General Terms

Question 1

Rationalism

Answer 1

• innate knowledge
• reason is source of knowledge
• deductive reasoning
• main applications: mathematics, logic
• Plato, Descartes, Leibniz

Question 2

Empiricism (opposite of rationalism)

Answer 2

• no innate knowledge
• perception as source of knowledge
• research methods: observation, experimentation, inductive reasoning
• main applications: natural sciences
• natural philosophers
• Locke, Berkeley, Hume, Aristotle

Question 3

Idealism

Answer 3

• knowledge is a construction of mind
• does not necessarily correspond to an outside world
• world exists solely in the minds of people
• ultimate truth relies on consistency of ideas
• has Ringe coherent with knowledge in social groups
• Plato, Socratic method
• Berkeley
• > experience is all there is

Question 4

Realism

Answer 4

• only reality is the material world
• study of outer world is only reliable truth
• Aristotle

Question 5

Positivism

Answer 5

• authentic knowledge can only be obtained by means of scientific method
• religion and philosophy as inferior forms of an explanation
• science as core to progress
• Comte

Question 6

Materialism

Answer 6

• what we call neuroscience today
• facts of universe can be explained in physical terms by the existence of nature of matter
• Problem of being an atheist
• one substance only

Old style materialism: man a machine , no soul, matter has a mind-like characteristic

Question 7

Interactionsim

Answer 7

• before Descartes:
• interaction flows in one direction -> mind has big influence on body
• Descartes:
• mutual interaction between body and mind

Question 8

Dualism

Answer 8

• mind is immaterial and independent of body
• Cartesian dualism
• brain and mental states are different substances

Question 9

Functionalism

Answer 9

• approach that examined practical functions of the human mind inspired by the evolutionary theory
• James

Question 10

Structuralism

Answer 10

• trying to discover the structure of the human mind by means of instrospection
• Titchener

Question 11

Determinism

Answer 11

-acts are determined by past events

Question 12

Reductionism

Answer 12

• explains phenomena on one level (like complex ideas) in terms of phenomena on another level (like simple ideas)
• reducing things to its simples parts (molecules or atoms)

Question 13

Associationism

Answer 13

-theory that all mental activity is based on connections between basic mental events, such as sensations and feelings

Question 14

Mentalism

Answer 14

• all knowledge is a function of mental phenomena
• depends on person perceiving
• subjective
• does not mirror external world

Question 15

Uniformitarianism

Answer 15

• assumption that the same natural laws and processes that operate in our present-day scientific observations have always operated in the universe in past and apply everywhere in the universe
• no god given direction or process

Question 16

Parallelism

Answer 16

• Leibniz (1646-1716)
• body and mind are independent from each other
• God creates two chains of events occurring simultaneously
• no interaction, still always five exactly same time

Question 17

Epiphenomenalism

Answer 17

• view that mental events are caused by physical events in the brain but have no effect on any physical events
• bath Tab problem

Question 18

Mysterianism

Answer 18

-we do not understand relation and we never will

Question 19

neutral monism

Answer 19

• mental and physical are two ways of organizing or describing the Same elements which are themselves neutral (neither physical or mental)
• universe consist of only one kind of stuff

Question 20

Idealism = Mentalism = immaterialism

Answer 20

• maintains that the mind is all that exists
• the only existence substance is mental
• the external world is either mental itself or an illusion created by the mind
• > problem of interaction between body and mind is not a problem at all
• Kant, Berkeley