EMPIRICISM

PHILOSOPHY

PHILOSOPHY OF MANDAVAO MEDICAL SCHOOL FOUNDATION

HISTORICAL BACKGROUNDUntil the 20th century the term Empiricism was applied to the view held chiefly by the English philosophers of the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries.• English philosopher who was the first to give it systematic

expression

JOHN LOCKE

• A philosopher, Locke’s compatriot, had anticipated some of its characteristic conclusions

FRANCIS BACON

• The philosophy opposed to Empiricism

RATIONALISM• Rene Descartes• French philosopher René Descartes; the Dutch philosopher

• Baruch Spinoza• Dutch philosopher

• Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz• 17th- and 18th-century German philosophers Represented By Such Thinkers As:

JOHN LOCKEAn English philosopher and founder of empiricism, a school of philosophy based on the belief that knowledge comes from everyday experience, scientific observation, and common sense, rather than from the application of reason alone

His “Essay Concerning Human Understanding” on 1690 portrays each individual as a blank slate

The person’s experiences become notations on the slate and make each individual distinct from other people

TABULA RASAThe mind at birth,

regarded as having no innate

conceptions or blank mental cabinet

BASIC CONCEPT OF EMPIRICISM

1. The philosophical belief that all knowledge is derived from the experience of the senses

2. In philosophy, empiricism is a theory of knowledge that asserts that knowledge arises from evidence gathered via sense experience.

3. It is one of several competing views that predominate in the study of human knowledge, known as EPESTIMOLOGY

4. In philosophy, it is a doctrine that affirms that all knowledge is based on experience, and denies the possibility of spontaneous ideas or a PRIORI thought

The branch of philosophy that studies the nature of

knowledge, in particular its foundations, scope, and

validity

working from something that is already known or self-evident to arrive at a

conclusion

WILLIAM JAMES JOHN DEWEY

Called his own philosophy as

RADICAL EMPIRICISM

Called his own philosophy as

IMMEDIATE EMPIRICISM

Radical empiricism is a postulate, a statement of

fact and a conclusion The postulate is that "the only things that shall be

debatable among philosophers shall be

things definable in terms drawn from experience"

These principles emphasized learning

through varied activities rather than formal

curricula and opposed authoritarian methods,

which, he believed, offered contemporary

people no realistic preparation for life in a

democratic society

PHILOSOPHERS ASSOCIATED WITH EMPIRICISM

GEORGE BERKELEY

• Also known as Bishop Berkeley was an Anglo-Irish philosopher whose primary achievement was the advancement of a theory he called "immaterialism“

• Subjective Idealism• Latter title of “immaterialism” by others, a theory contends that individuals can only know sensations and ideas of objects, not abstractions such

as "matter", and that ideas depend on perceiving minds for their very existence• This belief later became immortalized in the dictum, "esse est percipi" or "to be is to be perceived"• He stressed that things only exists either as a result of their being perceived

DAVID HUME

• Scottish philosopher considered as one of the greatest skeptics in the history of philosophy• He thought that one can know nothing outside of experience, and experience—based on

one’s subjective perceptions—never provides true knowledge of reality• He maintained that man’s beliefs are more a result of accumulated habits, develop in

response to accumulated sense experiences

ST. THOMAS AQUINAS An Italian priest of the Catholic Church in the Dominican Order, and an immensely influential philosopher and theologian in the tradition of scholasticism

Known as Doctor Angelicus (the Angelic Doctor) and Doctor Communis or Doctor Universalis (the Common or Universal Doctor), one of the 33 doctors of the church

He is frequently referred to as Thomas because "Aquinas" refers to his residence rather than his surname, and know for his work “ Summa Theologiae”

He was the foremost classical proponent of natural theology, and the father of the Thomastic School of philosophy and theology

His influence on Western thought is considerable, and much of modern philosophy was conceived as a reaction against, or as an agreement with his ideas, particularly in the areas of ethics, natural law and political theory.

BASIC CONCEPTS OF AQUINAS ON THE NATURE OF MAN

1. Human beings have the natural capacity to know many things without special divine revelation even though such revelation occurs from time to time

• Prudence, Temperance, Justice, and Fortitude.• These virtues are revealed in nature, and are binding on everyone

2. We are able to know God through his creation. Thus, we can speak of God’s goodness only by understanding that goodness as applied to human is similar to, but not identical with the goodness of God

• Faith, Hope and Charity

3. Man must observe four cardinal virtues as:

• Eternal, Natural, Human, and Divine

4. There are three theological virtues that should also be observed by every man:

5. There are four kinds of law:

6. Human beings have no duty of charity to animals because they are not persons but it would be unlawful to se them for food, but this does not give men license to be cruel to them

7. Rational thinking and the study of nature, like revelation, are valid ways to understand God for God reveals himself through nature, so far a man to study nature is to study God

8. Man uses his reason to grasp the truth about God and to experience salvation through the truth

9. The goal of human existence is union and eternal fellowship with God and this goal can be achieved through Beatific Vision

