PSYC 488 - History and
Systems Exam 1 Study Guide
- Mechanism
- Zeitgeist (personalistic vs. naturalistic views of
history)
- Determinism
- Reductionism
- Empiricism
- DESCARTES AND HIS CONTRIBUTIONS
- Mind-body dualism
- Innate vs. Derived Ideas
- Theory of Reflex Action
- MAJOR POST-CARTESIAN TRENDS IN EARLY WESTERN
PHILOSOPY
- EARLY BRITISH EMPIRICISM - John Locke
- rejection of innate ideas
- mind at birth as Tabula Rasa (blank slate)
- all ideas (thoughts) are the result of experience
- Objects in the physical world have two qualities: PRIMARY
and SECONDARY
- PRIMARY QUALITIES: properties of objects that exist
whether or not the object is perceived (examples: mass,
density).
- SECONDARY QUALITIES: properties of objects that only
exist when perceived (examples: taste, beauty).
- 2 kinds of ideas (thoughts): SIMPLE and COMPLEX
- SIMPLE IDEAS: Raw Sensory Impressions
- COMPLEX IDEAS: Combinations of many Sensory
Impressions
- ASSOCIATION: The process of combining SIMPLE IDEAS to
form COMPLEX IDEAS
- EARLY BRITISH EMPIRICISM - George Berkeley
- MENTALISM (subjective idealism): There are NO primary
qualities--all simple ideas are really the subjective
experience of secondary quality formation by the mind-- we
can never really know the nature of the external world.
Objects ONLY exist when they are being perceived.
- DEPTH PERCEPTION: A "by-product" of subjective idealism--
results from associations between feedback from muscles in
our eyes as we focus on various objects. Not a primary
quality of the physical world at all.
- BERKELEY'S MENTALISM criticized as Solipsism... it
required a specific view of God as a "surrogate perceiver"
when no actual people were around.
- LATER BRITISH EMPIRICISM - David Hume
- Starts with Locke's notion of ASSOCIATION and proceeds to
elaborate on the "how" of association (how it works).
- 3 LAWS of ASSOCIATION (still valid today):
- A) SIMILARITY= resemblance in terms of secondary
(perceived) qualities
- B) CONTIGUITY= proximity in time (TEMPORAL) and/or space
(SPATIAL) and
- C) CONTINGENCY= if/then relationship (cause and effect
relationships)
- LATER BRITISH EMPIRICISM - David Hartley
- Added a 4th LAW of ASSOCIATION: REPETITION= practice
(repeated association opportunities)
- Was a Physician as well as a Philosopher and proposed
physiological explanations of how the BRAIN and NERVES must
logically operate to produce the phenomenon of ASSOCIATION...
this represents an attempt to "rejoin" the mind and body
which had been "SPLIT" in the wake of Cartesian Philosophy
(The mind is a "by-product" of brain activity).
