Greg Detre
Thursday, 04 October, 2001
Lucy Allais/Dr Tasioulas
'It seems to me a near contradiction to say that
there are truths imprinted on the soul which it perceives or understands not'
(LOCKE). Is this a contradiction? If it is not, does Locke's case against
innate principles collapse?
If 'the boundaries of the species, whereby men sort
them, are made by men' (LOCKE) what is the role of real essences?
'But yet possibly it will still be objected, suppose
I wholly lose the memory of some parts of my life beyond a possibility of
retrieving them ... yet am I not the same person that did those actions, had
those thoughts that I once was conscious of, though I have now forgot them?'
(LOCKE). Can Locke answer this objection to his account of personal identity?
'We must here take notice, what the word I is
applied to' (LOCKE). How, according to Locke, is one to tell whether an
utterance of 'I' is applied to a man or a person?
'Essences being thus distinguished into nominal and
real, we may further observe, that in the species of simple ideas and modes,
they are always the same: but in substances, always quite different' (LOCKE).
Discuss.
'Knowledge then seems to me to be nothing but the
perception of the connexion and agreement, or disagreement and repugnancy of
any of our ideas' (LOCKE). 'All the objects of human reason or enquiry may
naturally be divided into two kinds, to wit, relations of ideas, and matters of
fact' (HUME). Does Locke make room for knowledge of matters of fact?
Can Locke explain how we have an idea of solidity?
'But if it be possible for the same man to have
distinct incommunicable consciousness at different times, it is past doubt that
the same man would at different times make different persons' (LOCKE). Is it?
'How shall the mind, when it perceives nothing but
its own ideas, know that they agree with things themselves?' (LOCKE). Has Locke
a satisfactory response?
Is Locke right to conclude that the ideas of primary
qualities of bodies are resemblances of those qualities, while ideas of
secondary qualities are not?
'Nothing but consciousness can unite remote
existences into the same person; the identity of substance will not do it'
(LOCKE). Is this correct?
Is Locke justified in distinguishing real from
nominal essence?
'Is it not ... a great contradiction to talk of
conceiving a thing which is unconceived?' (BERKELEY). Is it?
'... a certain colour, taste, smell, figure and
consistence having been observed to go together, are accounted one distinct
thing, signified by the name apple ...' (BERKELEY). Can Berkeley explain the
difference between my seeing one apple, while tasting another; versus my seeing
and tasting the same apple? (2001)
'After what hath been said, it is I suppose plain,
that our souls are not to be known in the same manner as senseless inactive
objects, or by way of ideas' (BERKELEY). Does Berkeley satisfactorily explain
how we know about ourselves and about other selves? (2001)
Is the account that Hume gives of our common sense
thought about the perception of objects an improvement on Berkeley's?
Is Berkeley right to maintain that the doctrine that
physical objects can exist unperceived depends on the doctrine of abstract
ideas?
'The connexion of ideas does not imply the relation
of cause and effect, but only of a mark or sign with the thing signified'
(BERKELEY). Why does Berkeley believe that, and what is the importance of the
thesis for his account of reality?
'God, whom no external being can affect ....
perceives nothing by sense as we do' (BERKELEY). How then can Berkeley hold
that unthinking beings are necessarily perceived by the infinite mind of God?
'If we have no idea of spirit, Berkeley cannot
explain how we can generalise about spirits.' Is this a fair objection?
Is Berkeley justified in insisting that his
arguments against 'that which philosophers call matter' do not detract from
'the existence and reality of things'?
'It remains therefore that the cause of ideas is an
incorporeal active substance or spirit' (BERKELEY). Assess Berkeley's arguments
for this conclusion.
'An idea, which considered in itself is particular,
becomes general by being made to represent or stand for all other particular
ideas of the same sort' (BERKELEY). Does Berkeley explain how this is possible?
Can Berkeley consistently allow that an oar with one
end in the water may look crooked although it is really straight?
How important for Berkeley's immaterialism is his
view that 'the very being of an idea implies passiveness and inertness in it,
insomuch that it is impossible for an idea to do anything'?
Does Hume show that our propensity to expect the
future to resemble the past is unreasonable? (2001)
Is the account that Hume gives of our common sense
thought about the perception of objects an improvement on Berkeley's? (2001)
'In short, there are two principles which I cannot
render consistent; nor is it in my power to renounce either of them, viz. that
all our distinct perceptions are distinct existences, and that the mind never
perceives any real connexion among distinct existences' (HUME). Is Hume's own
criticism of his account of the self the best criticism of it? (2001)
How important is the imagination in Hume's
philosophy?
