John Locke's Definition Of Sensitive Knowledge

1248 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Locke theory of knowledge

John Locke, a philosopher that published a book, titled “An Essay Concerning Human Understanding” in this book Locke talks about sensitive knowledge. What is sensitive knowledge? Locke definition of sensitive knowledge is “Knowledge is the perception of the agreement or disagreement of two ideas” (IV, I, 2) knowledge is the agreement or disagreement of two ideas that you are aware of. The “ideas” Locke mention in this definition are things that you immediately perceived, things that you immediately became aware of. For example, a person sees a chair in front of them, they are perceiving the chair directly and those thing you are perceiving are your ideas (the chair). In this paper, I am going to show how Locke successfully defends himself
In this book, Locke talked about knowledge, Locke points out that there are three degrees of knowledge: intuitive, demonstrative and sensitive. Intuitive knowledge were thing that you see are as they are, there are no intervention. For example, the sun, the sun shine so brightly in front of you that you have no doubts or even questioned that it was not the sun. Demonstrative knowledge is the opposite of intuitive knowledge, demonstrative knowledge has interventions or the connection of one idea to another Locke also mentions that demonstrative knowledge can also be called reasoning. Lastly, which is the focus of this paper is sensitivity knowledge which Locke defines sensitive knowledge as a perception of agreement or disagreement of two ideas. The “ideas” that Locke mentions these definitions are the object that you are perceiving, the object or thing that you are seeing in front of you. Sensitive knowledge in Locke definition is that external things exist because of sensory ideas. So, the proof that external objects exist is because of our sense (ex: smell, taste, feel ... etc.). Locke mentions that there is a limit to sensitive knowledge, this limit is that, a person can only confirm if an object exist, if they are within their field of vision. A consideration that sensory idea are produced by external object, Locke mention that sensory ideas con against our will. For example, pain, if you are hit, you feel pain and you have no control or choice to not feel pain. Descartes is another philosopher like Locke, he also talked about the proof for external objects existing. Unlike Locke, Descartes believes that pure intellect is the best proof, while Locke believes that sensitive knowledge is the best proof. I agree with Locke because even though Descartes object Locke’s theory and says that Locke is relying on sensory idea to heavily, Descartes theory also relies a bit

Show More
Related

  • Analysis Of Rene Descartes: The Father Of Modern Philosophy

    798 Words  | 2 Pages

    Our senses can sometimes be deceiving, and Descartes immediately comes to the conclusions that our senses cannot be a claim for knowledge. We have no proof that what we experience with our senses is true. Descartes says that we cannot truly...

    Read More

  • Locke Primary And Secondary Qualities Analysis

    1260 Words  | 3 Pages

    Locke, an indirect realist, explores our immediate perceptions and with this attempts to draw a line between ideas and qualities, just how these are different entities. Sometimes referred to as Representative Theory, according to Locke, we are aware only of our ideas, these being things existing “in our minds”, sensations created. Our perceptions are indirect and their qualities, these are the causal properties of physical objects that then cause those sensations. This dualistic account

    Read More

  • The Impact Of The Enlightenment On The Colonies

    764 Words  | 2 Pages

    Concerning Human Understanding disputed the notion that human beings are born already imprinted with innate ideas. All knowledge, locke asserted, derives form ones observations of the external world. Belief in witchcraft and astrology, among other similar phenomena, thus came under attack.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of John Locke's Some Thoughts Concerning Education

    348 Words  | 1 Pages

    Locke considers the basis of knowledge to be the acquiring of ideas, rather than an innate understanding of a topic. He states that knowledge can only be learned either through physical sensation or by the mind “reflecting on its own operations within itself” (6). In Some Thoughts Concerning Education, Locke also explains an effective manner of learning, describing that his own ideas are “not the product of some superficial thoughts, or much reading; but the effect of experience and observation” (9). A teacher, according to Locke, can take a student so far, but “no body ever went far in knowledge, or became eminent in any of the sciences, by the discipline and constraint of a master” (10). Essentially, the majority of a student’s learning occurs outside the classroom, as long as it is a topic the student feels motivated to pursue beyond school. That being said, Locke also points out that “our education fits us rather for the university than the world” (11). Taking all of this into consideration, Locke seems to believe the purpose of education is to teach students about topics they

    Read More

  • Locke's Theory Of Knowledge By Descartes

    766 Words  | 2 Pages

    Descartes argues in favor of human reasoning, involving innate ideas and subsequent deductions, as the sole avenue toward reaching this certain knowledge. On the other hand, Locke does not invest himself in the possibility of achieving any knowledge that can be claimed as a universal truth. Rather than this, Locke favored the idea that experience can lead individuals to knowledge that is most probable. Ultimately, these two philosophies cannot reconcile themselves together because of a core divergence on the question of the origins of knowledge. As Locke’s argument finds itself dependent on the concept of the mind as a “tabula rasa” at birth, this doctrine surpasses Descartes’ assertion of innate knowledge and, by extension, systematic doubt. For readers, the acceptance of the mind as a blank slate invariably leads to an acceptance of Locke’s reasoning above Descartes’. The argument propelling Locke’s essay and the improbability of innate knowledge favors the idea that there can be no universal truths and that, since individuals are born without any truths evident to them, they must depend entirely on sensory perception of the external world on which to base the beginnings of their knowledge. To support this, Locke considers how children gain knowledge of the world in small increments, as opposed to possessing an extensive knowledge from the time of their birth. Locke discusses that an individual with exposure solely to black and white would be absolutely unaware of scarlet or green, just like children are ignorant of the taste or texture of pineapples and oysters until they first taste

