What I would like you to do is to find a topic from this week's chapter that you were interested in and search the internet for material on that topic. You might, for example, find people who are doing research on the topic, you might find web pages that discuss the topic, you might find a video clip that demonstrates something related to the topic, etc. What you find and use is pretty much up to you at this point. Please use at least 3 quality resources.
Once you have completed your search and explorations, a) I would like you to say what your topic is, b) how exactly it fits into the chapter, and c) why you are interested in it. Next, I would like you to take the information you read or viewed related to your topic, integrate/synthesize it, and then write about the topic in a knowledgeable manner. At the end of your post, please include working URLs for the three websites. Keep in mind that it will be easier if you keep it to one topic.
By integrating/synthesizing I mean to take what your read/experienced from the internet search organize the information into the main themes, issues, info, examples, etc. about your topic and then write about the topic in your own words using that information. This is hard for some people to do - many students write what we refer to as "serial abstracts." They are tempted to talk about the websites rather than the topic proper and this what you DON'T want to do! They will talk all about website #1, start a new paragraph and talk all about web site #2, start a new paragraph and talk all about web site #3, and then write some kind of conclusion. Serial means one after the other...again, this what you DON'T want to do! Also if all three sites are on the same one topic it will be easier.
At first it is a real challenge to get out of the habit of writing "serial abstracts," but I assure you once you get the hang of it it is much easier to write using the integration method. And besides this is the way researchers and scientists write their technical reports and findings - many of you will have to be able to do this for other classes and for jobs that you may eventually be hired for so now is a good time to learn this skill. At this point don't worry about a grade, worry about doing your best to have fun with the topic and then integrate it into your own words to share what you found and now know. We will work on citing the sources later....
Additional instructions: For each URL (internet resource) you have listed. Indicate why you chose it and the extent to which it contributed to your post.
Chapter 2 Topical Blog
I have chosen to do more research on Descartes philosophical ideas of psychology. Psychologists today would no doubt insist that psychology is a discipline separate from that of philosophy. Wilhelm Wundts' publish of Principles of psychsological Psychology was what led to the separation of the two making them tow different disciplines. However, In my opinion philosophy helped begin the origin of psychology, which make them which make them very close when it comes to discipline.
Descartes contribution to psychology were huge. His most popular and satisfying discipline was mathematics, this being very important when he made a discovery that led to analytical geometry. Without this discovery the concepts we use today, like defining the relationship between independent and dependent variables, calculating correlations, performing tests of significance, and other quantitative information would not exist. Yet, another important contribution to psychology made by Descartes was the realization that the mind and body were separate. Descartes introduced a new definition of mind that allowed for new developments and theories in psychology. It helped push psychology towards empiricism as well as the theories of determinism, reductionism, and mentalism. Prior to Descartes, it was a common belief that the mind and the body only worked one way; the mind told the body what to do, but the body had no input on the brain. Descartes introduced a new idea that the mind not only communicated with the body, but the body also communicated with the mind. He also introduced the new idea of two types of ideas; derived and innate. Derived ideas were those thought processes that were directly influenced by an external stimulus. Innate ideas were those that were completely a mental process, not caused by an external stimulus. Many found this useful information in his time because people assumed that the soul controlled the mind, when in reality the mind has the control of reasoning, knowledge, and emotion. This led him to many perceptions of how the brain functioned. Descartes' theory that the brain is the most important organ in the mediation of behavior certainly would be a contributing factor to the theories of people like Sigmund Freud. Descartes focus was vision and visual perception, leading him to make discoveries on vibrations of the eye when light would make contact. This concept led me to think about off-center and on-center cells of the eye. My assumption is that Descartes focus on vision and perception eventually help another person discovery this concept.
Overall, Descartes introduced ideas that are the basis for the new ideas that came directly after him. His ideas are the framework for the psychology that has developed over the last 400 years. Without these ideas, the understanding we have now of the mind body relationship would be much different. This is what I meant by philosophy origins of psychology. Many ideas and concepts of psychology were discovered by philosophers. These contributions to psychology were of major help to psychologist at the time. Without this information psychology would not be what it is today.
http://www.psychology.sbc.edu/Descartes%20and%20Kant.htm
I chose this website because it held a lot of imformation on Descartes and the origins of psychology. The information I learned from this material contributed a lot to my blog. This material helped me understand what Descartes contributed to psychology.
http://www3.niu.edu/acad/psych/Millis/History/2002/descartes.htm
I chose this website because the information gave me more background on who Descartes was and little info on what he contributed to the sciences. The webpage didn't contribute a lot to the blog but, it defiantly helped.
http://www.rep.routledge.com/article/DA026
This website withheld a lot of info also, sharing background, discoveries, studies, and philosophy. This webpage also contributed a lot to my blog simply because it shared more background on his discoveries and ideas that gave psychology an advantage.
After reading the chapter the topic that intrigued me the most and caught my interest was Locke's Theory "White Paper." This caught my eye because the one area in the field of Psychology that I really enjoy is developmental and child Psychology. I believe this has to do with that field because it talks about how when a child is born they are born with now innate ideas, they are learned by experience.
John Locke pegged the theory of White Paper. This theory says that at birth our mind has no innate ideas and is blank. It says that we gain ideas from sensation that forms complete ideas from simple ones. This happens trhough the process of divison, combination, abstraction, and generalization. This theory also says that children should be trained to learn how to collect information and evidence and base their various beliefs off sound evidence and not just random things. Also, the theory of "White Paper" places responsibility on the parents when the children are young to get them started out in the right direction. It is the parents responsibility to get their children intrigued by learning new things and skills.
I believe that when Locke introduced this theory he didn't realize that it would start a whole seperate study in the area of Psychology. He probably didn't think that it would even develop into the field of Psycholog because it didn't exsist then. But, if he didn't express his thoughts in this area Psychology wouldn't be what it is today.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/locke/
http://www.bartleby.com/218/1406.html
http://www.ffst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/doku.php?id=john_locke_s_pedagogy
I chose to do more research on Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz because I was interested in his theories about Apperception, perception, and consciousness. This fits into the chapter because in chapter 2 they did a section on him. The section was less than a page long and I thought that it would be interesting to look into other things he did, but also to look deeper into what the book talked about. I wanted to learn more about him and his theory on the Apperception. Leibniz was born in the year 1646 and died in the year 1716. He went to the University of Leipzig as a law student when he was fifteen years old. He is considered a universal genius because of what he was able to do in his lifetime in so many categories: logic, philosophy of religion, mathematics, etc. He was considered to be a German philosopher, mathematician, and a logician. One of his most known inventions was that of integral calculus. Some of the books that he wrote were New Physical Hypothesis, On the Art of Combination, and Theodicy. He wrote many more even though some were never published. Another interesting fact about Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz is that he was a librarian for multiple places and he worked on windmills, lamps, submarines, and other things when he was in service to the Duke of Hannover. Now that I am able to understand more about Leibniz as a person growing up and some of the things that he accomplished I wanted to look into his ideas of Appreciation, Perception, and consciousness.
In Gottfried Leibniz book Principles of Nature and Grace he stated what his definitions were of these ideas. To begin it should be understood that Leibniz believed that all human beings were born with a blank slate. He believed that there is past impressions that stay in your memory for use when actively using the mind. According to Leibniz Apperception is the ability for an organism to reflect on their inner states of perceptions. Apperception is the consciousness of a soul and he believed that not all souls have the ability to reflect on their inner state or that they had a conscious. Apperception can also be referred to as memory, which is said to hold the past perceptions and to hold the past in the soul. Perception is the internal state of monad representing external things. The difference between perception and consciousness is referred to as appreciation. Alongside perception are petites perceptions which are being used all the time by the organism and there are an infinite amount of them happening all the time. Perception can be both conscious and an unconscious thing. This is because we sometimes perceive something, but we aren’t truly aware that we perceive it till it is come to our full attention. In an article he uses the example of the refrigerator humming. It is an example of an unconscious perception because you may not be fully engaged in it but your mind can still distinguish that it is humming. All of this can be rather confusing to follow because it is like a circle of information with lines going every which way inside the circle. Basically everything is connected in some way or another.
