John Locke Research Paper

Anum Shah

November 5, 2014

John Locke

John Locke is an English man. He was a doctor during his time. Locke belonged to the royal society. The royal society consists of people who were forward thinkers. Locke was into politics; he also wrote on politics and argued on contract theories. Locke was an empiricist. Locke believes all ideas come from experiences.

John Locke believes ones knowledge is based on experiences. He says everyone is born with no ideas. He says, “When you’re born you know nothing, you have instincts, as you get older you get experienced and gain ideas through experiences.” I disagree with him on that specific subject. As humans babies are born with few ideas. Babies remember their birth, thus the unusual crying in their

The first one is Ideas of sensation. Ideas of sensation include the five senses; to touch, to taste, to see, to hear, and to smell. An idea of sensation also includes external objects. External objects are colors, light, heat, cold etc. The second experience John Locke mentions is Ideas of reflection. Ideas of reflection include operation of the mind, such as, what one is thinking of when they are actually thinking of. To say it another way is, to think of their thought. Another Idea of reflection is internal sense, which is to be aware of what we think, such as emotions, feelings and how one makes judgments. Idea of reflection “comes from the mind.” John Locke also says, “Experiences are sources.” He goes into detail and explains experiences are sources of your thoughts/ideas. John Locke believes one cannot think of the color red if he never seen it before. John Locke believes thinking is like motion in bodies. I agree with him because before we think to move our body something signals our brain which signals it back in order for our body to make a

He believes the mind is mostly passive in experiences and cannot avoid having simple ideas. Simple ideas are one uniform appearance. Simple ideas cannot be created or destroyed; they do not have will power. However, complex ideas are ideas of a thing. Complex ideas are made of simple ideas. Simple ideas are broken into three types matter, mind and existence. Matter is a shape, for example solidity and figure. Mind is pain and pleasure such as motive for acting. For example, ones senses: to look good or to look bad, Taste good or taste bad. Matter and mind make up existence which is unity. John Locke explains unity is units such as dividing things up. Existence is also succession which is time and power which is manipulating