'The central defect of Hume's discussion of
causation is that from beginning to end we do not know what "necessary
connexion" means.' Do you agree?
Does Hume have an adequate explanation of our belief
in the external world?
Why does Hume have such difficulty in explaining the
nature of belief?
'What is our idea of necessity, when we say that two
objects are necessarily connected together?' (HUME). Can Hume's answer be
improved on?
'...'Tis vain to ask, Whether there be body or not?
That is a point, which we must take for granted in all our reasonings' (HUME).
Why must we? Does Hume consistently take it for granted?
'We have no reason to draw any inference concerning
any object beyond those of which we have had experience' (HUME). What does this
mean? Has Hume proved it?
'Were we not first perswaded that our perceptions
are our only objects and continue to exist even when they no longer make their
appearance to the senses, we should never be led to think that our perceptions
and objects are different and that our objects alone preserve a continued
existence' (HUME). Does Hume have good reasons for thinking this?
Is Hume right to be dissatisfied with his account of
the self?
Explain the significance of, and assess Kant's
arguments for, the claim that space is transcendentally ideal.
What according to the transcendental deduction is
the connection between self-consciousness and the objectivity of the
categories?
Does Kant refute all the main arguments for the
existence of God?
Did Kant succeed in explaining how synthetic a priori
propositions are possible?
Does Kant have any good reasons for thinking that
space is transcendentally ideal?
What do you think that the Transcendental Deduction
is trying to show? What, if anything, does it show?
Has Kant a consistent view about the
thing-in-itself?
Might space and time be wholly our contribution to
experience?
'It must be possible for the "I think" to
accompany all my representations; for otherwise something would be represented
in me which could not be thought at all, and that is equivalent to saying that
representation would be impossible, or at least would be nothing to me' (KANT).
Discuss.
Does Kant succeed in disproving empirical idealism?
Explain Kant's treatment of the proposition that
every event must have a cause.
When Kant maintains that a man who tells a malicious
lie could have refrained from doing so, is this consistent with his other
philosophical views?
Is the account that Hume gives of our common sense
thought about the perception of objects an improvement on Berkeley's?
'We have first raised a dust, and then complain, we
cannot see' (BERKELEY). Were most of the philosophical problems of this period
of philosophers' own making?
'Empiricists explain thought in terms of perception,
whereas rationalists explain perception in terms of thought'. Discuss.
'What is thinking?' Compare the views on this of any
two of the philosophers you have studied for this paper.
'It would be a travesty to claim that the
empiricists believed that knowledge was based entirely on sensory information,
and the rationalists that knowledge was based purely on reason.' Discuss with
reference to at least one empiricist and one rationalist philosopher covered by
this paper.
Compare and assess the approaches to scepticism of
at least two of the philosophers covered by this paper.
'It seems to me a near contradiction to say that there are truths imprinted on the soul which it perceives or understands not' (LOCKE). Is this a contradiction? If it is not, does Locke's case against innate principles collapse? (2001)
Can Locke explain how we have an idea of solidity? (1999)
Is Locke right to conclude that the ideas of primary qualities of bodies are resemblances of those qualities, while ideas of secondary qualities are not? (1998)
If 'the boundaries of the species, whereby men sort them, are made by men' (LOCKE) what is the role of real essences? (2001)
'Essences being thus distinguished into nominal and real, we may further observe, that in the species of simple ideas and modes, they are always the same: but in substances, always quite different' (LOCKE). Discuss. (2000)
Is Locke justified in distinguishing real from nominal essence? (1998)
'But yet possibly it will still be objected, suppose I wholly lose the memory of some parts of my life beyond a possibility of retrieving them ... yet am I not the same person that did those actions, had those thoughts that I once was conscious of, though I have now forgot them?' (LOCKE). Can Locke answer this objection to his account of personal identity? (2001)
'We must here take notice, what the word I is applied to' (LOCKE). How, according to Locke, is one to tell whether an utterance of 'I' is applied to a man or a person? (2000)
'But if it be possible for the same man to have distinct incommunicable consciousness at different times, it is past doubt that the same man would at different times make different persons' (LOCKE). Is it? (1999)
'Nothing but consciousness can unite remote existences into the same person; the identity of substance will not do it' (LOCKE). Is this correct? (1998)