One thing interesting about the beliefs of Leibniz is that he thought that there were some animals out there that were capable of understanding eternal trust of logic and mathematics. The animals that are able to do this are called rational animals and their souls are then considered minds. He believed that because when he considered the case of the dog compared to that of a human beings that they had the same mentally activities, but human beings were still different from them. He thought that all animals and most human beings were rational, but it is who can engage in reasoning that is considered more advanced.
Another thing that Gottfried Leibniz did was to come up with theories to why God existed. When I started my research on him I didn’t know much, but now that I have done some research I am now aware that his man did a lot of research in his time and really set up theories for future scientist and philosophers to work with. He believed that God exists because there had to be something out there that was so perfect and the only being that could be completely perfect was in fact God. Overall I found Leibniz to be a very interesting guy with a lot of good ideas concerning the mind and the soul.
http://mally.stanford.edu/leibniz.html This is a short webpage, but it had information about what books he published, and his life timeline. This website was a good short summary of what I wanted to know about him.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/leibniz/#AppMemRea I chose this link because it gave a good summary of his life. It is long but I went through looking for some main things about his life and then went looking for more details into Apperception, memory, and reason
http://www.academia.edu/967732/Leibniz_and_Brentano_on_Apperception I chose this one because it was comparing two different scientists and it went into better detail about perception and apperception
The topic I chose to research for chapter two was John Stuart Mill. In this chapter there were several subtopics based off of this philosopher. Within these subtopics we learned more about his childhood/upbringing, his influences, his development into adulthood/ the success he had, how his philosophy derived from psychology, and much on his logic and reasoning. The reason I chose John Stuart Mill was mostly because I was fascinated with his upbringing and I wanted to learn more about him. After skimming through a couple of websites and seeing some key topics I was excited to learn more about his personal life and some of his most popular works.
As a child, John was heavily influenced by his father James. James, at the peak of his career, worked as a Chief Examiner/administer for the East India Company, but still put aside a considerable amount of time to work on properly educating his son John. John was taught various subjects: Greek, Latin, art, literature, algebra, geometry, economics, mathematics, history, and much more. Once John hit his teen years he started exploring more on his own and began editing different legal works and more importantly philosophical manuscripts. His education was very important to both him and his father and eventually he earned a junior position for the same East India Company as his father, and later worked his way up the ladder and filled his father’s position as Chief Examiner. Shortly after this, John suffered from a short bout of depression that he attributed to his father pushing him so much. He said that he had much knowledge, but he was never fully educated on his own feelings. Gradually this depression disappeared.
Although I am greatly fascinated by John’s personal life, and was tempted to just rant on about that for the entire blog, there were a few other things not mentioned in the book that also equally grabbed my attention. One thing that intrigued me was John’s writings on “The Subjection of Women and Other Social and Political Writings.” This piece of work was first published in 1869, at time in which women were not by any means equal to men. The main purpose of this essay, as stated in the essay, was to show:
“That the principle which regulates the existing social relations between the two sexes—the legal subordination of one sex to the other—is wrong in itself, and now one of the chief hindrances to human improvement; and that it ought to be replaced by a principle of perfect equality, admitting no power or privilege on the one side, nor disability on the other.” He goes on to say how the inequality of women affects both men and children in a family and he also mentions how it alters their moral/intellectual development. I was very surprised to read this, this movement for equality seems to be out of its timeframe but it is interesting how it could be creating a framework for future events.
It seemed very brave of Mill to speak out about such a controversial topic. It’s always exciting to read about these kinds of issues, but as I read more about Mill’s works I found that this was a common theme. Another controversial issue that he wrote about was religion and published his opinions in three essays. Basically in these essays Mill’s criticized traditional religious views and came up with an alternative: Religion of Humanity. He found people to be very lazy if they believed in an all-powerful/loving God since there were so many evils on earth. Because of these evils Mills, like his father, believed that this God either wasn’t real or he wasn’t as omnipotent/benevolent like they everyone thought he was. He goes on to say that the only proof there is of a God is that he created the complex features of the world because how else could it have developed the way it did? So in response to all of these issues he had with religion he came up with his own ideas that idealized humanity. This religion still advocates purity and morally right ways of acting, but it adds that we are all participants fighting along with Religious icons like Jesus trying to secure a position on either good or evil. With this religion he believed that we all were more “capable of greater sympathy, moral feeling, and an ennobled sense of the meaning of our own lives,” essentially he believed that this religion would act as an “instrument of human cultivation.”
Mill’s childhood and upbringing is very interesting, but the fact that he touched base on such controversial issues at such an early time is mind boggling. I really enjoyed reading up on two topics that I feel strongly about and seeing his opinions on them.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mill/
http://www.iep.utm.edu/milljs/
www2.hn.psu.edu/faculty/jmanis/jsmill/sub_wom.pdf
After reading chapter two I decided to look up more information on John Locke and his views or theories on early childhood development. I decided upon Locke because I think it’s an interesting topic and given that I’m a nanny for four children I can relate it to my everyday life.
Most everyone can say that they have heard of the nature vs. nurture theories and many people tend to agree with one side more than the other given the knowledge or research they have done on the topic or just their own beliefs or possible experiences. John Locke seemed to have agreed with some aspects of the nature side, but favored or did most of his research on the nurture side. Looking along the lines of child development, Locke believed that when we are born we are actually born with a blank slate; also known as the “white paper” theory. Instead of viewing humans as having ‘innate ideas’ Locke believed that instead we had ‘natural inclinations’; which just include our personality, interests, and disinterests. I tend to think of it as being what makes us individuals and different from one another; our “uniqueness”. From what I understand it’s not that Locke didn’t believe in the natural occurrences in humans, but rather that he believed that these so called natural things had to be shaped in one way or another and this is why he thought education started from the crib, a child learns from the beginning by observing the people in their environment, long before they are able to learn from books and sources like the media and their peers.
Locke seemed to have a good sense of the development and education of children, he touched on the fact that all children are not going to be the same and can definitely not be dealt with the same when it comes to the way they react to a given situation. He encouraged that parents observe their children, because you can learn a lot about their tendencies on how they react and respond to situations under different circumstances. A point that I found interesting was that he said to watch a child in their most natural state or when they have the freedom to do whatever they enjoy doing because then you can you use that observed information to motivate that child in a particular way. Being that I have recently just learned about motivations, reinforcements and so on I just thought it was amazing that Locke had somewhat already known to do such things. The number one thing I enjoyed about Lockes views and or findings on child development was the fact that he said curiosity in young individuals is what motivates them toward knowledge. We all know that children ask a million questions, and when you finally answer those first million they will continue on with a million more questions of “why is that” and “how comes”, but Locke reminded us as adults and parents we need to see this sense of curiosity as a positive thing, yes it may be annoying at times but this is a way a child learns and develops their own mind and opinions on life. As I have gotten older and look back at younger children a quote by John Locke will stick with me for hopefully the rest of my life and reminder that you have an influence on every child’s life, children are constantly observing and something that you say or do is in some way educating them, “Children, are strangers to all we are acquainted with, and all the things they meet with are at first unknown to them, as they were to us”.
http://www.baylor.edu/content/services/document.php?id=37670
http://www.education.com/reference/article/cognitive-development2/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3zCgi_BUmY
The topic that I chose to research more about was Decartes. More specifically Decartes Dicourse of Methods. While reading the chapter that first time I was contrigued on his way of interpreting a situation and solving it through these four steps that he made up. From the chapter I gathered that this was the best method for him to gain as much knowledge about the world. I wanted to learn more so I read the Discourse and some evalutions(opinions) of the discourse to also get a better understanding of the material.
