Empiricism Flashcards
What is empiricism? [1 mark]
Empiricism is a philosophical idea revolving around the theory that knowledge is based off of experience, which comes from our senses (sight, touch, smell etc.)
Aristotle was an empiricist. Explain his key philosophical idea. [4 marks]
Aristotle’s key idea was called Aristotle’s Causality. In his causality, Aristotle looked at the world and searched for evidence as to why things were like that. Aristotle’s causality, is a philosophical idea that the world is in constant change. According to Aristotle, things can be in two states of change: potentiality or actuality. For example, a seed is a seed (its actuality) but has the potential to be a plant. The important point to remember is that he believed everything has a cause and cannot take place without it.
St Thomas Aquinas was an empiricist, meaning he based his ideas off of evidence and experiences. Explain briefly how he was similar to Aristotle and what “The Cosmological Argument” is. [3 marks]
Bonus: give an example of a point from the Cosmological Argument.
Similarly to Aristotle, Aquinas believe in the cause + effect function however in particular where God is the cause and the effect is the creation of the universe, which links to the cosmological argument. An example of this is: (1) everything that exists has a cause therefore (2) the universe cannot have caused itself.
John Locke was an empiricist. Explain his key idea and what this means [3 marks]
John Locke’s key philosophical idea is that the mind is a blank piece of paper or more commonly known as Tabula Rasa, meaning blank slate. By this he means that the mind is blank at birth however throughout our life one gains knowledge through their experiences - people, senses, actions etc.
David Hume was an empiricist. Explain his philosophical ideas and how they were similar to Locke. [3 marks]
Hume, similarly to Locke, believed that all knowledge comes from our experiences. He thought that our minds are not capable of creating original ideas and instead any “new” idea is formed from two or more combined ideas which he called a complex concept. For example, a mermaid is a complex concept of a fish and a human.