'In short, there are two principles which I cannot render consistent; nor is it in my power to renounce either of them, viz. that all our distinct perceptions are distinct existences, and that the mind never perceives any real connexion among distinct existences' (HUME). Is Hume's own criticism of his account of the self the best criticism of it? (2001)
Is Hume right to be dissatisfied with his account of the self? (1998)
'Knowledge then seems to me to be nothing but the perception of the connexion and agreement, or disagreement and repugnancy of any of our ideas' (LOCKE). 'All the objects of human reason or enquiry may naturally be divided into two kinds, to wit, relations of ideas, and matters of fact' (HUME). Does Locke make room for knowledge of matters of fact? (2000)
'It would be a travesty to claim that the empiricists believed that knowledge was based entirely on sensory information, and the rationalists that knowledge was based purely on reason.' Discuss with reference to at least one empiricist and one rationalist philosopher covered by this paper. (1999)
Is Berkeley right to maintain that the doctrine that physical objects can exist unperceived depends on the doctrine of abstract ideas? (2000)
Is Berkeley right to maintain that the doctrine that physical objects can exist unperceived depends on the doctrine of abstract ideas? (2000)
'... a certain colour, taste, smell, figure and consistence having been observed to go together, are accounted one distinct thing, signified by the name apple ...' (BERKELEY). Can Berkeley explain the difference between my seeing one apple, while tasting another; versus my seeing and tasting the same apple? (2001)
Is the account that Hume gives of our common sense thought about the perception of objects an improvement on Berkeley's? (2001)
Is Berkeley justified in insisting that his arguments against 'that which philosophers call matter' do not detract from 'the existence and reality of things'? (1999)
'It remains therefore that the cause of ideas is an incorporeal active substance or spirit' (BERKELEY). Assess Berkeley's arguments for this conclusion. (1999)
Can Berkeley consistently allow that an oar with one end in the water may look crooked although it is really straight? (1998)
How important for Berkeley's immaterialism is his view that 'the very being of an idea implies passiveness and inertness in it, insomuch that it is impossible for an idea to do anything'? (1998)
Does Hume have an adequate explanation of our belief in the external world? (2000)
'...'Tis vain to ask, Whether there be body or not? That is a point, which we must take for granted in all our reasonings' (HUME). Why must we? Does Hume consistently take it for granted? (1999)
'Were we not first persuaded that our perceptions are our only objects and continue to exist even when they no longer make their appearance to the senses, we should never be led to think that our perceptions and objects are different and that our objects alone preserve a continued existence' (HUME). Does Hume have good reasons for thinking this? (1998)
'After what hath been said, it is I suppose plain, that our souls are not to be known in the same manner as senseless inactive objects, or by way of ideas' (BERKELEY). Does Berkeley satisfactorily explain how we know about ourselves and about other selves? (2001)
'If we have no idea of spirit, Berkeley cannot explain how we can generalise about spirits.' Is this a fair objection? (1999)
'It remains therefore that the cause of ideas is an incorporeal active substance or spirit' (BERKELEY). Assess Berkeley's arguments for this conclusion. (1999)
Does Hume show that our propensity to expect the future to resemble the past is unreasonable? (2001)
'The connexion of ideas does not imply the relation of cause and effect, but only of a mark or sign with the thing signified' (BERKELEY). Why does Berkeley believe that, and what is the importance of the thesis for his account of reality? (2000)
'The central defect of Hume's discussion of causation is that from beginning to end we do not know what "necessary connexion" means.' Do you agree? (2000)
'What is our idea of necessity, when we say that two objects are necessarily connected together?' (HUME). Can Hume's answer be improved on? (1999)
Explain Kant's treatment of the proposition that every event must have a cause. (1998)
'How shall the mind, when it perceives nothing but its own ideas, know that they agree with things themselves?' (LOCKE). Has Locke a satisfactory response? (1999)
'An idea, which considered in itself is particular, becomes general by being made to represent or stand for all other particular ideas of the same sort' (BERKELEY). Does Berkeley explain how this is possible? (1998)
How important is the imagination in Hume's philosophy? (2000)
Does Hume have an adequate explanation of our belief in the external world? (2000)
Why does Hume have such difficulty in explaining the nature of belief? (1999)
'What is thinking?' Compare the views on this of any two of the philosophers you have studied for this paper. (2000)
Explain the significance of, and assess Kant's arguments for, the claim that space is transcendentally ideal.
