3.1.3 Reason as a source of knowledge - 5 markers Flashcards
Outline the difference between analytic and synthetic truths
This is a linguistic or semantic distinction, which is to say that it is about how statements are true rather than how we justify or check them. An analytic truth is a proposition that is true just in the virtue of the meanings of the words, meaning the truth of the proposition is contained in the meaning of the words. For example, ‘all bachelors are unmarried’, is analytically true, whereas a synthetic truth is a proposition that is not true or false in the virtue of the meaning of the words, but in the virtue of the way the world is. For example, “the walls are white”.
Outline the difference between a priori and a posteriori knowledge
This is the distinction about how we justify or verify things we know. A priori knowledge is those true propositions which can be justified without experience. Empiricists believe the only kind of a priori knowledge is analytic truths, whereas rationalists believe you can have “synthetic a priori knowledge” which includes innate knowledge, where we are born with certain principles that do not need to be justified with experience. For instance, “every cause has an event.” Whereas a posteriori knowledge is any true proposition that is justified through or after experience. For empiricists this is the most important kind of knowledge and incorporates all of our knowledge derived from experiments and observations in science.
Explain the difference between necessary and contingent truths
This is a metaphysical distinction as it refers to what exists and how the world is. A necessary truth is one which could be no other way. Necessary truths are true in all possible worlds and to imagine them being otherwise would produce logical contradiction. For example, squares have four sides. Whereas a contingent truth are truths about the world which could’ve been otherwise without contradiction. They depend on how the world happens to be. For example, my hair is brown, but it could have been blonde.
Explain the difference between simple and complex concepts
This is the distinction about how knowledge can be broken down into. A simple concept is a single, uniform conception with nothing distinguishable within it. Locke claims that all knowledge can be broken down into component parts of simple concepts, for instance, color, shape, and smell. which we can then use and manipulate into complex concepts. A complex concept is derived from multiple single concepts. For example, a ‘chair’ a complex concept, can be broken down into multiple single concepts such as “brown”, “hard”, and “wooden”.
Explain Plato’s Slave Boy argument for innate knowledge (INNATISM)
Plato, a rationalist, asserts through ‘Menos paradox’ that it’s impossible to inquire into any new knowledge. ‘Menos paradox ‘outlines:
P1: For any x, one either knows, or does not know, x.
P2: If one knows x, one cannot inquire into it.
P3: If one does not know x, one cannot inquire into it.
P4:Therefore, whether or not one knows x, one cannot inquire into it.
Plato uses this paradox to assert that learning is a process of anamnesis (recollection) of what is innate in us. Through Plato’s ‘Slave boy argument’ Socrates (Plato’s mouthpiece) questions an unschooled slave boy with a series of geometrical problems, with no formal education the slave boy proceeds to grasp these eternal geometrical/mathematical truths. These truths weren’t derived from experience and neither derived from Socrates questioning. Ultimately, concluding the boy has innate knowledge of mathematical truths.
Outline Leibniz’s marble analogy as an argument for innate knowledge (INNATISM)
In reply to Locke’s straw man, Leibniz an empiricist, uses the analogy of a piece of marble, this piece of marble contains ‘veins’ which can be sculpted and carved out. Correspondingly, how “innate knowledge” is drawn out through experience. Leibniz contends that children are simply unaware of the principle of non-contradiction, this principle allows to distinguish that “something cannot be and be at the same time”. Therefore, alluding to children possessing knowledge, however, not being conscious of that knowledge.
Explain the empiricist account of how we form concepts
Humes, an empiricist, argues that the mind takes in sense impressions and reflects on these to creates concepts. For example, we take in sense impressions of wooden, hard, and brown and through reflection we create the concepts of a chair, which is a kind of copy of those sense impressions in our minds: “The copy principle”. Hume argues all ideas derive from these sources, firstly, if you lack the relevant sense, you cannot form the ideas associated with it e.g. blind people cannot form the idea of “red”, and secondly as every idea can be derived can be explained in terms of simple and complex impressions.
