Reason And Experience

Question 1

What is an analytic proposition? Example

Answer 1

One which is true or false just in virtue of the meaning of the words. EG. All bachelors are unmarried men

Question 2

What is a synthetic proposition? Example

Answer 2

One which is not analytic. If it is true or false in virtue of the way the world is. EG. Ripe tomatoes are red

Question 3

What is an a priori proposition? Example

Answer 3

They are either innate or based on logic. They do not require sense experience to be known to be true. EG. A²+B²=C²

Question 4

What is an a posteriori proposition? Example

Answer 4

They are based on experience. EG. Snow is white. (That can only be established through experience).

Question 5

What must all analytic propositions be?

Answer 5

A priori, because they are true or false just in the meaning of the words

Question 6

What’s rationalism? Example

Answer 6

It gives an important role to reason and claims that we have synthetic a priori knowledge of how the world is outside the mind. EG. Maths or morality. We have those concepts without relying on sense experience

Question 7

What is empiricism? Example

Answer 7

It disagrees with rationalism. Many mental states are synthetic EG. I feel sad. But they don’t require sense experience to be known

Question 8

What do rationalists believe about how we acquire knowledge?

Answer 8

That we either have a form of rational ‘intuition’ or ‘insight’ which enables us to grasp certain truths intellectually or we know them innately.

Question 9

Locke was an empiricist. What did he believe?

Answer 9

That all ideas are derived from sense experience. The mind is tabula rasa at birth. He believes that we must be conscious of an idea for it to be part of the mind

Question 10

A self evident truth

Answer 10

Is logically consistent (all bachelors are unmarried men)

Question 11

Necessarily true

Answer 11

A priori truth (irrespective of experience. Dealing with concepts EG love can’t picture it

Question 12

Contingently true

Answer 12

A posteriori truth (after experience) - ideas: picture thinking

Question 13

A priori foundation of…

Answer 13

Rationalism

Question 14

A posteriori foundation of..

Answer 14

Empiricism

Question 15

A prioris sole principle

Answer 15

I think therefore I am

Question 16

Certain structures in our brain that organise our senses

Answer 16

Conceptual schemes - we don’t experience a world with out mediation. This is counter initiative (agains common sense)

Question 16

Synaesthesia

Answer 16

When the senses become one rather than above

Question 16

Epistemology

Answer 16

Theory of knowledge

Question 17

Totalitarism

Answer 17

A dictator believes one way of democracy - one ideology

Question 18

Episteme

Answer 18

True knowledge

Question 19

Nilalist

Answer 19

Belief that values value for nada

Question 20

Dogmatye

Answer 20

Every opposition has an equal opposition

Question 21

What’s the difference between a priori and innate knowledge?

Answer 21

A priori doesn’t need experience to be known. Innate - born with the ability to do something (learn a language)

Question 22

What is a principle?

Answer 22

A self evident truth that is either true by definition or deduction

Question 23

2 a priori self evident truths

Answer 23

I think therefore I am. God is perfect.

Question 24

What are the 2 foundations of knowledge?

Answer 24

A priori propositions and a posteriori propositions

Question 24

What is synthetic a priori?

Answer 24

Categories of the understanding and intuitions. Every event has a cause

Question 25

Descartes skeptical method

Answer 25

Experience can’t be the foundation of all our ideas because the senses are fallible. We could be dreaming or being deliberately manipulated by an evil genius

Question 26

Descartes I think = I am as an argument for not being tabula rasa

Answer 26

Maths is always necessarily true/false and I have a “clear and distinct” idea of it. I have a clear and distinct idea of myself. Trademark argument - knowledge of god as a “clear and distinct idea”. It is innate a priori and necessarily true Something greater cannot come from something lesser

Question 27

The Cartesian circle

Answer 27

Whatever I perceive “clearly and distinctly” is true. They are true because god exists and is no deceiver, who would not allow me to be mistaken. This depends on Descartes earlier proof of the existence of god. Descartes cannot know that this proof doesn’t contain an error unless he assumes that his clear and distinct perception depends on the assumption that god exists etc

Question 28

Locke’s theory of how we imagine god

Answer 28

We have experience of authority figures and merely imagine an ultimate version

Question 29

Hume - all ideas can be traced back to simple ideas

Answer 29

Impressions: perceptions (outward sentiment) and sensations (inward sentiment). Simple ideas are less vivid copies of impressions- compound, transpose,augment, diminish. Complex ideas - golden mountain

Question 30

Hume’s criticism of himself

Answer 30

The missing shade of blue

Question 31

Berkeley bringing out the absurdity at the heart of empiricism

Answer 31

“To be is to be perceived” - strict empiricists cannot prove the experience of the physical world when it’s not being perceived

Question 32

GE Moore: ethical non-naturalism

Answer 32

There are no moral facts in nature that can be verified true or false therefore morality is not empirical. Justice like yellow difficult to explain.

Question 33

Plato - maths principles exist independently of us

Answer 33

The meno salve boy deduces Pythagoras without any prior knowledge of maths. Mathematical principles exist independently of us and can be discovered in physical objects

Question 34

Locke - counter argument for Plato “slave boy”

Answer 34

If knowledge of number or deduction is innate, why can’t children/idiots reason?”

Question 35

Hune’s fork - 2 parts of reason

Answer 35

Reasons of idea and matters of fact

Question 36

Reasons of idea: Hume’s fork

Answer 36

Analytic a priori propositions demonstrate the relation between ideas and qualities that define that idea
Tautological
Necessarily true/false
A>B B>C therefore A>C
Maths doesn’t give us new knowledge of the world

Question 37

Matters of fact: Hume’s fork

Answer 37

Synthetic a posteriori propositions are continent knowledge claims about a state of affairs in the world
Verified true/ false through empirical evidence
“The sun is 92.9 million miles away from the earth”
Continently true (could change)

Question 38

What is utilitarianism?

Answer 38

Greatest good for the greatest number of people

Question 39

What is Chomsky’s universal grammar?

Answer 39

That we are born with the innate capacity to acquire language. Children are able to construct original sentences from a poverty of stimulus. All children acquire language in the same manner

Question 40

Kant’s a priori categories of understanding

Answer 40

Synthetic a priori. Causation, quantity, time, space, substance etc are all conditions of possibility for experience itself. “Concepts without intuitions are empty but intuitions without concepts are blind”

Question 41

Sapir whorf hypothesis

Answer 41

We are born a blank slate and our knowledge of the world is dependent on our language.

Question 42

What is linguistic determination?

Answer 42

The particular language we learn determines how we experience the world

Question 43

What is cultural relativism?

Answer 43

All cultures have different ideas and values which are historically specific. EG piraha Indians who have no past or future tense

Question 44

The Cartesian circle (easy)

Answer 44

Clear and distinct ideas cannot be fallible as god is no deceiver, yet this is based on the fact that god exists to make clear and distinct ideas necessarily true.