So, while I was reading the Discourse of Methods, I discovered that it was very long and mostly an essay of his life. Decartes talked about his early life all the way up until he died. Decartes education was better than anyone he knew, and he had all the advantages to be as smart as he was when he was older. The teachers were amazed at his abilities and the people older than he attended the same classes were jealous. Decartes tried to get as much information about every topic that he could while attending school. Whether it was math of reading, Decartes, wanted to know everything about the subject. After doing this he almost found himself bored of the typical education style format that he was recieving, and believed that he could teach him self differently. Decartes that in doing this that he would become even smarter than he would had staying in school. He found himself wrong and later admitted that in the Discourse of Method. He said that he was nieve for thinking that he could teach himself. Decartes later turned to some of the great philosophers in the world and learned from them. He incorporated the logic of philosphy into subjects such as math and reading. By doing this he generated four rules in reasoning. The first rule was that he would not accept anything as true which he did not clearly know to be true. The second was to divide each difficulty which he examined into as many parts as possible and as might be necessary to resolve it better. The third was to conduct his thoughts in an orderly way, beginning with the simplest objects, the ones easiest to know, so that little by little he could gradually climb right up to the knowledge of the most complex, by assuming the same order, even among those things which do not naturally come one after the other. And the last was to make his calculations throughout so complete and my review so general that he would be confident of not omitting anything. I think that in summation of all the rules is that Decartes did not judge things by their cover, he was not bias, and he examined even the littliest things as the most important.
In my continued research of Decartes I found that everything seemed to be the same thing as my initial description of Decartes life. Except that I was wrong in thinking that he was bored with the education. He was not bored, but was seeking a greater truth. He felt that he was not getting that from a typical education system. Also, during this time there was this new "natural philospohy" which is basically what we call the scientific method. Decartes was taking ideas from great phiolospher such as Bacon and Galelio. Since this was such new concept, Decartes, was on his own in the way he would present this to the public. So he came up with the four rules that I mentioned earlier. I also found out that even though Decartes was the pioneer that he needed help from other people. He wanted a collabortaion on the idea of using natural philosophy to go about finding out the answers to questions. He found his answer in God. While reading the Dicourse I came apon a sectiont that talked about God. Since God is flawless and the qualities of God are flawless then the principles that Decartes made up have to be true. God would not want someone to make up false principles, therefore what Decartes was saying was driven by something divine.
Continued research and reading lead me to the discovery of Decrates fourth part of Discourse on Method. This part is a moral section that Decartes made up to live by when he is seeking the truth. Basically made up so he does not stay frozen in time while facing the uncertainty in the practical affairs of life. First, to obey the laws and customs of his country, holding constantly to the Catholic religion, and governing himself in all other matters according to the most moderate opinions accepted in practice by the most sensible people. Second, to be as firm and decisive in action as possible and to follow even the most doubtful opinions once they have been adopted. Third, try to master himself rather than fortune, and change his desires rather than the order of the world. I think he is trying to say that by determing what is good and what is bad, then you will have a better since on what is important and a better understand of what is really good and what is bad.
http://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/descartes/descartes1.htm
This article was important becasue I got to read first hand Decartes Discourse on Method.
http://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/descartes/descarteslecture.htm
This article was useful because I got to see another opinion on the Decartes and the Discourse on Method.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/descarte/#H10
This was useful because I got to read more about the Discourse on Method and the 3 maxims that are brought up in the reading
After reading this chapter I keep finding myself thinking about the social contract theory. With all the recent controversy with gun control and other touchy subjects, I really wanted to find out how social contract theory would fit into these debates. John Locke was a big advocate of the social contract theory. He even wrote a book called "Two Treatises on Government" in 1690, which really elaborated the idea of the social contract theory. I think this concept fits into the chapter because we can see that these men faced the same problems as we do now, just in different forms and issues. They too, were trying to find out a way for the people and government to survive together peacefully. John Locke believed that the way the government operates should be determined by the people. I think that more and more, we get away from this idea in our country. This is why this topic interested me so much. I wanted to see if these theories, that were made hundreds of years ago, would actually be beneficially to us in the age that we live in. I believe the answer is yes. I understand that things have gotten more complicated but sometimes we over-think things. We need to keep in mind the ways that government and people can thrive together.
The easiest way to see how the social contract theory effects us today is looking at the Declaration of Independence. Our forefathers modeled our country and it's documents off of the social contract theory. The country that we live in today was built of these same ideas that men like John Locke had hundreds of years ago. I think that it is important for us to keep these theories in mind when making important political decisions. Though social contract theory seems to be all for the people, it also talks about when citizens choose not to take part in the government they live in. It contains the idea that if someone is not actively participating in the government, they have the right to act against them.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/soc-cont/#SH2b - Gave me some more info on John Locke and his ideas of social contract theory
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/rousseau-soccon.asp - went more into depth on the theory
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/23/opinion/krugman-the-social-contract.html?_r=0 - ideas of social contract in our era
Topical Blog 3
Chapter 2 discussed several influential individuals that impacted the philosophy of psychology. Chapter 2 ended with a short part on Immanuel Kant (1724-1804). Most of the individuals in Chapter 2 had similar view points while Kant seemed to differ from the pact as a rationalist rather than an empiricist. I chose to research more about Kant, his life, and his ideologies because I found myself very interested in him at the end of the chapter. I, as many of the individuals in the book, believe that knowledge is built from experience. However, with all the different view points discussed in chapter 2, I still have no clear stance on how I believe experience or the process of experience occurs. Kant's idea that the concept of space and time are learned "intuitively" intrigued me. I looked back on some of my first memories as a young child and it was hard to separate out what I already knew, what I thought I already knew, and what I had indeed learned throughout my short years of life.
I learned many different things about Kant. It is interesting to ponder his life experiences and wonder if/how they "molded' him into the great philosopher he became. Immanuel Kant was born and baptized as "Emanuel" but changed his name to Immanuel after learning Hebrew. I found his knowledge of the Hebrew language to be very intriguing for 2 reasons; Kant was a German native and throughout the Chapter we learned about many of the individual's rejection/skepticism of religion. I wonder if Hebrew was something that everyone learned back then or if it was just for the wealthy or prestigious families. Even more enthralling to me, was Kant's central use of religion in his theories.
The thing that surprised me the most about Kant was his lack of travel. According to one source, he never traveled more than 10 miles from his hometown, with another estimating up to 40. In either circumstance, looking at Kant's longstanding influence on modern philosophy and other specialized areas of studying, one would assume that Kant was an exquisite world traveler. His universal ideas are unimaginable to me. While thinking about all of Kant's revolutionary ideas, I thought about today's leading professionals, researchers, scientists and wondered if their ideas and inventions will be discussed in future textbooks.
Kant's ideas are widely accepted as "critical philosophy" with his fundamental principle being human autonomy. He believes that scientific knowledge, religion, and morality are simple components of human autonomy and that they are basic structures of human reason. Some would compare this to innate ideas. As you can see, some of Kant's ideas are very theoretical while others are practical. It is Kant's theory that the best philosophical systems is a combination of these two overarching views.
Chapter 2 touched the premise of his Three Critiques. "Critique of Pure Reason", "Critique of Practical Reason","Critique of Judgement". Within these monumental works, Kant teaches his ideology that the mind, contrary to Hume, can in fact think of cause and effect and that this is actually how our brain works. He believed that cause and effect, like space and time, are innate to the human brain.
Some argue that Kant's biggest influence was on that in the world of ethics. He believed that everyone should act as their own ethical king; that they should always act as moral as possible. To Kant, an action is moral only if you would want to live in a world where if everyone in that world did the same act all the time. If your answer is NO, you would not want to live in a world where everyone does that certain action all the time, then your answer is also NO, you cannot do complete that act at all, not even once. Kant split up his ideology of ethics into two parts; consequential-ism and deontology. The latter means that consequences do no matter whereas the prior means that they do. In addition to that Kant, believed that there was no grey area. Something is either right or it is wrong. He believed that you should, under no circumstances, lie and that "the greater good" does not exist. You cannot act immorally in order to stop someone else from being even more so immoral. This goes back to his original idea that everyone is their own moral king and should always behave has moral as possible. While some of these views may be far fetched, it was still interesting to learn about and it was obvious how those same dilemmas in ethics/morality still plague the human species.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwOCmJevigw - this gave me information about Kant's views on ethics along with some of the basics to his life.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant/ - this highlighted Kant's three critiques along with describing his stance on human autonomy.