What according to the transcendental deduction is the connection between self-consciousness and the objectivity of the categories?
Does Kant have any good reasons for thinking that space is transcendentally ideal?
Might space and time be wholly our contribution to experience?
Did Kant succeed in explaining how synthetic a priori propositions are possible?
'Is it not ... a great contradiction to talk of conceiving a thing which is unconceived?' (BERKELEY). Is it? (2001)
'God, whom no external being can affect .... perceives nothing by sense as we do' (BERKELEY). How then can Berkeley hold that unthinking beings are necessarily perceived by the infinite mind of God? (2000)
'We have no reason to draw any inference concerning any object beyond those of which we have had experience' (HUME). What does this mean? Has Hume proved it? (1998)
Does Kant refute all the main arguments for the existence of God?
What do you think that the Transcendental Deduction is trying to show? What, if anything, does it show?
Has Kant a consistent view about the thing-in-itself?
'It must be possible for the "I think" to accompany all my representations; for otherwise something would be represented in me which could not be thought at all, and that is equivalent to saying that representation would be impossible, or at least would be nothing to me' (KANT). Discuss.
Does Kant succeed in disproving empirical idealism?
When Kant maintains that a man who tells a malicious lie could have refrained from doing so, is this consistent with his other philosophical views?
'We have first raised a dust, and then complain, we cannot see' (BERKELEY). Were most of the philosophical problems of this period of philosophers' own making?
'Empiricists explain thought in terms of perception, whereas rationalists explain perception in terms of thought'. Discuss.
Compare and assess the approaches to scepticism of at least two of the philosophers covered by this paper.
Grayling (ed) *Philosophy: A guide through the subject*, chapters on 'Empiricism' and 'Rationalism'
Bennett *Locke, Berkeley, Hume*
Personal identity: Williams, Problems of the Self
Causation:
Primary and secondary qualities: Mackie
Berkeley??? (Dancy???)
? Locke on PQ/SQ
? Locke on personal identity (Williams)
Berkeley
Hume on causation
? Hume on induction
? Hume theory of mind
Locke�s world is composed of insensate, indivisible and minute particles, or corpuscles, with the properties of extension and motion. These are arranged into macroscopic structures, which we recognise as objects. We can be said to �see� something when we form an image in our minds which resembles its cause. This is known as the representative theory of perception, in that our ideas are immediate and represent and intermediate between us and the real material world. This material world would continue to exist, even if all humans and minds were to vanish from the world.
Secondary qualities do not exist in the objects, insofar as the objects can be described entirely in terms of their primary qualities. However, by virtue of their composition the objects have dispositions to cause certain ideas in us, and it results from the primary qualities of an object to give rise to our ideas of its secondary qualities, like colour. For instance, in the case of a mirror, we would say that its reflectivity is not a primary quality, that is to say, it is a structure composed wholly of corpuscles with the primary qualities of position, size, motion etc. Yet the particular arrangement of its surface corpuscles give rise to a disposition to cause us to see our reflections in the mirror. Like colour and the other secondary properties, the reflectivity does not reside in so much as arise out of the object.
Locke is a realist then: objects in the world exist wholly independently of us, and any other perceiving minds, being there to perceive them. They have only primary qualities. Their secondary qualities are dispositions, inherent in their particular instantiation of primary qualities, which when perceived, have secondary qualities attached in the idea formed by the perceiving mind. If there were no perceiving minds, the dispositions in the object would never give rise to secondary qualities. However, given that there are perceving minds, secondary qualities could be said to reside in the object in its dispositions, even while it is not being actively perceived at a given time.
Williams: psychological continuity isn�t one-one, so it can�t be a ground for speaking of identity
Parfit: when it is one-one, psychological continuity can be a ground for speaking of identity
psychological connectedness = matter of degree
(as opp to psychological continuity = yes/no)
Locke + Butler debate: can�t analyse identity in terms of memory because memory presupposes identity
q-memory = natural next step
a memory doesn�t count unless the past experience is causally related to the memory � it�s not enough for them simply to match
attacking Parfit:
I am more intimately related to my body, not just as a brain in a body � it wouldn�t be me if I was in a different body
empirical facts relating brain to its housing body
just because a brain transplant is conceivable (as mind-body zombie distinctions seem conceivable), doesn�t mean that there isn�t a systematic and intimate unseparable brain-body relation
the question of personal identity might not have an answer
'We must here take notice, what the word I is
applied to' (LOCKE). How, according to Locke, is one to tell whether an
utterance of 'I' is applied to a man or a person?
