, the two have some quite key differences in the way they view empiricism. Locke believed in causality, and used the example of the mental observation of thinking to raise your arm, and then your arm raising, whereas Hume believed that causality is not something that can be known, as a direct experience of cause, cannot be sensed. Locke believed that all knowledge is derived from our senses, which produce impressions on the mind which turn to ideas, whereas Hume's believed that all knowledge is derived from experiences,

Rationalism is the theory that opinions and actions should be based on reason and knowledge rather than religious belief or emotional, while empiricism is the theory that knowledge is derived from senses-experience which stimulated the rise of experimental science. The philosophers Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, and Hume all have different views on the existence and nature of external objects. Some see it as the view on objects as everything is sense related other see it that it is all from thought but the object is not existent.

Locke argued that just the discovery of knowledge alone through believes could put forth a justification that knowledge “requires only reasonably high probability”. When Descartes talks about his solution when he states “what we directly see, feel, hear, touch…are our own sense data that ultimately exists in our minds” Descartes that by using our senses we interpret things that are certain. And so we have to use our senses in order to prove certainty, whereas Locke states that certainty only has to do with a reasonably high probability. If we were not able to use our senses, just through our prior knowledge of what we know we wouldn’t know if something was for certain. An example I can illustrate, if someone shows us an exotic fruit in part of the jungle which we have never traveled but, we are familiar with oranges and apples and such other fruits, but we only see the fruit, can we tell what color is on the inside? Or how tough the rind is? Through Descartes method we will be able to see the rind and based on our knowledge fruit come to a conclusion about it. Through Locke’s method we only need knowledge of the fruit we already are familiar with in order to formulate both how tough the rind is and what color is on the

The foundations of law have been set in the ideas of natural laws that are given to us. There are many different theories on how our laws of nature have brought us to develop the social contracts and government of today’s society. John Locke and Saint Thomas Aquinas’s views of how social contracts are developed from natural and eternal laws are both well seated in the belief of God given rights, but differ in the politics of the governments.

Locke (1632-1704) further discounted the work of Descartes, as well as that of Plato. He maintained that all ideas originate in ones experiences. A newborn is devoid of ideas until experience begins to form these ideas.

Locke also believes that people have innate ideas through experiences. He has three explanations for this idea. Firstly, if we had innate ideas, we would know that we have them, which means that if you have ideas they are conscience and everything you think, you think you think. Secondly, if there were innate truths of reason we would all agree on them. Lastly, our memory cannot recall these innate ideas.

Socrates once said, “As for me, all I know is that I know nothing.” Several philosophers contradicted Socrates’ outlook and believed that true knowledge was in fact attainable. This epistemological view however had several stances to it, as philosophers held different beliefs in regards to the derivation of true knowledge. Rationalists believed that the mind was the source of true knowledge, while in Empiricism, true knowledge derived from the senses. Rene Descartes, a rationalist, and John Locke, an empiricist, were prime examples of epistemologists who were seen to differentiate greatly within each of their philosophies. However, although Descartes and Locke’s ideas did contrast in that sense,

Like Descartes, Locke also believed in an external world. As an empiricist, Locke relied heavily on the senses to provide true knowledge (Moore 2002). He shared Aristotle’s belief that the mind is a blank slate, also known as tabula rasa, at birth (Paquette 211). Our sense experiences thereafter provide us with knowledge to fill in those slates (Paquette 211). In Locke’s “Representative Theory of Perception,” also known as Epistemological Dualism, he stated that material objects exist and are separate entities from human beings (Paquette 227). However, he also believed that objects exist in the mind as psychological entities (Paquette 227). Locke concluded that people can taste, smell, touch, and see the external world which, in turn, becomes impressions in our minds (Paquette 227). Descartes and Locke are thus seen to be similar in the sense that they both believed in an external world.

Locke feels that we do not have any innate ideas.  Then the question arises of

John Locke starts off his treatise with the thesis that ideas spring from two fountainheads--sensation and reflection. The former, man acquires from external sensible objects that affect man's five senses--those same senses endowed upon all men by the Creator. Material things outside man's being are the objects of sensation. Through experiencing sensation, man's thinking process gives rise to ideas thereby gaining for the thinking being a certain amount of

     Locke instead is an empiricist, and therefore he directly critiques Descartes epistemic system and tries to establish his own foundation of knowledge. Locke believes that our knowledge of the world comes from what our senses tell us. Locke’s theory state that we are all born with a blank slate, tabula rasa, before we

John Locke, a British philosopher, focused on the role of social environment and experiences in education. Locke believed that children’s minds were blank slates. Meaning we are not born with any innate notions or abilities. Locke consider the mind “to be...white paper void of all characteristics, without any ideas.” (Crain 7) The mind is very pliable and ready to accept new information. Locke believed children learned in four ways, the first of which is associations. What this means is that we simultaneously think of two things and associate them. For example if you get sick after eating at McDonalds, you might feel stomach pain every time you see one. The next way is repetition, or doing something several

John Locke (1632-1704) was the first of the classical British empiricists. (Empiricists believed that all knowledge derives from experience. These philosophers were hostile to rationalistic metaphysics, particularly to its unbridled use of speculation, its grandiose claims, and its epistemology grounded in innate ideas) If Locke could account of all human knowledge without making reference to innate ideas, then his theory would be simpler, hence better, than that of Descartes. He wrote, “Let us then suppose the mind to be, as we say, white paper, void of all characters, without any ideas: How comes it to be furnished? To his I answer, in one word, from EXPERIENCE.” (Donald Palmer, p.165)