1. Empiricism, Sensationalism, & Positivism

2. British Empiricism
Empiricism: “philosophy that stresses the importance of experience in the attainment of knowledge” (text)
Generally, inner experience not included in the definition; reference is to sensory experience.
Some points re: empiricism (text)
Sensory experience constitutes the primary data; no suggestion that experience alone constitutes knowledge
Knowledge can’t exist until sensory evidence has first been gathered – I.e., attainment of knowledge begins with sensory experience
All subsequent intellectual processes must focus only on sensory experience.

3. Although British Empiricists disavowed innate ideas, in favor of ideas from experience, they did not reject the notion of instinct or innateness in general
we have inborn propensities which regulate our bodily functions, produce emotions, and even direct our thinking.
What Empiricists deny is that we are born with detailed, picture-like, concepts of God, causality, mathematics, etc
Like Bacon, British Empiricists also moved away from deductive proofs and used inductive method of arguing
(In spite of their advocacy of inductive argumentation, though, British Empiricists still made wide use of deductive arguments)

4. Major philosophers associated with British Empiricism:
Thomas Hobbes
John Locke
George Berkeley
David Hume.
James Mill and his 19th century son J.S. Mill
Restricting the British Empiricist movement to these few is misleading.
Until rise of English idealism (ca 1850), all British philosophy after Locke bears the marks of his empiricism.
More than any other philosopher, Locke was cited as an authority by philosophers, philosophical theologians, and political thinkers. (In fact, lengthy article on "metaphysics" in the first edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica (1773) is essentially a summary of Locke).

5. Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) “Founder” of British empiricism
Descartes had offered mechanistic explanation of animal behavior
Hobbes: next logical step is to view man as machine, also
Hobbes became 1st thoroughgoing opponent of rationalism
First modern determinist (reviving materialism of Democritus)
Every thought, feeling, purpose was simply “internal motion” (in brain)
All experience is some special form of motion – e.g., no distinction between the will to do something and the doing of it.
Sensation is a continuation of motion that impinged on sense organs, which transmit motion through the nerves to the brain
Memory & imagination: movements slowly decaying
Thus, physical basis for memory
Mind reduces to material processes
Monism… strongly opposed to Cartesian dualism
Some things remembered better than others
Memory based on contiguity and similarity
Pleasure: due to speeding up of flow of blood; pain due to impediment of blood
Changing rate of these physiological processes leads to emotional feelings and to general bodily reactions that augment or inhibit a tendency to action.
All actions initiated by endeavours– small, incipient actions or beginnings of actions
Not just readiness/desire to act; not a “mental” event

6. Some background Primarily a political theorist
Leviathan – all powerful state (e.g., English monarchy) which men must accept if they are to avoid destroying one another. Need for such a state arises because of the nature of man.
Seeks pleasure and avoids pain
Society prevents excessive pleasure-seeking which infringes on rights of others
Mainspring of human conduct: self-interest (most important motive: fear)

7. This was immensely important system of ideas
Human acts result from an objectively knowable human nature
Man is made in such a way that analysis may make prediction and control possible

8. John Locke ( )
Usually regarded as originator of British Associationism, although Hobbes preceded him
Wrote Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690)
All knowledge comes through experience, either through the senses or through reflection on sensory data.
No innate knowledge: Tabula Rasa
Probably most important aspect of Essay
Attack on Descartes’ belief in innate ideas.
The Tabula Rasa
Mind at birth is blank slate.
Idea not original– Aristotle. Locke “rescued the idea from obscurity”
If born without ideas, how is it that adult minds are filled with so many thoughts, concepts, images?
EXPERIENCE – all depends on individual experiences. (Note: Now this begins to sound modern)
Only natural that we think we have innate ideas. Few can remember a time when they didn’t have an idea of, e.g., God.
Locke says we’re taught the idea when young, so it isn’t surprising that we can’t recall a time when we didn’t have the idea
Similarly, no innate ideas of truth, honesty, goodness, beauty, etc. They aren’t things “out there”; they are acquired by experience.

9. Kinds of experience Locke’s views have been oversimplified
Sensation – primary. All ideas built from initial sensations
Reflection – operations of the mind (e.g., thinking, doubting, perceiving, reasoning, etc)
Mind can combine simple ideas into a compound (e.g., red, blue, gray…. Leads to “color”)
Mind can bring 2 ideas together and compare them (e.g., lighter than……; heavier than..)
Mind can abstract properties
Locke’s views have been oversimplified
He does not take everything away from mind of newborn. What he did say os
No inborn ideas; all are gained through experience
Mind has innate capacity to act on incoming associations and organize them, abstract them, etc.
Notion of ideas as “elements” -- forerunner of “mental chemistry notion”

10. Simple and complex ideas
Simple: arise from direct experience
Complex: built up from simple
How do simple ideas combine? Why are some ideas “picked out” to become associated and others are not?
Natural connections (e.g., thunder and lightning)… exist in nature
Rational connections: made by the act of reflection. E.g., similar things tend to be associated
Contiguity: e.g., (from Locke)…adult has aversion to honey; feels nauseous when looks at it. Explanation: as child, had overdose of honey and vomited. Idea 1 (honey) and idea 2 (vomiting) have become associated. No general connection in nature. This is, of course, a description of aversive conditioning
Locke probably missed point that Natural connections may be special case of contiguity principle