Quiz 5

Question 1

Descartes

Answer 1

France (1596-1650)
Meditations
Rationalist

Question 2

Wax experiment

Answer 2

• wants to challenge old belied that what he knows best are physical objects
• am of “conversion”
• when properties of wax change, the SAME piece of wax remains
• judgements based on 3 essential characteristics (extension, flexibility, changeability) - not from senses

Question 3

3 essential characteristics from wax experiment

Answer 3

1. extension (it will always be extended and in different ways)
2. Flexibility (shape is not fixed and wax can take on innumerable shapes
3. Changeability (wax can go through innumerable changes in form or appearance and of place)

Question 4

Function of wax experiment

Answer 4

• show concept of physical object and how it allowed hum to make judgement
• most important: what made judgement possible
• casts doubt on empiricism
• reinforces D’s existence

Question 5

Final epistemic principle from Med III

Answer 5

“Whatever is clearly and distinctly perceived is true”

• Talking about intellectual perception
• Clear and distinct
• wants to prove God’s existence

Question 6

Clear

Answer 6

if content is present to an attendant mind as so self-evidently true that all rational grounds for doubt are excluded
- intellectually see relationship and conclusions follow

Question 7

Distinct

Answer 7

if it contains nothing but what is clear

- relies on someone’s intuition that this is true

Question 8

Descartes proving existence of a non-deceiving God

Answer 8

in order to:

1. guarantee reliability of final principle
2. bring back physical world
3. restore a limited role for sense experience

Question 9

Substance dualist

Answer 9

2 kinds of reality / substance:

1. extended (physical/ material)
2. thinking (mental reality)

Question 10

Mind-body dualist

Answer 10

body is made of extended substance and mind is made of thinking substance

Question 11

David Hume

Answer 11

• Scottish (1711-1776)
• British empiricists
• Limited skeptic

Question 12

Hume’s aims in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understandings

Answer 12

1. Wants to understand the principles and limits of human understanding
2. Wants to chip away at claims made by rationalists
3. Wants to do for “moral philosophy” what Newton did for “natural philosophy”

Question 13

Hume’s method

Answer 13

Experimental method

Conclusions should be drawn only when they are supported by the experience rather than by purely conceptual inquiry

Question 14

Impressions of sensation

Answer 14

• include bodily sensations of pressure and pain

- can be simple or complex

Question 15

Impressions of reflection

Answer 15

• “passions” that resolve from the mind reflecting on its own contents
• always complex

Question 16

Ideas

Answer 16

can be simple or complex

* All ideas are copies of impressions *

Question 17

Ideas vs. Impressions (Hume)

Answer 17

impressions are more forceful and vivacious

Question 18

Hume’s fork

Answer 18

there are 2 objects of human inquiry

1. Relation of ideas
2. Matters of fact

Question 19

Relation of ideas

Answer 19

• a priori
• concern logical and mathematical relations
• necessarily true
• negating them creates contradiction
• certain but not informative of world

Question 20

Matters of fact

Answer 20

• a posteriori (experience)
• concern the world we experience
• when true, only contingently true
• negating does not produce contradiction

Question 21

Hume’s main concern with matters of fact

Answer 21

“Matters of fact that refer beyond the present or remembered testimony of the senses”

Question 22

Q1 and A1- Hume

Answer 22

What is the nature of our evidence for matters of fact propositions which refer beyond the present or remembered testimony of the senses?
- relation of cause and effect

Question 23

Q2 and A2- Hume

Answer 23

How do we arrive at our knowledge of cause and effect?

- by “experience” (a history of observing “constantly conjoined events”)