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/311398/Immanuel-Kant - this gave me details about Kant's early life.
Immanuel Kant is the topic I chose from this week’s chapter. Kant was an eighteenth-century German philosopher, who believed our knowledge is built from our experiences in life. I find it interesting that he was able to link our mental capabilities through space and time of the universe. The first site explains how Kant was influential in metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, political philosophy, and much more. Although Kant was raised as a Pietist, his interests were in Latin classics. Kant would find his passion for philosophy while attending the German University of Konigsberg. Afterwards Kant went on to teach philosophy for over forty years in Albertina and did not retire until he was seventy-two years old. During Kant’s career he would publish scientific books, philosophical books, and several essays. One of his books entitled “Critique of Pure Reason,” was about understanding metaphysics as, “the cognitions after which reason might strive independently of all experiences,” states that our moral judgments are based on our ability to reason. Kant felt that reasoning is the answer for improving human life and it is important for “Freedom to make public use of one’s reason in all matters,” suggesting that our ability for individual reasoning creates many different opinions that are equally entitled to be heard. When it comes to the human mind Kant believed that it is complex with the ability to function or synthesis, this function is important for us to apply concepts which in return benefit our cognitive abilities.
The second site talks about how Kant grew up in a rationalist and empiric world of thinking and reasoning. Kant’s moral beliefs led him to create the categorical imperative, which means morally accepted laws need to be consistent and apply universally. He was interested in how we act on or resist our desires. He knew how we act or resist these desires determines our will-power. Kant was also interested in human right issues, he believed in treating “humanity as an end in itself.” Kant’s philosophy helped to shape human rights, he wanted to separate from the authoritarian way of governing, and focused on moral rights for each individual human being. He challenged people to learn more about human rights and to step back and think with a different perspective. Kant did not want people to be treated unfair for their differences; he wanted them to be embraced for their diversity. He knew the importance of communication and advocated for human rights education. “Act so that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in that of another, always as an end and never as a means only.” Kant wanted us to respect each other and to value one another’s thoughts.
The third site is on you-tube, where the narrator informs the viewer about Kant’s history. Kant’s parents were saddle makers with Piesist religious beliefs, which was a religious movement focusing on emotions and feelings. A family pastor helped Kant attend school, where his thoughts influenced his writing. Metaphysics was fascinating to him, and how we all fit in with the universe. He thought we were nothing but substance in space. Kant was intrigued by Emanuel Swedberg and his thoughts about the spirit world. He also respected David Hume’s theory about association, and was concerned with morality, and was influenced by the social contact’s view of individual treatment. He was for respecting the dignity of the common man. Kant was also committed to his perception of nature; he thought human beings are responsible for their own actions. He wanted to link human nature with the formality of freedom, and thinks truth is derived from our knowledge of experience. In other words we perceive the world from our own unique experiences.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant/
http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=afh&AN=74281231&site=ehost-live
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfkfBoTQN4I
My topic this week is Immanuel Kant. After reading the chapter I really found Kant's work to be extremely interesting and realized that I would like to learn more about his life and contributions to psychology and many others areas of academia. Immanuel Kant fit into the chapter quite nicely as in the book he is discussed as a European Diplomat emphasizing philosophy which ultimately led him to write three major books of value; Critique of Pure Reason, Critique of Practical Reason, and Critique of Judgement. These books would include very interesting information about his empiricist ideas regarding experience and how it can shape a person. Although Kant is known mostly for his philosophical work these ideas would lead into important psychological advances although Kant himself never believed psychology would ever make it to be a true science.
Immanuel Kant seems to be most recently known for his dissatisfaction with the ideas of his predecessors. One that I would like to discuss stems from Empiricist ideas of Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. These empiricists focused on the idea that human knowledge originated in our sensations. The mind is a blank slate or "tabula rasa" that becomes populated with ideas by its interactions with the world. They also argued that experience teaches us everything such as concepts of relationship, identity, and causation. Kant then took these ideas and argued that the blank slate model of the mind is insufficient to explain our beliefs; stating that some components of our beliefs must be brought by the mind to experience.
Rationalism, being an idea approached by Descartes, Spinoza, and Leibniz, was something Kant looked to shut down right away. Rationalists believe that we can know the world through the analysis of ideas and derivations done through logic and knowledge can be achieved by means of reason. Descartes, in particular, had the idea that, based on the awareness of his own existence and the existence of God, he could infer the existence of other objects. Kant's work Refutation of Material Idealism refutes Descartes idea. Kant argued that the knowledge of external objects cannot be inferred. Kant also doubted the claims of Rationalists due to their own contradictions, such as "The world has a beginning in time and is limited as regards space," and "The world has no beginning, and no limits in space." Kant goes on to argue that these contradictions have both been proven because they both share the metaphysical assumption that we can have knowledge of things as they are, independent of the conditions as we experience them. However, Kant did believe that the contradictions can be resolved if we understand the proper function and domain of the fallacies produced to contribute to knowledge. We have to recognize that we can't know things as they truly are without the knowledge of our own experience.
Although Immanuel Kant's ideas did stem from the arguments of his colleagues, he also had many great ideas of his own including his Transcendental Idealism. Known in his books, Kant discussed that in order to access objects we must fully understand sensibility. He goes on to give the example that the reason priori judgements are possible in geometry, is that space is a form of sensibility. He also details that we can't experience objects without being able to represent them specially, being that it's impossible to grasp an object as an object unless we understand the regions of space which it occupies. Without this, our sensations can't focus on the properties of particular items. Kant also discussed the importance of time. Time is something that we can't gather from experience, Kant suggests, because they can't be perceived directly.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/kantmeta/
I chose this website because it's URL attracted me from the start due to the .edu on the end, which are known to be highly valid and good source of information.
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08603a.htm
I chose this website not only because of the URL but also due to the type of knowledge that I found on the page. The site really went into a lot of detail about Kant's contributions to academia
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant/
I chose this wedsite because it had many different categories about Kant and organized it in an easy to read, yet very knowledgeable fashion.
Bre Gibbs
The topic that I decided to look into from chapter two is the Rules of Associations. Rules of Associations can also be referred to as Associations of Ideas or Mental associations. The Rules of Associations is a term used in the history of philosophy and psychology that refers to explanations about the conditions under which representations arise in consciousness. The principles are an important historical school of thinking that account for the succession of mental phenomena. The three commonly asserted principles of association were similarity, contiguity, and contrast. Many other principles were added by the nineteenth century. They observed that the association of one idea or memory with another gives a face validity. The notion of association between ideas and behavior gave some early impetus to behaviorist thinking. Some core ideas to the rules of associations accrued in some recent thoughts on cognitions and consciousness. Many people before David Hume had ideas on the rules of associations. David Hume had the strongest impression of the rules of association. David Hume attempted to improve John Locke’s epistemology on the basis of Berkeley’s radicalization of empiricism. The most important step in
Hume’s philosophy was to be found in his endeavor to discover what is given to our consciousness through our senses. Lock implied far more in its content than Berkeley and Hume was far less interested in discovering in its content than Berkeley. Hume described the same phenomena in a bundle of ideas. Hume said that we can’t discover such a thing as unity, relations as a liner, mechanical causality in those impressions or sensible things. It is not necessary to assume such a thing as unity beyond what is immediately given to us in our experience. Hume believed that he must be satisfied with what is really known and it was his task that all those universals such as substance, unity, identity, relation, causality, are to be explained by some psychological law. Hume reduced the principle of association into three groups. The three groups were identity, contiguity in time and place, and cause and effect. Hume believed that it was important to accept everything as we experience it. Hume did not allow us to apply the concepts of knowledge to natural sciences.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/association_of_Ideas#section_1
http://www.csudh.edu/phenom_studies/western/lect_7.html
http://plato.standford.edu/entries/hume/
The topic I choice for this week’s search happened to be on Berkeley’s work on vision.