NATURAL LAW

Governs man’s participation in the eternal law

and can be discovered by human reason

BEAUTIFIC VISIONIn Christian theology, the beatific vision is

the eternal and direct visual perception of

God

ARISTOTLE A Greek philosopher, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great

His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology

Together with Plato and Socrates, He is one of the most important founding figures in Western philosophy

His writings were the first to create a comprehensive system of Western philosophy, encompassing morality and aesthetics, logic and science, politics and metaphysics

BASIC CONCEPTS OF ARISTOTLE1. Ultimate reality in ideas is knowable only through reflection and reason. Ultimately reality in physical objects

is knowable through experience

2. In living creatures, form is identified with the soul; plants had the lowest kinds of souls, animals had higher souls which could feel and humans alone had rational, reasoning soul

3. The universe had never had a beginning and would never end; it is eternal

4. Everything in nature has its end and function, and nothing is without its purpose. Man is created for a purpose

5. If there were no change in the universe, there would be no time since the counting of motion depends for its existence on a counting mind. If there were no human minds to count, there could be no time

6. Mind and body are unified but they are not the products of physiological conditions of the body, the soul manifest its activity in certain faculties which correspond with the sages of biological development. In human, the soul manifest its activity in human reason

7. Imagination is the process by which an impression of the senses is pictured and retained before the mind and is accordingly the basis of memory

8. Reason deals with the abstract and ideals aspects

9. Human aspirations and desires have some final pursuit, and their chief end is happiness

10. The truly good person is a person with a perfect insight and a person of perfect insight is also perfectly good

11. A slave is a piece of live property having no existence except in relation to his master

12. Wealth is everything whose value can measured in terms of money, but it is the use of the money than the possession of the commodities which constitutes riches

ACCORDING TO ARISTOTLE

There Are Five Special Senses

• The rudimentary

Touch

• The enabling

Sight

• Is the central sense organ because it recognizes the common qualities which are involved in all particular objects of sensation

Heart

ELEMENT OF HUMAN SOUL

Irrational Element

• Shared with animal such as desire• VEGETATIVE FACULTY

• Nutrition and growth• APPETATIVE FACULTY

• Emotions and desires such as joy, grief, hope and fear

Rational Element

• Distinctly human• The ability to control these desires with the help of reason• Man’s desire is not instinctive but learned and is the outcome of

both teaching and practice

DOCTRINE OF THE MEANStates that the moral virtues are desire-regulating character traits

which are at a mean between more extreme character traits or vice

EXAMPLE:If one wants to develop COURAGE

Excessive desire (vice) – RASHDeficient desire (vice) - COWARDICE

FRANCIS BACON

Widely considered the most influential and versatile English writer of the 17th century

He addressed a broad range of topics in his works, including ethics, philosophy, science, law, and history

He also enjoyed a long political career

BACON’S CONCEPT OF MAN

1. Knowledge is the power of establishing the dominion of man over earth for knowledge is power

2. To arrive at knowledge, man must study natures with the intention of grasping their forces. Natures are the natural phenomena of heat, sound, light, etc., forms are the immanent forces of the natural phenomena

3. Human mind must be free of all prejudices or idols an pre-conceived attitudes because they prevent successful study of natural phenomena

THE FOUR PREJUDICES

OF THE HUMAN MIND:

Idols of the Tribe

Idols of the Cave

Idols of the Market Place

Idols of the

Theater

BASIC CONCEPTS OF MAN BY HOBBES

An English political philosopher best known for his treatise “Leviathan” Written during the mid-17th century amidst the tumult of the English Revolution

Leviathan outlines Hobbes’s theory of sovereignty or political authority

1.In the natural condition of mankind, some men may be stronger or more intelligent than others

2.In a state of nature, all men have the right or license to everything in the world

3.Life in the state of nature is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short

4.Man has a self-interested and materialistic desire to end war

5.Men form peaceful societies by entering into a social contract

6.As long as one man does no harm to any other, the sovereign should keep its hands off him

QUESTIONS1. Define the following terms:

Empiricism Tabula rasa Doctrine of the mean Beatific vision Summa Theologiae

2. Do you agree that human mind, at birth, is like a tabula rasa? Explain well your answer

3. Explain the statement that “there is no certainty that the future will resemble the past”? Cite a situational case to explain this statement

4. What is meant by the statement of Aquinas that human beings have no duty of charity to animals?

5. What is the goal of human life? Cite examples to explain your point of view

6. Is life in the state of nature “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short? Defend your answer

7. Do you agree that the “body and soul are unified”, as conceived by Aristotle?

8. It was Hume who first advanced the idea that the explanation of moral principles is to be sought in the utility they tend to promote. Explain well this statement of Hume

9. What is the goal of life according to : St Thomas Aquinas David Hume Thomas Hobbes Bertrand Russell

10. Do you agree that marriage should be discouraged because it disturbs the peace of mind of the individual? Support your answer