'Essences being thus distinguished into nominal
and real, we may further observe, that in the species of simple ideas and
modes, they are always the same: but in substances, always quite different'
(LOCKE). Discuss.
'Knowledge then seems to me to be nothing but
the perception of the connexion and agreement, or disagreement and repugnancy
of any of our ideas' (LOCKE). 'All the objects of human reason or enquiry may
naturally be divided into two kinds, to wit, relations of ideas, and matters of
fact' (HUME). Does Locke make room for knowledge of matters of fact?
Which are the Lockean primary and secondary qualities???
The Aristotelian primary/secondary distinction was on the basis of whether or not 2 senses could give us information about the same property, usually touch and vision. But don�t taste and smell combine to tell us about the chemical properties of an object??? Should our resulting idea of an item of food then be considered a primary quality???
soul vs consciousness vs thinking???
�waking man, whereof the sleeping man is never conscious, has never the least perception. I ask then, whether Castor and Pollux, thus, with only one soul between them, which thinks and perceives in one what the other is never conscious of, nor is concerned for, are not two as distinct persons as Castor and Hercules, or as Socrates and Plato were?� � Locke is making an analytic statement about personal identity
�To think often, and never to retain it so much as one moment, is a very useless sort of thinking� � yeah, but that�s because Locke doesn't consider unconscious memories
arguments against matter:
arguments that all of the secondary qualities are in the mind:
intense heat + pain are a single unitary sensation, and pain only exists in the mind of a perceiver
arguments that all of the primary qualities are in the mind
other arguments
proofs of God:
continuity, i.e. that objects don't disappear when there�s no finite mind perceiving them
coherence of objects as collections of ideas + laws of nature in general
Is Berkeley right to maintain that the doctrine
that physical objects can exist unperceived depends on the doctrine of abstract
ideas?
'The connexion of ideas does not imply the
relation of cause and effect, but only of a mark or sign with the thing
signified' (BERKELEY). Why does Berkeley believe that, and what is the
importance of the thesis for his account of reality?
'God, whom no extemal being can affect ....
perceives nothing by sense as we do' (BERKELEY). How then can Berkeley hold
that unthinking beings are necessarily perceived by the infinite mind of God?
Don�t all pure forms of monism really come down to the same thing???
Why do I dislike the argument from �but isn�t extreme heat a pain�???
can we not say that there is a disposition in heat to cause pain when perceived, so that the pain is a secondary quality in the way that Locke (see Dancy above) describes it, that is, a necessary result of the way the object (here, heat) is, but
Doesn�t his follow-up argument that great heat and ensuing great pain appear as but one uniform sensation rests on his earlier fallacy that perception is immediate, with no processing or reasoning involved??? Also, he states without proof that just because the sensation of heat and pain appears �simple and uniform� that it is �uncompounded�.
Why can�t you imagine sensible pain without any extraneous qualities???
his argument against causation is that our idea of necessary connection derives from reflection upon Custom(???), rather than any sensory impression, and so is not true knowledge (since any true idea must have its source in sensory impressions, right???)
i.e. it�s only a �relative idea� (cf Strawson, appendix C), a proposition empty of positively/descriptively-contentful blah blah�
and his argument about induction takes over from this
ok, so we don't have an impression-based idea of necessary connection and we rely on Custom strengthening the assocation (i.e. contiguity, priority plus constant conjunction) between cause and its attendant effect)
the problem of induction:
we have no idea if the laws of nature are going to stay stable
we don't know if we�re noticing the right regularities
or more accurately, even if the laws of nature stay the same, we don't know whether the regularities we�re noticing are time-dependent (cf Goodman�s new problem of induction)
How important is the imagination in Hume's
philosophy?
'The central defect of Hume's discussion of
causation is that. from beginning to end we do not know what "necessary connexion" means.' Do you agree?
Does Hume have an
adequate explanation of our belief in the external world?