It fits into this chapter because it talks about just that, Berkeley’s work in understanding how we perceive perception. I’m interested in this topic for a few reasons; for one, the eye is so complex and small but allows us to do so much. To be able to grasp at any idea to how the eye might work back then with little to work with is fascinating. For Descartes to know that the retina projects an inverted image from what we see in real life, to Berkeley figuring out that the eye consist of muscle that widen and focus to determine the perception of depth. Is remarkable and seems beyond their time to be able to come up with such theories.
One of Berkeley’s most important works was that of vision, published in his twenties in 1709 as “An essay towards a new theory of vision”. Out of these essays came one of his first works known as the “New Theory of Vision”, which showed his attempt to provide a theory of the visual perception of depth. In an age where the eyeball was a mystery to many, partly due to improper dissection, all sorts of theories prevailed in an attempt to understand its anatomy. From Leonardo’s outlook as the eye being an organ of vision to a “box camera obscura” to Maurolyco sight by retina, it wasn’t until Berkeley published his work did the philosophical world become shocked. With his attempt to explain that sight is not distance, but through touch can one immediately perceive depth. That it is the regular connection between the two ideas that allows vision to provide us information about the distance of the objects we perceive, and not the similarity between the ideas of vision and touch. But since Berkeley never made any observations on the topic, his work was seen as a contribution to the psychological analysis of the facts of vision. Never the less, Berkeley went on to publish two editions in his first year, earning him a reputation in both England and Europe as an important contributor of vision.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1315034/
http://tigger.uic.edu/~hilbert/Images%20of%20Berkeley/Berk_life.htm
http://www.bartleby.com/219/1103.html
My topic is different styles of teaching children. In this chapter I read John Locke’s view on education. He had a strict method of teaching. I’m not just talking about school though. I’m talking about right and wrong and everyday things. I am interested in this topic because I want to work with children in my career and hopefully have kids someday. I want to learn about the methods people use that work and don’t work. Parents and adults in general are very influential in a child’s life. If a child is not taught and raised well it can emotionally and psychologically damage them.
Parenting which can also be called child rearing has different styles. Parenting styles is a psychological construct representing standard strategies that parents use in child rearing. The first type of parenting is authoritarian. An authoritarian parent tells there kids exactly what to do. They are mostly discipline and not much nurturing. The opposite of authoritarian is indulgent or passive. An indulgent parent allows their children to do whatever they wish. They are all nurture and no discipline. The third parenting style is authoritative. An authoritative parent is an equal mix and authoritarian and passive. They have the same amount of discipline as they do of nurturing.
Each of the parenting styles has different styles of discipline. An authoritarian parent has clear expectations but shows little emotion towards the child. The parent might say something like “because I said so” instead of giving an explanation. A permissive parent shows a great deal of affection toward their children but they don’t set boundaries. An authoritative parent has clear expectations and consequences and is affectionate towards their children. They are flexible and problem solve well with child dealing with behavioral challenges.
Overall I all I feel like the best parenting style is authoritative. It is the best of both worlds. Teaching children is a delicate balance. You must set firm boundaries but if they do make mistakes, which will happen, you must listen to their side of the story. Explaining why you do what you do, it helps them understand and hopefully become a good parent themselves. Another hard thing for a parent to do is to let a child make a mistake. As long as it isn’t permanent they will learn from their mistakes. Just remember you are a role model to children as an adult so you need to be consistent and kind.
Sources:
http://www.webmd.com/parenting/guide/discipline-tactics
http://www.webmd.com/parenting/guide/make-your-kids-bedtime-battle-free
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parenting_styles
BR
From chapter two I decided to do more research about John Locke. I found him to be interesting while reading about his views about childhood development and education. I’ve always been interested with developmental psychology topics as well so I enjoyed learning more about John Locke’s research and theories.
Locke believed children are born with blank slates for minds so to speak. According to John children’s minds had natural feelings of personalities, likes and dislikes. The positive of the minds being blank slates is that they can be shaped or molded to learn their natural tendencies. Locke believed that with education, that the earlier they are taught the better for shaping their development. This is interesting to me because it makes me think of how it is the best time to learn a language when we are toddlers instead of when we are teens or adults.
According to Locke what drives children the most is curiosity and liberty. Children are very curious so I can see how this can push them towards discovering and learning things on their own and with others’ help. Children should be treated with rationality. By parents doing this they help set their child up for being able to reason abstractly and to practice reasonable actions in the future. Early upbringing and education if not guided by reason can be an issue to the brain which has the appearance of truth or goodness, but once believed or enacted would block development of one’s humanity according to the belief of Locke. He also thought some children are more quickly thinking or stronger wills than others, but all are equipped to become people of freely following their own reason’s declarations to become in a sense their own independent being. All of Locke’s points of his theory about child development and education kept me interested and intrigued. I enjoyed learning more about this topic because I can relate to it and see the points he makes in how my nephews were raised and how they act and obtain information as they grow.
http://www.baylor.edu/content/services/document.php?id=37670
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1692locke-education.asp
http://www.faqs.org/childhood/Ke-Me/Locke-John-1632-1704.html
The topic from chapter two that I chose was Descartes and his era of revolutionary development of science. I find his view the first to totally differ from what had already been done. This fits into the chapter because it is the first turning point towards modern psychology. He is also the first person to question the majority of things that had been done. Maybe it is the realist in me that interests me, but I find him really intriguing. The use of the Cartesian system brought reality to the subject.This class has opened my eyes to how new the study of psychology is, and how much it has changed over the short amount of time and I wanted to study more about the changes over time. Descartes is the first to push towards modern psychology. I also find the idea of religion in psychology very interesting, and descartes being the first to suggest natural creation without God’s creation. After researching I found many interesting factors.
Descartes brought reality to psychology and made the theory rational. I understand that psychology is rather new and most of our founding fathers did not particularly study psychology, therefore, I find it more interesting that someone who is trained in a different area can question an entire theory on a topic. He used the Cartesian system of rationalism, nativism and mechanistic intervention. All of his successes are claimed to be brought by his one dream with distinct visions of his destiny. These visions not only provoked his philosophical views but his mathematical views as well. On the psychology side for a general area he developed natural sciences. One of his famous quotes, “ I think, therefore I am,” is found throughout all of his workings. During my research on him I begun thinking of the meaning. Descartes being the realist he is, he rejected several other ideas. Yet when he declined these ides he revisited most to reconstruct them in firm ways. So his think quote, I think, is somewhat egotistical. He thinks logically, therefore, he is right. This brings him to the idea of thinking is directly in relationship with existence. But the introduction of reason emerges and he begins to question the evidence. Can you trust your senses? This is a tripy idea that got my mind turning. We all know as psychologist that you cannot trust your memory, yet most of our testing is done from self report. So what does that bring, can you trust your senses? He questioned EVERYTHING! This also brought consciousness and existence to his area of study. This man is truly never ending and very rational, almost to the point of crazy.
His next area of development concerned dualist and mechanist. He introduced the idea that there is a clear separation from mind and body, however, with mechanist the body operates like the mind with a direct influence on the body. His belief included that all the direction of the body, mind, and soul comes from the pineal gland. This seems to me like it generally questions religion a bit. He was the first to somewhat separate god from his philosophical view.In a few of the sites it states his religion as conservative catholic, however in one site it questions his belief entirely. As a relatively religious person this interests me as well, because the further I get into psychology studies I find myself information hungry on this topic. Descartes was in the era of enlightenment, and there is no doubt that is what he did. This brings me to the idea of empiricism vs. rationalism and the proof of god through perception. He states that god is proof of clear perception, yet this creates a circle phenonomon. The idea of rationalism is that everything can be explained with logical connections. God’s existence is however nothing but logical and that is why is is criticized. This the only topic within Descartes that is not clear to me, it seems like he stumbled with this one and gave it up to higher power. This books notes made me very interested, but very confused. The spark notes are not enough, and so I bought the book to learn more!