    Read More

  • Locke, Hobbes, Mill, Thoreau

    1432 Words  | 3 Pages

    For individual property to exist, there must be a means for individuals to appropriate the things around them. Locke starts out with the idea of the property of person; each person owns his or her own body, and all the labor that they perform with the body. When an individual adds their own labor, their own property, to a foreign object or good, that object becomes their own because they have added their labor. This appropriation of goods does not demand the consent of humankind in general, each person has license to appropriate things in this way by individual initiative.

    Read More

  • montaigne and descartes on doubting

    1564 Words  | 4 Pages

    ...se which…belong exclusively to the mind…things are sensed through understanding, understood through senses (Montaigne 414)”.

    Read More

  • Essay On Theaetetus

    1436 Words  | 3 Pages

    General ideas can be formed by the mind without the use of our senses or sensory organs. Senses are acquired at birth but, the essentials of knowledge, truth and being, is slowly and hardly gain through many years of education, experience, and reflection later on. We now know that we cannot get the essentials of knowledge, truth and being for perception itself. Therefore knowledge cannot be based on

    Read More

  • Good vs Evil in Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game

    1037 Words  | 3 Pages

    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? Whence comes it by that vast store which the busy and boundless fancy of man has painted on it with an almost endless variety? Whence has it all the materials of reason and knowledge? To this I answer, in one word, from experience (Locke, 1690/1947, bk. II, chap. 1, p.26).

    Read More

  • René Descartes Does Not Reject Sense Perception

    2400 Words  | 5 Pages

    I contend that, based upon the arguments presented in the Second Meditation, Descartes shows that we can use our senses to help us understand the true nature of things, but the senses alone are inadequate to determine truth (since they are often deceived), and that all that may be known with certainty (truth) are those things we know by our judgment, thinking, and understanding of them in our minds. Descartes' argument does not necessarily reject any role of the senses in the process of understanding.

    Read More

  • Nature Vs. Nurture: Thomas Hobbes And John Locke

    812 Words  | 2 Pages

    Our mind then processes that perception into an idea. A great example I can give is from my childhood. I was playing outside by my elderly neighbor and she said, “Stop,” and I did, which made her tell me I was very obedient. I didn’t know what that word meant so I looked it up and did not like the definition. Ever since that day I tried to not be obedient unless I wanted to be or absolutely needed to be. I heard something I didn’t know anything about, researched it and reflected on it and decided I didn’t want to be that. My experience makes me agree with Locke because I was able to process what happened to me and decide for

    Read More

  • John Locke, George Berkeley and David Hume

    1235 Words  | 3 Pages

    John Locke, Berkeley and Hume are all empiricist philosophers that believe in different things. They have things in common such as the three anchor points; The only source of genuine knowledge is sense experience, reason is an unreliable and inadequate route to knowledge unless it is grounded in the solid bedrock of sense experience and there is no evidence of innate ideas within the mind that are known from experience. The relationship between our thoughts and the world around us consisted of concepts which were developed from these philosophers. I have argued that Locke, Berkeley and Hume are three empiricists that have different believes.

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast Monism And Dualism

    1052 Words  | 3 Pages

    John Locke’s Essay on Human Understanding his primary thesis is our ideas come from experience, that the human mind from birth is a blank slate. (Tabula Rasa) Only experience leaves an impression in our brain. “External objects impinge on our senses,” which interpret ate our perceptions of various objects. The senses fill the mind with content. Nothing can exist in the mind that was not first experienced by the senses. Dualism resembles Locke’s theory that your mind cannot perceive something that the senses already have or they come in through the minds reflection on its own operation. Locke classifies ideas as either simple or complex, simple ideas being the building blocks for complex ideas.

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast Locke And Descartes

    1153 Words  | 3 Pages

    That everything in our mind is in idea. It all could be developed by human reason, not innate ideas. Locke goes on to describe his theory in order for your mind to gain knowledge humans will have to fill it up their brain with ideas, and learn through their five senses. Since, the innate ideas was not that relevant to Locke he needed to come up with another perceptions. Locke then suggested that external experience called as sensations; this experience which we can attain our knowledge through our senses that we have such as smells, touch and color. In other words, it is about analyses the characteristics of an object. The second kind of experience which Locke mentions is internal experience known as reflection, it is summarize those personal experience such as our thoughts, thinking, and feelings. He says that all knowledge come from sensations or reflection, “These two are the fountains of knowledge, from whence all the ideas we have, or can naturally have,” (page186). Therefore, the sense and observation make up the whole of knowledge. On the contrary, as for Descartes views he believes we do have innate

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast Descartes And Locke

    1019 Words  | 3 Pages

    Descartes defines knowledge as doubt and uncertainty. He describes that our main source of knowledge is our sense perception.

    Read More

More about John Locke's Definition Of Sensitive Knowledge

Open Document