# Locke and Ideas

## February 19th, 2020

- Pre-class scribblings:

        The world is heavy on me
        Today the clouds don't break
        Poetry is awful
        Everything's a mistake

        If I don't smile I will weep
        If I don't weep then I will die
        I want to lean upon you, Lord
        But weariness will try

        To keep me from raising my hand
        To wing me off of sleep
        To sit and stare but everywhere
        The mind fills...

- "I got some Leibniz cookies for you - a thoroughly rational choice!"
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- Today we're going through a *lot*, so get ready!
    - The outline is:
        - Locke's psychological/epistemological claims
        - Locke's "ideas" and "qualities"
        - Complex vs Simple ideas
        - Against innate ideas
        - Ideas of substance/God (Book II, chpt. 23)
    - I mostly want to explain Locke's empiricism and what he's arguing for today, and to try to understand that argument he's making

- Locke makes several different, separate claims that might confusingly bleed together
    - Locke believes in PSYCHOLOGICAL EMPIRICISM: that all, or nearly all, human beliefs are acquired
        - ...rationalists, on the other hand, think at least some beliefs are innate
    - Locke also claims EPISTEMOLOGICAL EMPIRICISM: that all/most of our knowledge comes from experience
        - So, one says beliefs are acquired over time, while the 2nd is specifically talking about knowledge, and where true knowledge of the world comes from
        - Locke, though, believes that the 1st claim naturally leads into the 2nd!
            - ...as we'll see, though, this isn't a straightforward inference

- Before we talk about all that though, what does Locke mean by "ideas"?
    - In II, chpt. 8, par. 8, Locke says an idea is "whatever the mind perceives in itself or is the immediate object of perception, thought, or understanding"
        - So, if we're holding a snowball, the IDEA is how our mind represents the snowball to us (often in terms of other ideas or "qualities" like white, cold, round, etc.)
        - In these terms, we can have direct, immediate perception of our idea of a snowball, but *not* the snowball itself
    - Locke also refers to "powers," the ability for something to evoke ideas/qualities in us
        - Like Galileo, Locke splits these into 2 types of qualities:
            - PRIMARY qualities are those inherent in the object, e.g. solidity, figure, etc.
            - SECONDARY qualities are just those in us alone, e.g. colors, sounds, tastes, etc.
                - Objects may have a "power" to evoke these qualities, but they don't actually have them inherently outside our perception

- Now, in II, chpt. 1, par. 2-4, Locke says ideas can come either by reflection or sensation
    - SENSATIONS are ideas that come from our senses
    - REFLECTIONS lead to "ideas that come from the mind paying attention to its own operations," like doubting, believing, imagining, etc.
        - "These are NOT just abstract ideas, but things Locke calls complex ideas" (?)

- So, it seems we could ascribe the "Empirical Principle" to Locke's core belief here: *anything* we have an idea of, we must have either sensed or reflected on
    - However, this leaves out a BUNCH of things like deductions, combinations of ideas, etc. (e.g. the idea of a unicorn) - and Locke recognized this!
    - So, he also proposes that we have COMPLEX IDEAS: ideas that are combinations of other, simpler ideas
        - To get a fair view of this "principle," we need to include this distinction between simple and complex ideas

- Now, rationalists take issue with this: maybe many of our beliefs are acquired, but even if you were taught the principle of non-contradiction in a class, they'd still argue you "knew" it innately since don't know it's true BECAUSE of experience; temporally, it comes later, but logically it precedes everything else!
    - "Rationalists believe we're born with our mind 'prepared to understand these truths'"
    - Locke, though, would argue that even these logical principles are learned through experience alone!

- How, then, can we make logical explanations rational if they're based on experience? How can we known God exists, for Locke? We'll talk about that on Monday!