Overall, I enjoy learning about rationalism and Descartes. He pushed the limits and for the most part was right. He was the first to change things and object. This topic is never ending and there are several ways to seeing things, and partially I think that is why I enjoyed it so much. I want to be pushed to think in different ways.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8wh8C7lP7U
This video is silly, but a great tool to understand empiricism and rationalism. It put things in simple terms. I used this when I was thinking about how he begun his process of questioning things. And his idea of “ I think, therefor I am.”
http://www.sparknotes.com/philosophy/principles/section4.rhtml
I read through the spark-notes of this book and stumbled across his idea of proof for god based on perception. This is used toward the end a lot and a small amount in the middle when talking about religion in psychology.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/René_Descartes
I chose this site because it is the best place to get total summary in one place! I love wiki, but know it is a risky site. This site was used throughout my entire post, it used much of the same information from our text. It gave me a good background knowledge.
I read about George Berkeley, and particularly on his beliefs of visual processing.
Berkeley was from Ireland originally, but lived in many different places throughout his life, including England and America. Berkeley was highly influenced by other philosophers we studied in this chapter, such as Loche and Descartes. He believed in "immaterialism," which means that basically objects are not made of matter but we perceive them as matter. This is where we get the quote "to be is to be perceived." This unfounded belief had great influence over his work "An Essay Towards a New Theory of Vision." In that essay, he touched on all of the standard topics of vision, such as angles, lines, and distance perception. Based on what we now know about visual perception, he was wrong on some things, but overall provided a groundwork in the right direction towards figuring out how our visual processes work. His essay was pretty incomprehensible, mostly because he waffles -says a whole lot of nothing- throughout the whole thing.
Although I don't agree with everything he said in his essay on vision, I do respect the fact that he did not claim to have all of the answers. Even the title says that it is only an essay TOWARDS a new theory of vision, and not a theory of its own. Technology was not advanced enough to analyze vision like we can today.
http://tigger.uic.edu/~hilbert/Images%20of%20Berkeley/Berk_life.htm
This website gave a good background of Berkeley's life.
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/An_Essay_Towards_a_New_Theory_of_Vision
This source is Berkeley's actual essay on vision. It was very dry and hard to read, but it was a good example of some of his actual in-depth work.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/berkeley/
This site is a slightly alternative background of Berkeley's life, which I compared with the first site.
The topic that I chose to further explore from this chapter was that of Decarte’s Discourse on Method where he describes four basic rules in order to get to the truth of some matter he was looking into. The rules of the truth went as followed:
1) Descartes would accept nothing as true unless “it presented itself so clearly and distinctly to my mind that there was no reason to doubt it”.
2) Take problems and analyze them, reducing the problems to their fundamental elements.
3) Systematically work from the simplest of these elements to the more complex.
4) Finally Descartes would carefully review his conclusions to be certain of omitting nothing.
Descartes started using these rules by doubting everything he came into contact with so he could, in essence, make a clean slate for him to work with. Through these rules Descartes would be rational and believed all truth could be found through the human capacity to reason.
An interesting part to these rules he has made deals with the concept of a higher power or God. Descartes believes that there are three things that are not able to be doubted and those are: He cannot doubt that something has to be there to do the doubting (I think, therefore I am). The method of doubt cannot doubt reason as it is based on reason itself. By reason there exists a God and God is the guarantor that reason is not misguided. God is a perfect being and cannot be independent of an imperfect being like Descartes, therefore God must exist. I find this interesting because at this point in time the church is very much in power and in control of a lot of media outlets such as books and journals. It seems like Descartes doesn’t truly believe this because the argument is the reasoned proof of the existence of God. It is true that at this time this rational thought process is revolutionary but it doesn’t seem like it would hold up with today’s ideologies.
What seems to be Descartes main point in this publication is that people just need to use common sense and not believe everything they hear, see, or really figure out with any of their senses. What Descartes does in this portion of his Discourse of Methods is explains that you need to use doubt in your judgment of scholastic material and to not use skepticism; truth can emerge from a careful use of reasoning.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGh3VKdcPDw – This was a walkthrough of how Descartes came about coming up with the Discourse of Methods and just simplifies his thoughts on religion and how God would exist.
http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/world_civ/worldcivreader/world_civ_reader_2/descartes.html -This was a translated version of the Discourse on Methods that gave more insight on what Descartes was trying to get across.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discourse_on_the_Method - This was used to get a background history on the Discourse on Methods created by Descartes
Hume's theory of impressions and ideas stems is said to be given credit to previous works of John Locke. However, both were mentioned in this previous chapter, both mentioned for their theories and ideas.
Hume believes that impressions and ideas are divisions of perceptions of the mind. These perceptions occur when we are immediately aware of conscious experiences. Hume defined an impression as a "perception which involves actual sensations (hearing, feeling, seeing) and defined an idea as an "perception which arises by thinking of something, rather than experiencing it". Hume believed that an impression was more of a feeling or a sense, a perception that is clear and vivid in one's mind. However, an idea is a thought, something less clear and vivid. Hume theorized that ideas can be described as copies of an impression. For example, when a song is played, an impression is occurring, for the mind is hearing the song. When the mind is reminded of the song at a later time and moment, an idea is occurring, for the mind is thinking of the song that was previously played. Therefore, the mind is making a copy of the impression and remembering it as an idea. Hume believed that when we are creating these ideas, the mind can only use materials that a single impression or multiple impressions have provided. Alongside this, the mind can form ideas without the presences of the "thing", such as the mind can form a thought without having the feeling the sensation that would be needed to form an impression. Therefore, am impression cannot be formed without the sensation to be present. Because the mind can form ideas without a presence, it is easy to confuse and make mistakes about these ideas. Back to the song example; the song is not be played but is being remembered, it is easy to forget or make mistakes about the tune, lyrics, or formation of the song. However, it is much harder to make these mistakes with impressions because it is difficult to make a mistake about a sensation or feeling.
Overall, Hume's theory of ideas and impressions makes a lot of sense and seems sensible. After reading about the ideas and impressions, I began to consider previous sensations and thoughts in terms of impressions and ideas.
http://homepages.wmich.edu/~baldner/humeideas.htm
I selected this site and the material on the site because I have always been taught that a sign of a good website is it ending with .edu, which caught my attention. I also selected this site because the material inside the site coincided with what I had read in the book.
http://cw.routledge.com/textbooks/alevelphilosophy/data/A2/Hume/ImpressionsIdeas.pdf
I selected this site because the site is an selection from a textbook. Also, the pdf file was lengthy, showing that it was full of information.
http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl201/modules/Philosophers/Hume/hume.html
I selected this site because it is from Oregon State. A website from a college should be credible and the site was also full of lots of good information.
I chose to learn more about Descartes' innate ideas from chapter two. I think Descartes was an interesting philosopher that had a lot of amazing ideas. I don't know where we would be today with out the thoughts that he had. His thoughts on innate ideas really make me think deeply. It is a very tough argument to attempt to prove the existence of God but his argument is exceptional, especially for the time period he lived in, and it is still used in philosophical debates today. I am interested not only in his concept of innate ideas but in most of his ideas in general. He was a very wise man that is still influencing modern philosophy.
The simple definition of an innate idea is important in itself. Most things in life are thought to be learned throughout life's experiences, whether it be from parents, siblings, teachers, friends, or authority figures. It is interesting to hear Descartes' ideas on innate ideas because he proposes that these ideas are ideas that humans are born with. They are not developed throughout life or any given instance. Innate ideas are fundamental and come from no previous knowledge of anything. Descartes proposes that innate ideas are not learned but known. This is an interesting concept because that means that something has to have happened for us to just automatically know something. Some support for Descartes' theory on innate ideas came from a man, Leibniz, he proposed the thought of truisms which support Descartes theory because it means that some things are universally true to everyone. He believes that these universal truths are innate ideas.
Innate Ideas showed Descartes' ability to think rationally using intellect instead of senses. This is important because Descartes, from Plato, believed that the senses could be fooled and that to avoid being fooled by senses it was important to strictly abide by intellect and the processes of thought. Physical things could always be deceiving. Descartes believed that these senses were innate ideas because without any previous knowledge we can see, hear, and feel. We do not need to learn to do any of these things.
