Birds

Chapter 10 Section 10
He believes that birds have no idea how to retain or repeat song. However, that is exactly how most birds will learn to sing. By listening to the birds around them and repeat it as well as they can. Some birds even pick up new notes and add them year after year. He also says that it is a mechanism for self preservation and protection, the song is actually a sign to female birds of how "fit" the male bird is and how good its genes may be. Females will then choose a male bird with the best song to mate. Nice try Locke

Animals can't think??

Chapter 11
Locke talks about how animals do not have the ability to analyze ideas, or to put many ideas together as well as humans do. This is true, but he underestimates how smart animals can be. He says that maybe with some senses they will put some ideas together and grasp a semi large picture overall. But there are animals that have abilities to work together and form life long relationships as in the case with some apes. They stay with there mate all throughout their lives. They also become very protective and are able to bring together ideas of an enemy and protect what they need to protect. Prairie dogs have the ability to yelp when they see an enemy flying over head. However, when a young prairie dog yelps they will look up and determine for themselves if this is truly an enemy or just a young mistake. Even bees do waggle dances and release pheromones to point the rest of the colony in the direction of food. Although he is right that animals aren't as smart as humans, I believe he is horribly underestimating them. Then again the research and observations that had been done at his day in age are must less numersome than the info we have today.

Locke: Memory, Recalling Ideas

Book II Chapter 10
Locke talks about the mind retaining (retention he calls it) and recalling ideas, objects, and experiences, such as heat, light, yellow, sweet. He says there are two ways that the mind can bring these things to the front of the mind in the current time. One is by actually keep what you are retaining in your sight. The other he says, is the minds ability to pull it from "memory" which he calls the storehouse for ideas. The aability to recall an idea or experience is dependent on a couple things. He says that repetition has a significant effect, which is now the bases for teaching at all levels, so he was right on with that one. Furthermore, he says those events or sensations that have the strongest affect on us. For instance he believes the things that hit deepest are things that have to do with pleasure or pain. Which is true to some point but there may also be events that don't cause either that will make a lasting impression on our memories, so he has the right idea but that will not always be the case.
He also says that the reason infants do not remember any of that time of there life is because none of the events are repeated. However, I think it may be the fact that a childs brain is not able to assess all the information that is actually presented and there for does not possess the ability to store and recall all this information.

getting old

Found this to be interesting, from book 2 chapter 9 part 14

"Decay of perception in old age. But yet I cannot but think there is some small dull perception, whereby they are distinguished from perfect insensibility. And that this may be so, we have plain instances, even in mankind itself. Take one in whom decrepit old age has blotted out the memory of his past knowledge, and clearly wiped out the ideas his mind was formerly stored with, and has, by destroying his sight, hearing, and smell quite, and his taste to a great degree, stopped up almost all the passages for new ones to enter; or if there be some of the inlets yet half open, the impressions made are scarcely perceived, or not at all retained. How far such an one (notwithstanding all that is boasted of innate principles) is in his knowledge and intellectual faculties above the condition of a cockle or an oyster, I leave to be considered. And if a man had passed sixty years in such a state, as it is possible he might, as well as three days, I wonder what difference there would be, in any intellectual perfections, between him and the lowest degree of animals."

I find it to be really true, we weather away and our senses gain insensitivity. There's no preventing it from happening, it's a way for us to get weak and die due to the lack of sharp senses we could have had. Locke in the end of this rant seems to say that having dulled senses makes us just like the animals. Going back to Descartes, he says the same thing almost. The only thing that separates us from the animals is that we have a mind and we can think. Not the same exact note, but with dulled senses we cannot function like normal humans, our minds are slower because we cannot feel the stimulation.

8. Idea of God not innate (aka more confusion)

"...since it is hard to conceive how there should be innate morals principles without an innate idea of a deity." This is a true statement but that doesn't signify that god exists. I don't sell drugs because the law says it's illegal andI'll go to jail. This isn't innate, through my lifelong learning experiences, the law told me it was illegal. But now I'm confused because I thought Locke believed that God is not innate when he just inferred that he is innate.

Confused... How unusual

I was going through book 2 again and I decided that I am officially confused as to what I believe out of Locke's mouth. Now, as we all know, Locke's not a big fan of the concept of innate principles, which by definition are inherent or intrinsic characteristics or properties of some thing, such as a quality or capability which is possessed since birth. But in Book 2, it appears to me that he is contradicting one of his strongest beliefs.

