John Locke and the Basis of Empiricism:
Empiricism held an essential philosophical position during the Enlightenment. It began and developed in England. Its foundations were created in the end of the seventeenth century by John Locke.
Even though Locke’s philosophy was given the same name as Francis Bacon’s philosophy, they are and always have been two different currents.
According to John Locke there are no inborn ideas. This means we need to learn everything in our life. Humans coming to this world are like ‘tabula rasa’ – the blank slate. We know nothing and our knowledge comes only from what we’ve experienced and learned. However, we may only gain the material of knowledge; the power of our mind is innate. This allows us not only to learn and believe, but also analyze gathered information. ‘Sensations’ are processes, which happened in the external world and ‘reflections’ are our thoughts and conclusions.
As stated by Locke, everything in our mind: our own observations, external experiences, abstract conceptions and fantasies; every other thing is considered to be an individual ‘idea’. There might be either simple ideas (not created by us, only acquired by experience) and complex ideas (combinations of simple ideas).
Taking into consideration Locke’s theories: when we see a squirrel, it becomes some sort of idea to our mind, a signal picked up from environment. We are not in the possession of any proof, that this squirrel actually exists, but internal reflections are supposed to convince us, that we are not wrong and the squirrel is real.
John Locke was an extremely logical man. He might not have been a genius, but thank to his sober and moderated way of thinking many views in science were strengthened. Nevertheless, are his opinions true? Are we really born with no knowledge about world surrounding us? What about the ethical principles? If we are born without them, do we actually know the difference between good and evil? An we trust our senses, when they deliver information to our mind?
This is just my way of looking at this subject. How about you? What are your opinions about John Locke and empiricism?
Get more info about John Locke at:
This is a tricky thought. If we born without any knowledge, so are we still raised by people around us that learn us how to behave and how to know the difference between good and evil and all of the ethical principles. I think we have some knowledge when we are born, does basic things like eat, flee, breath. But if we are born with these knowledge can we not also be born with knowledge about good and evil? Things like good and evil, ethical principles and so on can change all the time and be different for every single person. These things are something you can build up. But you can never build up breathing and the instinct of flee. So I believe that we are born with some basic knowledge and the rest of the knoweledge we have are learnd.
Great entry Kamila!
Good article Kamila!
Like Linnéa said, this is a very tricky thought. I think we was born with some knowledge like breath, eat, talk, walk and so on, but that a huge part of what we know now and how we behave depends a lot of how our childhood was, how our parents treated us and what they learned us. Because if they hadn't learned us anything we wouldn't know so much because we hadn't had the opportunity to discover new things if our parents hadn't showed it for us.
Awesomely written Kamila! (:
I believe that knowledge is information that we receive during our life. What we start out with is, in my way of seeing things, instincts. I think that is important to keep these two concepts apart. Breathing and the will to eat is instincts. However as a child one is very open to new knowledge and takes in much of the same. It is a tricky matter though.
Your ethical principles, and the ability to differ between good and evil are probably things that develop over time, and are very influenced by your surroundings especially while growing up.
However these are just my way to see on things, and it is nothing I can know for sure. (:
Nice article Kamila!
I really agree on Andreas comment on that our knowledge comes to us when we grow up and live our lives with experiences and learning. I also think that we have some basic instincts from birth.
The ethical principles are a little bit more trickier. I think that back in our minds we have at least some knowledge about wrong/right and good/bad when we are born. I think that it is during our childhood that we first really learn,understand and develop our knowledge on what is right and what is wrong,and that can then of course develop even more and change during our life.
If we are not born with the sense of good and bad, it is scary to think that our parents or anything/anyone around us have made us think like we do. What if they're wrong and the things they've taught us are good are in fact bad? Of course we can learn from others later in life, but what if the whole world is wrong about good/evil?
So I want to believe that we are born with some sense of what is right and wrong from the beginning, and that it later develops.
I totally agree with the previous speakers when it comes to that we are born with some instincts, like eating and breathing etc. But to some extent I do think that we learn from experience and how we are treated. I mean some things seams to come natural, things like behavior e.g. some people seems to be born to talk in front of a big crowd etc. but really that comes from confidence and confidence is something which we could actually learn to gain depending on people around us and experience.
Another thing that could actually prove that we only learn from experience is that even though we have been told a billion times not to do this or that, we have to try it to be certain that we actually shouldn't!
Beautiful work Kamila!(:
I also think that we're born with some basic instincts, like breathing, eating etc. Without them, we wouldn't survive for that long, would we?
And I also think, like previous people have said, that we develop other instincts and behaviour over time, for example our understanding of good and evil etc. However,good and evil are different for every person. One person might think that theft is the biggest evil there is in the world while someone else doesn't think there's anything bad about it. (I personally think that mass murder is the worst "evil"- not theft.)
For example, most of us think violence is bad and should be avoided. There are always a few exceptions to this, but the majority feel this way. However, there is a village in the world (don't remember exactly where) which has been completely isolated from the world until recently. In this village, they often arrange fights where everyone, including small children, joins in. These fights aren't controlled by any means and are like "everyone against everyone", and people often die from this, e.g. small children. The people in the village think this is necessary, to make the people in the village the way they "should be" and get used to violence in a way. I guess most of us think this sounds horrible, I know I do at least. But why don't the people in the village think this is horrible? Because they've been taught different kinds of morals and ethics than we have. By this I mean that morals and ethics, for example, aren't something which we're born with, but something we're taught during life.
oh, it's so interesting to read your comments!
Personally, I think that when we are born we are already different. We have differnet sets of behaviour and skills and it is 'programmed' in our DNA :) So I don't think I actually agree with John Locke, that we come to this world as 'tabula rasa'.
I like your explanation, Victoria. We still do the same things over and over again, sometimes even if we're not allowed to. :D
But of course, we HAVE to learn things, such as walking for instance :) I don't think that the moment you opened your eyes for the first time, you started running around. It took time and practise, but now it is a perfectly natural thing for us to do!
Lia, that's an interesting case.
Of course, enviroment we live in affects us and therefore we develop differently depending on what we've been taught and where we were brought up.
As you mentioned the village, have you heard about cases when twins were separated? There was one, which was on the media all the time couple of years back; two boys were brought up in different parts of the world. (I think one somehwere in USA and the other one in Australia). They have developed differently, and apart from their looks and genetic material they had nothing in common.
So, I guess you are all correct: some things are natural for us, like breathing and eating. We don't have to learn how to do it -- we just do it, it was always programmed in our minds. Also, behaviours - like stubborness -- I would say we can also just have it, not necessary learn how to be stubborn. However, thoughout our lives we are taught differnet things and that is consistent with John Locke's theory. In the end, isn't it obvious for us that we don't know everything and attend schools to gain new knowledge? :) :)