Descartes had a lot of interesting ideas and I am glad to have learned more information about him. His ideas on innate ideas is amazing and takes a lot of deep thought to even begin understanding. He had a lot of complex ideas that are fun to think about.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innatism
This was a helpful site because it contained a lot of background information on his innate idea concept.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes-epistemology/#1.5
This site gave some information on Descartes' influence to come up with his concept on innate ideas.
http://oll.libertyfund.org/?
option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=1698&chapter=141993&layout=html&Itemid=27
This site talked about the background on innate ideas and the contribution Descartes made.
From chapter 2, I decided to do more research on John Locke. I was interested in John Locke because I liked his theory that we are all born with blank slate. John Locke’s theory that everyone is born with a blank slate or tabula rasa says that we are not born with preexisting good or evil. Everything that we know and grow to learn comes from our sensory experiences. Locke believed that there were two kinds of ideas, simple ideas and complex ideas. Simple ideas come from sensory or reflection. This is just putting objects with senses like the apple is read or the stove is hot. While complex ideas are a combination of simple ideas. Locke suggests that we learn like building blocks. We keep adding to simple ideas and we gain the knowledge to make complex ideas.
http://nmalbert.hubpages.com/hub/The-Empiricist-John-Locke
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empiricism
http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/history_knowledge/locke.html
I decided to write about Descartes and his work because he did so much for the very beginning of psychology. Also because it was really easy to find information about his work. Although Descartes did most of his work in the field of philosophy, Descartes helped the field of psychology greatly. I am very interested in philosophy and have been interested in how the two subjects of psychology and philosophy overlap.
I very quickly found a YouTube video that (although crudely drawn, and narrated) had a bunch of his work in about 2 minutes and 30 seconds. It is nice to use to show a visual of what exactly Descartes did to come to his conclusion of "I think therefore I am" (Cogito, ergo sum). This is probably what he is most famous for. Descartes wanted to find something that was all true, something that could not be doubted. After coming to a conclusion that everything he knew could have been taught to me wrong, he concluded that in order for him to be able to doubt everything's existence, he must exist. In order for him to be doubting his doubt, he must be able to create the doubt himself.
The reasoning that Descartes used to prove everything wrong was very methodological. He had four rules which he must follow; (1) Proceed by means of doubt, (2) Divide argument into simplest parts, (3) To go step by step from simple to complex, (4) Review so that nothing is missed. Step 3 was especially important to psychology. This was an introduction to the scientific method, which is upheld by psychology.
One of his less famous works but still very important (especially to psychology) was coming up with the "Cartesian coordinates". The Cartesian coordinates are the two lines shaped like a "+" with an "x" axis and a "y" axis. With this, any point in space could be measured. This discovery is incredibly important to psychology. Without it, most of our quantitative analyses would not be possible. (For example: Defining the relationship between IV's and DV's, performing tests of significance, and correlations).
I can't imagine what the study of psychology would be like today without the works of Descartes nor would I want to know.
Sources: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHihkRwisbE
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ren%C3%A9_Descartes
http://www.psychology.sbc.edu/Descartes%20and%20Kant.htm
First source: Covered important works in a very short amount of time. A bit of rude narration but gets the point across.
Second source: Helped get a general idea of who Descartes really was and why he did what he did.
Third Source: Most helpful source. Helped me really see Descartes contributions to psychology.
In this chapter I decided to focus on John Locke's Social Contract Theory.The Social Contract Theory basically asks what is the purpose of government and why does government exist. This theory was proposed by John Locke, who was a British empiricist. An empiricist believes that that one's knowledge of the world is constructed from one's experiences. John Locke is one of the philosophers of the nineteenth century that help to start and spread empiricism in Europe.
I am interested in this section of the chapter because the theory proposes some interesting ideas. The Social Contract Theory tries to determine what drives humans to establish a government. This concept is something that I never considered before. All throughout the world, different governments and different people hold power over other people. Why does this trend transcend across cultures? Why do people need a government in the first place? These questions are very interesting and open an argument that I never thought about before.
The Social Contract theory says that government would agree to govern wisely and protect the rights, welfare, and common good of its citizens. The citizens would agree to support the government and participate in it. Citizens failing to do so could expect the government to act against them. On the other hand, governments failing their end of the bargain could expect to be overthrown by the people and replaced by a more just government.
John Locke did not invent the Social Contract Theory. He was one of many philosophers who interpreted the theory. Locke believed that people were morally bound by the Law of Nature not to harm each other. However, people had no protection from others who wanted to harm or enslave them. Locke argued that people agreed to form a government that would provide a "neutral judge", acting to protect the lives, liberty, and property of those who lived inside that government.
I believe that the social contract theory essentially comes down to one main idea: people are selfish and only want to establish their own desires. However, people realized that everyone else also wants to establish their own desires, so they give up some rights to establish a government and therefore gain other rights and protections.
There are many different stances on the social contract theory. The theory is as old as philosophy itself and the debate still continues to this day. People argue whether the desire to form a government is an innate quality or socially constructed, but I think the main lesson to be learned from the social contract theory in this chapter is that government should be controlled by the people, and that as long as they contribute to society and are proactive citizens, the government should care for them. I think we have gotten away from this in our country. Obviously the founders of the United States based the Declaration of Independence on Locke's ideas for a reason. Our government was established on the grounds that its people had the right to overthrow it if that government no longer served the needs of the people. I do not think that we need to overthrow the United States government, but I do think that we have lost sight of the fact that government only exists for the benefits of the people who live inside it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZAQZhzgwCI
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_contract
http://www.iep.utm.edu/soc-cont/
RB
For this week, I have chosen to research more about raising and educating children. In reading chapter two, I came across this subject in the section covering the British empiricist, John Locke. His views on education specifically caught my attention as it applies to what I would like to do for a living. Thus, when reading over his points on education, my interest was instantly peeked. His views on raising and educating children were very intriguing.
As I researched this topic more thoroughly, I found out that not only was Locke a pioneer in British Empiricism, but he was also a pioneer in the field of education. According to Locke, a person’s character is formed in the early years. He saw children as blank slates just waiting to be filled out. Thus the first few years are the most crucial in child development. In Locke’s eyes, children will either learn to be generally good, or generally bad. Thus he saw education as being an essential asset. In steering toward the correctional aspect of education, Locke believed in making education as pleasant as possible for children. He believed this for two reasons. One, in part, was because he wanted children to be happy for the most part. The other reason was that he believed that, if children were happy and enjoyed their education, then they would get more out of it. If children are not happy or are punished too much, then they will come to dislike the learning process. Another thing that Locke points out is that children should not be taught by rules or be made to think that learning is a task. Instead, Locke suggested that teachers and parents should teach their children through experience and practice. These were just some of the many examples I found while doing my research.
I enjoyed reading about John Locke and his views on education. His views on the stages of development, his opposition to discipline, and the relationship between the teacher and the student were all very interesting to me. I hope to learn more about him in the future.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/27532614?seq=1
This source gave me a lot of information about John Locke's background as well as his contributions to the field of education
http://www.oxbridgewriters.com/essays/childcare/rights-and-childhood.php
This webpage gave more of a detailed outline of his views on education
http://www.sparknotes.com/philosophy/lockethoughts/section5.rhtml
This site gave me specifics from his book Some Thoughts Concerning Education
While reading this chapter I became interested in John Locke's theory of personal identity. I am interested in learning more about this because how, why and what makes people think and act the way they do has always interested me. It fits into this chapter because it has discussed John Locke and Descartes. First I wanted to find out what personal identity actually consisted of. Personal identity is what makes up a person through experiences and ideas.
The Bodily Theory of personal identity is that people make judgements on the human body, people have the same appearance, DNA, and fingerprints, and that these things actually change over time. Another theory was formed by Descartes (another reason it relates to the chapter), the Immaterial-Substance Theory. This theory takes that people are only souls or immaterial substances and these are dependent on human bodies.
