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John Locke's Episodic Experience Essay

1680 Words7 Pages

Every moment of our lives that we witness within the external world is taken in by our perception of the world, and into our minds. To John Locke, in accordance to his text An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, the mind is a blank sheet that is filled by the many experiences that humans witness as they live. The two main aspects that is included in making marks on this mental sheet are sensation, the initial absorption of information, and reflection, the mental process to analyze the information. In terms of sensory experiences, sensation is when our sensory organs receives the external information and reflection is when our minds process what this information indicates. However what about an episodic experience, and can Locke’s explanation be applied to current knowledge? In order to determine if this can …show more content…

The meaning of an episodic experience that this paper will refer to would be any life experience that humans will go through as this live. This can include emotionally related episodes like traumatic experience or more calming experiences, as well as an episode from any given day of a person’s years spent within the external world. A further property can be placed based on Locke’s statement within Section II, paragraph nine of his essay where he says that “To ask, at what time a man has first any ideas , is to ask, when he begins to perceive; - having ideas, and perception, being the same thing” (Locke pg.13). When Locke says having ideas, he means the knowledge and information that one receives as they live and interact with the external world. Life events are included in this since moments of our lives are made up of our perspective and interaction with the world. Therefore the definition of an episodic experience that shall be used in for the rest of the paper is an experience that is created by a person’s perspective of the external

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