One of Locke’s largest points is "All ideas come from sensation or reflection” (Locke 101). He thinks that man is completely blank when they are born and that their basic senses are what gives them knowledge. Locke states, “Let us then suppose the mind to be, as we say, white paper” (Locke 101). Locke is basically saying that human nature is like a blank slate, and how men experience life in their own ways is what makes them good or evil. Overall, Locke believes that any and all knowledge is only gained through life
Locke initiates a third term between the soul and body, one that is mediated more or less, between the two. His approach wasn’t quiet exactly scientific ideology, if so it would identify too closely to the brain with consciousness. The brain, just as body and substance may change, consciousness remains the same. This reinstates that it is not the brain (body) responsible for personal identity, but
...e is an argument that states that differences of men’s discoveries depend upon their application of their faculties. This is really self-explanatory. It just means that the reason why men make different discoveries is because each one applies its faculty to what pleases him the most. They decide on what to apply their faculties and knowledge. The chapter ends by saying that men should think for themselves and apply reason to their life. This means questioning principles, not taking everything for granted, and not believing that they were born with innate ideas. Because of this, Locke ends his readings by telling the reader not to assume that his ideas presented are not true. He encourages the reader to reach his own conclusions and determine himself if Locke’s ideas hold absolute veracity or not.
Locke believed that the identity of a person could be assigned to the consciousness. He thought that a person would remain the same as long as their consciousness continues to be the same over the course of their life: “Consciousness always accompanies thinking, and makes everyone to be what he calls ‘self’ and thereby distinguishes himself from all other thinking things; in this alone consists personal identity, i.e. the sameness of a rational being; and as far as this consciousness can be extended backwards to any past action or thought, so far reaches the identity of that person” (Essay II.xxvii.9). Locke believes that your body and your personality do not determine your identity. Instead, you can know that a person is the same person as long as their consciousness continues to be the same over the course of their life.
Some of these would include their thoughts on the senses, certain knowledge, the mind, and identity. Descartes had a lot of doubt about our senses and said that knowledge couldn’t come from the outside world through the senses. He said we can’t absolutely trust our senses because of how they can deceive us. Locke on the other hand says that knowledge does rely on the senses and observations from the outside world. He says that all ideas come from sensation and reflection and all knowledge is founded on experience (Locke 33). Descartes said that knowledge depends on absolute certainty and that perception was unreliable, which Locke disagrees with. Locke believes in ideas based on perception and says he believes in knowledge that has a high probability. Descartes believes in deductive reasoning and says that it “can never be performed wrongly by an intellect which is in the least degree rational'' (Selected Philosophical Writings 2). Descartes, as mentioned, thinks very highly of the mind and that that is where our knowledge comes from. Whereas, Locke says that there are no innate ideas present in the mind and that the mind is a “white paper, void of all characters, without any ideas'' (Locke, 33). Another difference in their beliefs is that Descartes believes in “I think therefore I am”, whereas Locke believes our identity is proven through our memories. As we can see, the philosophies of Descartes and Locke
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
... on the other hand is not developing any new fundamental properties. He is fixing the old fundamental properties held by the scholastics. All he is doing is keeping with that sensory perception is the only way to obtain knowledge, but agrees with Descartes by saying that you should be cautious. Locke really doesn’t know if the fundamental properties of the science are those the new science identified as fundamental. They could be fundamental or they could not be. The mind has limited knowledge and if the mind doesn’t know and hasn’t obtained the knowledge from sensory experience then you wont know unless you do. Locke is a very conservative person, he is not overstepping his bounds by making claims about things that he can not prove, so he plays it safe and he stay within the realm of the knowledge and doesn’t delve into areas that he can not know anything of.
The first caveat to note is that Locke’s political philosophy is divided into two discernible eras – his Oxford period (1652-66) and his Shaftesbury period, when he was employed by Lord Anthony Ashley-Cooper (later Earl of Shaftesbury) from 1666-1683 through his final years following Shaftesbury’s death. The ‘two Lockes’ are somewhat distinguishable and should certainly be born in mind, even if one were to concentrate solely on his Two Treatises, and ignore his earlier thinking. Nonetheless, the Treatises, written in his later incarnation should be read not just as classics in their own right but as the mature culmination of Locke’s political philosophy into an original and insightful theory of government, power, property, trust, and rights, for there are Lockean continuities in his political thinking that reach back into his earliest political sketches. For example, scriptural exegesis used to support his political ideas, and his fear of violence (national and towards him and his friends), uncertainty, war, and accordingly of any doctrine or behaviour that could lead to unsettling anarchy or persecution. It was a fear of persecution that kept him from admitting to authorship of the Two Treatises, after all Seventeenth Century Britain certainly produced many provocative and extreme opinions, and indeed a few writers, including some close associates, were executed for their seditious thoughts. Locke retained a fear for his life long after the troubles had died down.
John Locke was considered as the first British empiricist. Empiricism is defined by Google Dictionary as, “The theory that all knowledge is derived from sense-experience.” You see; in John Locke’s 2nd book of An Essay Concerning Human Understanding he explains how we as humans acquire the materials of our knowledge. Locke believed that we are born with a tabula rasa or “blank slate.” This means that we are born with no ideas or thoughts until they are created through experience and sensation. Those thoughts are to be the foundation for the complex ideas and knowledge to be later constructed. Although Locke believes we are all born with “blank slates” he states that we are all born with different ways to bring simple ideas together. One way was to combine the ideas into a complex idea. As in combine an idea of substa...
John Locke was an empiricist who believed that people could acquire
knowledge from experience. Ideas acted as raw materials and by knowing
the relation of the ideas, we got knowledge. All ideas are based on
experience but knowledge can also be justified by intuition and
demonstration. By sensation and reflection, we get sensitive,
intuitive and demonstrative knowledge with different degrees of
certainty and ways of evidence. In investigating the two main sources
of ideas of Locke, we then will explain the two kinds of knowledge
which based on reasoning by using suitable examples.