A quote by Albert Einstein “Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.” one of the most influential people discussing limitations on the rational mind. The argument between empiricism and rationalism seems to be a back and forth battle between a bunch of old guys arguing about which came first the chicken or the egg. Although when they were brought together is when it seems to make the most sense. For rationalism we have the belief that reason is the primary source of all knowledge, only reason itself can give meaning to experience and separate reality from illusion. To understand truth we must be completely sure of it, this requires a rational method of inquiry based on doubt.
Chuang Tzu believed that how we perceive things are directly related to each of our separate pasts, or our “paths”. Also, that we need to realized that our conclusions and dispositions would be completely different had we experienced another past, even possibly just one single instance. Confucius believed that all things are naturally good. It is only if you haven’t pursued the way that you can turn out evil. He also believed that the most important characteristic of our personalities is created by how we treat others.
Do our senses ever fail us? Absolutely, but for the most part, our experiences are great indicators for predicting the future. So what points of rationalism are acceptable? One we can agree on is that the world is ruled by logic, that is to say if the physical world isn’t logical, then our senses have failed us. Descartes was a mathematician and physicist as well as a philosopher.
World views Materialism vs. Dualism Materialist such as Chris Frith believe that everything is composed of material, so this would mean they believe that the mind and the body are one (brain=mind).On the other hand, dualist such as Plato and Aristotle believe in the existence of a soul (mind) which is present in a different world one that is separate from the physical one. I believe that the materialists are right because there are too many scientific facts that show us how dualism is wrong. We can see that the laws of physic and other technologies show us the flaws of dualism through materialism. We have all been thought in high school the law of conservation of energy by Newton. This law states that in a closed system (our universe) energy can neither be created or destroyed it can only be transformed into another form.
Rationalism is the theory that some of our human knowledge comes from the reason, unaided by the senses. Basically rationalists believed that the truth could be broken down into two types, by using different logics. The first logic is called the law of contradiction, which means how we decide that to be false which involves contradiction and that to be true which contradicts or is opposed to the false. The second logic is called the law of the excluded middle, which means any statement made is either true or its contradiction is true, there is no middle ground. For example, in the book in chapter 2 on page 58, a statement is made that’’ two plus two equals four’’.
Plato’s theory of forms is unconvincing discuss Plato was a duellist and thus believed that there are two worlds; the material world and the world of ideas/Forms. The world of ideas or Forms is the true reality and the world of appearances is just reflections of world of Forms. Plato believed that our knowledge of the Forms was a priori which means that our souls knew the Forms before it was inside us, therefore we have knowledge prior to experiencing the objects with our senses. Plato believes everyone is born with an intuitive but imperfect understanding of the Forms. He also believes the philosopher is able, through using his intellect, to achieve true knowledge of the abstract Forms without using his senses.
Later, Philosopher Hume came out with his version of the “tabula rasa” principle, the copy theory of ideas. The theory that suggests all of our ideas are either copies of sense impressions and rearrangements of copies of sense impressions. The idea of empiricism, we cannot have reason prior to having experience. Some people often choose to believe in what we cannot see, for example, love cannot be seen directly, we are only able to see the feelings and actions that demonstrate love. In the religious domain, it’s the same scenario the people believe in what they cannot see, yet
Speech according to him is the transition of the mental to the verbal; he puts words to the superior position claiming that there is no possibility of science without words and perceptions thus neglecting empirical methods. Also we have desires and aversions, and those things that contradict our desires or aversion are seen as evil opposite – good. Further the power is defined as an instrument to get the desired object or to put another way to fulfill the appetite, one’s power may collide with another one’s that is what hold people from using it and it is called fear, not to use power because of fear is called manners. There are two types of power – one acquired from the moment of birth another through the experience. The state of nature is the war of all against all since not regarding that some maybe stronger than others everyone has capacity to kill, but people also have the Natural Rights like The Right for life – clash of these two takes place.
It also puts limits on God’s power. According to the definition of a theistic God, God is omnipotent. If God is all powerful then he should be able to command whatever he wants but by saying that morality is independent of God would mean that God is subject to the rules of morality (Fisher, 359). All in all the main issues with the Autonomy Thesis are that it would only be reasonable if one was not considering the existence of a theistic
Yet before analysing this, it is important to consider the main ideas behind Descartes’ meditations. The first of these see’s Descartes engage in a process of radical doubt, one which he believes will leave him with one certain truth, and thus a truth which can be used as a criterion to judge every other idea which he may obtain (Cottingham, 1992). The reason for this being the deceptive nature of the senses from which all his knowledge was obtained from. “All that up to the present time I