Both of these theories were rejected by John Locke. He believes that psychological continuity is the basis of personal identity. Personal identity doesn't occur through the brain in this theory but instead it occurs through human consciousness. He believed that our consciousness stayed the same and that through our experiences we identify ourselves. If I read this correctly it basically means that when something significant happens in our lives we remember it even years down the road and the experience shapes who we are and who we become. This contributes to psychology in a way because when most people experience something horrific they don't want to experience anything like that again so they do anything to make sure that it doesn't occur again. Or for someone who experienced a rough childhood it is going to shape that persons life either negatively or positively. The child will either act out or the child will learn from it and I guess grow up and handle it, and make sure they don't mistreat their children or give them everything they didn't have as a child.
John Locke also theorized "associationism." This theory is also known as the association of ideas. He believed that when children are young they should be making "positive associations." He believed childhood associations are most important because they help to form the self and our personal identity. It is this theory that helped the development of psychology.
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/452945/personal-identity
This website gave me the Bodily and Immaterial-substance theories. It summarized everything but part of it was a little confusing.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/person-i/
This explained psychological continuity so I better understood it.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3115296/
This website helped me understand exactly what associationism was and how it relates to psychology.
After reading the chapter this week, I decided I would really like to learn more about George Berkeley and his ideas of perception, vision, and reality. Berkeley was mentioned in the chapter with the concept of subjective idealism. In researching George Berkeley, I found the Principles, in which he claims that nothing in this world exists except ideas.
Berkeley presents here the following argument (see Winkler 1989, 138):
(1) We perceive ordinary objects (houses, mountains, etc.).
(2) We perceive only ideas.
Therefore,
(3) Ordinary objects are ideas
Materialists such as Locke and Descartes counter this argument using mediate and immediate perception. They change the argument to
(1) We mediately perceive ordinary objects, meaning that we perceive them only indirectly.
(2) We immediately perceive ideas, meaning we directly perceive and understand ideas.
Now that the way we perceive each, ordinary objects and ideas have been separated, the third claim cannot be made. Berkeley disagrees. Berkeley claims that ordinary objects cannot exist without ideas. Some have asked how, then, can an ordinary object form ideas in multiple people’s minds? For example, how can one person walk into a room and see a table, then another person walk into the same room and also come up with the idea of the table? It seems obvious that there is a physical table that gave both people this idea of a table. Berkeley claims, however, that this is not the case. He says that a purely physical object (the table) cannot act on a purely mental object (your mind). The reason this idea was put into both peoples’ minds is because someone put it there. That someone is God.
Berkeley argues that God is the only reason anything exists without human perception and human ideas. He claims that a table in a room with no one in it still exists because it is in God’s mind.
Berkeley also claims that ideas cannot exist without the mind. In this, he is saying that the table cannot exist without the mind thinking about it. Again, it does not have to be a human idea in a human mind. He is simply stating that the only way any of us have encountered this world is through ideas. Try to come up with anything that exists without though. The problem here, of course, is that you are thinking of it now, and it now exists as an idea in your mind.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/berkeley/
http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/berkeley/principles1.html
http://www.philosophybro.com/2012/01/george-berkeleys-treatise-concerning.html
In reading the chapter this week, I became interested in John Locke. While researching him I learned more about his theory of personal identity and decided to write about that for the blog assignment.
The theory of personal identity asks whether a person is the same at two different times. For example, am I the same person now as I was when I was ten years old?
Some people believe that because I have the same body that I had when I was ten that I am the same person. I have the same DNA, the same facial features, the same organs, etc. This is the Bodily Theory. Descartes would disagree with this idea, because bodies can be similar in appearance and DNA.
The Immaterial Substance Theory discusses how a person's identity is based on their soul, and not the body they are put into. It was believed that if you took the soul from a prince and put that soul into the body of a cobbler, the cobbler would now be the prince. The physical form is not what matters, but the soul inside the form. This was the theory that Renee Descartes believed in.
Both of these theories were rejected by John Locke. He said that the identity of a person consists of the sameness of consciousness. This means that identity depends on the thoughts, memories, and experiences a person has. Locke believes in a human soul, but is unsure of the role a soul plays on identity.
Because of this idea, Locke believes that a person who suffers from amnesia but is conscious will have an instant identity, but does not have an identity over time. This is because they are able to form thoughts and have experiences, but they do not have a lifetime of memories to fall back on.
It is also believed a person who committed a crime will be forgiven by God as long as they do not remember committing it. This is because it is no longer part of their memories or past experiences, which makes it no longer part of their personal identity. They are, however, still guilty of committing the crime, and should be punished for it.
A person's identity is constantly changing and growing. With each passing second a person experiences more, has more thoughts, and creates more memories that allow them to grow. The framework of the person stays the same, but the content continues to change.
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/452945/personal-identity/296529/Traditional-criticisms
http://voices.yahoo.com/john-lockes-theory-personal-identity-688130.html?cat=38
http://www.philosophyideas.com/files/mind/Locke%20on%20Personal%20Identity.pdf
The topic I chose from this chapter was Descartes’ views on the mind-body problem. Being a Cartesian dualist, he thought that the mind could exist and be viewed as separate from the body. He believed that the mind was a “thinking” thing and the body was a “non-thinking” thing. The reason I chose this topic is because I agree with him. I think that the mind and body are connected, but they are separate. Descartes also believed that the mind could influence that body, and vice versa (interactionism). In context of the mind being the same as a “soul”, I believe that when our bodies die, our souls do not. We have hopes, dreams, feelings, and these things make me believe this. Also, being a Christian, as even Descartes was, exempts me from believing that our souls die along with our bodies. He was educated in the scholastic tradition, which combines the Church views and reason. However, I also think that many philosophers and scientists probably went along with the community when it came to religious authority, as to not be shunned by others. Aristotle went along with these views, although he believed that the mind and body died simultaneously, so it would be possible that he did not actually believe in God. Descartes arguments were that he could “doubt” whether or not he had a body, but could not when it came to having a mind, as well as the thinking vs. non-thinking ideas I discussed earlier. His famous quote, “I think, therefore I am,” explains his views quite well. If he could imagine himself without a body, though, couldn’t it be possible for him to imagine himself without a mind as well? I believe this was some philosophers’ return arguments toward this argument. Some other arguments toward Descartes’ views that I uncovered in my research were that we can perceive our thoughts, but are our minds seeing and thinking, or is the perception point located in another world or dimension? This was one of the deeper arguments that I found, and it really made my mind spin. Who actually perceives the emotions and experiences that are occurring with our souls? Is it our minds, souls, or something somewhere else?
I agree with all of Descartes’ arguments, and I think I will also add one: consciousness. If one is unconscious, the body will still be breathing and working on autopilot, but your mind is having no thoughts or emotions. Your “soul” is not having any experience whatsoever. If it is true that your thoughts can be blank while your body still working, couldn’t that be considered a rational argument for this problem? For every theory, however, there has to be some doubts to your own thoughts. Mine is that if your mind and body are separate, is it possible that these things can be interchanged with other people? Could your soul enter a vacant body? I’m not sure on that one. This was Plato’s view on the question, and I suppose it could be possible, but how many bodies do you have to go through before God sends you to heaven? Plato apparently believed in metempsychosis, where the soul “migrates” to a different body when you die. I think some cultures believe in this as well. I think it is an interesting concept, but if there is a heaven, and you only get “one life”, what does God consider to be “one life”. Furthermore, if your mind, or soul, migrated to a different body, wouldn’t all recollection of inhabiting your previous body be erased? I think I would probably remember if I had a previous body, but maybe this is my first.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dualism_%28philosophy_of_mind%29 I chose this source due to its content and other views related to Descartes’, as well as different views from other philosophers. This way, I got to see the other views and decide whether or not I agreed with him.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/dualism/ I chose this for its amount of content and also because of reliability. Stanford is known for its elite academics, so I thought this would be a good one. It discussed other views during his time, as well as views that derived from his own.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQteB83stEE This source was a video from an academic who is very interested in digital culture, religious experience, philosophy of mind, film, science fiction and consciousness studies. His name is Jeremy Johnson, and from his biography, I also got that he was working on a Master’s degree in Consciousness studies. His thoughts and interpretation of Descartes’ views are very intriguing and he sounds very knowledgeable on the subject.