S.D. John Locke John Locke was one of the most important and influential philosophers ever in history‚ which he expressed through writing. John Locke was born on August 29‚ 1632 to John Locke and Agnes Keene‚ in a cottage by the church in Wrington‚ in the English county of Somerset. Immediately after he was born he was baptized. Both of his parents were Puritans and he was raised that way. His father was a country lawyer and a military man‚ in which he was a captain during the English Civil
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is the study of how we acquire knowledge and justify our beliefs. Descartes promoted a rationalist epistemology through his masterwork Meditations on First Philosophy (1641)‚ which were designed to build a theory of knowledge from the ground up. Rationalism states that knowledge is acquired through the use of reason. In contrast‚ John Locke promoted empiricist epistemology through his Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Empiricism is any view which bases our knowledge‚ or the materials from which
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Descartes Knowledge The question of our existence in reality is a question which philosophers have tackled throughout time. This essay will look at the phrase‚ cogito ergo sum or I think therefore I am‚ a phrase brought about by Rene Descartes. This phrase is the backbone of Descartes whole philosophy of our existence in reality. As long as we are thinking things‚ we exist. When we look at this approach to our existence we must first deny that any sensory data
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Discussion Question 6 How did the "Doctrine of Empiricism" change the way artists created art? Give examples. The term "empiricism" has a dual etymology‚ stemming both from the Greek word for "experience".(http://www.philosophybasics.com/branch_empiricism.html) The “Doctrine of Empiricism” changed the way artists created art. They went from an open-minded outlook on the way to express art to a more structured view. It vanished the idea of metaphysical‚ tradition‚ and myth and replaced it
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In Descartes’ Meditation‚ he ponders over the idea that he is mistaken and often deceived. He believes that nothing is certain and goes through a series of mind-tests to prove that he is‚ in fact‚ an existence. In doing this‚ he also attempts to prove the existence of God as well as his own existence to ensure that things are certain and indubitable. He first banishes all preconceptions and starts with a clean slate. All knowledge that he knew of previously were through his senses. His senses‚
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Innate ideas John Locke‚ a renowned English philosopher in the seventeenth century‚ argued against the pre-existing prevalent belief of innate knowledge‚ such as those led by Descartes. Many of Locke’s arguments begin with criticisms on philosophers’ opinion on innate knowledge‚ notably Descartes. Therefore‚ many of Locke’s arguments are direct rebuttals of Descartes and other philosophers’ beliefs about the existence of innate knowledge. To arrive at the conclusion
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Descartes Optics Descartes’s theories of light and vision were central components of his natural philosophy‚ closely linked to his cosmology‚ physics‚ theory of matter‚ and theory of perception. Descartes replaced traditional explanations of natural phenomena with explanations hidden under terms of matter and motion. By eliminating these theories‚ Descartes needed to formulate new explanations of the qualities of bodies and our perception of them. In other words Descartes goes on to call into
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many people‚ including some religions. John Locke has several arguments against innate knowledge; among these‚ the argument that states that if we did in fact possess innate ideas‚ then everybody would agree on at least one idea. There are no principles that everybody aggress on. Therefore‚ innate ideas cannot possibly exist. Locke uses the logic of this argument for several different situations such as the argument for moral innate knowledge. Locke starts off this argument by saying “No moral
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First‚ I explore John Locke’s conception of substance. After‚ I argue that Locke’s theory of substance is necessary for his theory of identity‚ and therefore philosophically vital for Locke’s ethical and political theories. I consider objections to Locke‚ but ultimately defend Locke’s theory of substance and its primacy in Locke’s overall philosophy through a different interpretive approach. Locke’s Substrata: John Locke’s doctrine of substratum—a metaphysical theory that posits that an imperceptible
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Rene Descartes the Father of Modern Philosophy René Descartes is generally considered the father of modern philosophy. He was the first major figure in the philosophical movement known as rationalism‚ a method of understanding the world based on the use of reason as the means to attain knowledge (Palmer‚ 2011). Along with empiricism‚ which stresses the use of sense perception rather than pure reason‚ rationalism was one of the main intellectual currents of the Enlightenment‚ a cultural movement
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