Locke brings up the argument of tabula rasa, where he infers that the mind is a blank sheet which through experience attains simple ideas that stand as a basis for our more complex ideas to grow off of. He explains how the mind does this through complex ideas, subjects, and modes. This makes sense and all, but wouldn't these three things count as innate principles, since they are all basises? The mind naturally functions this way, it is not taught to function this way, hence they would seem to be innate. That's how I feel although I may not be right, comment and let me know what you think because I'm confused.

While Descartes goes on about how God is real beacause a triangle has three angles, Locke seems to come to rational conclusions desiphering faith and reason. I especially enjoy and woud like to point out one part that stretches all the way into book 4. Locked points out that it is only right to use understanding and reason to find the truth. "he that takes away reason to make way for revelation, puts out the light of both, and does much of the same, as if he would persuade a man to put out his eyes, the better to recieve the remote light of an invisible star by a telescope." This basically targets people who believe that their immediate religious revelations are correct without using reason or rationality to truly find out. Locke in turn seems to believe that people that do this usually end up with opinions and explanations that make no sense.

As far as innate principles go, I always had assumed that everyone was born with them. But Locke brings up a rational argument in this aspect. He believes that people are not born with innate principles, because if we were, they would be immediately percieved at birth, and a human being must grow up, learn, and undergo experiences for any principle to become apparent to them; knowledge is learned in life, not innate. I like this argument very much because it is rational and makes sense unlike many of Descartes arguments. Descartes on the other hand believed that we have innated principles which are the basis for how we learn everything else. I believe Locke's rational is that when you are a baby, you can't talk, you don't know what anything is, and you don't have words or items to associate your thoughts with, therefore you have pretty much no memory of the time before you learned to speak and comprehend what is around you.

Locke: Book 2, Chapter 1

moving onto book two, i've noticed that Locke seems to write more reader friendly. Locke makes his concepts and ideas clear without rereading multiple times. In chapter one of book two, he gets into thoughts and ideas. Knowledge is formed from experience, reflecting is a process of thinking and operating on pieces of an idea. When sleeping we perceive the events of our unconscious? From infant to elder, your mind progressively grows and so do your senses. Senses and sensations trigger new thought.

Locke & God's Existence

Locke's views of god are quite different from Descartes. From what I've gathered, it seems Locke questions and examines weather knowledge is certain. In (25 & 26) he breaks he tries to explain that knowledge is gained not innate. However, Descartes seems to be opposing this idea based on the fact that there is certain knowledge we know since the day we enter this world (that being the source of our basic knowledge that we grow from). Both philosophers seem to be really positive on their ideas of thought and innateness, however I feel they beat around the bush when it comes to god, they really dont get into depth about what they think. They are both on opposite pages of the argument it seems, Descartes seems to deny the gradual gain of knowledge (and existence of god?) and Locke would deny the innate existence of ideas in the mind. Locke's ideas may change though.

In all of my hating on Descartes, I found a quote that made me think, which surprised me." For it is obvious that whatever is true is something, and I have already demonstrated at some length that all I know clearly is true." At first I thought I would be able to go off on a field day tearing Descartes apart about how stupid and obvious this statement is and how this statement is obviously true when referring to Descartes because his conclusions and epiphanies are so simple and primative so they would be impossible to be false. But it is actually a well thought out analysis of what one clearly knows. Think about it, if you have the thought that a certain person is a nice truthful human being, and on every encounter this is the vibe that they gave off to you, but you don't know the person in actuality is a backstabbing liar, you obviously don't know the person is nice, you think the person is nice. But, there is a "know" about this fact. You know it is true that you think the person is nice. And this rule can be applied to any thought really. That is why that statement caught my eye. It's not the world's greatest discovery, but I got something out of it.

Descartes' Overall Brainbusters in Method 5

One thing I forgot to point out was how Descartes focuses on the human perception and what we percieve as true and not true in Meditation 5. "But once I percieved that there is a God, and also understood at the same time that everything else depend son him, and that he is not a deceiver, I then concluded that everything that I clearly and distinctly perceive is necessarily true." Well Rene, I guess if something is clearly true, then it makes sense that you would percieve it as clearly true. What a brain buster, he must have had to think real hard to come up with that one. "But I now know that I cannot be mistaken in matters I plainly understand." I guess this also would make sense. You know what else makes sense? The color red, is red! This is about the complexity of these brainbusting epiphanies that Descartes has come to. If I recall correction the title of this part is MEDITATION 5: Concerning the Essence of Material things, and Again Concerning God, That He Exists. So what I've concluded about the essence of a material is that a triangle has 3 angles that equals 180 degrees, and that God's existence is as much an essential property of God's as having three angles that add up to 180 degrees is an essential property of triangles. AKA since triangles have three angles, God exists. Sorry, that's not good enough for me. How about you analyze the three religions. Find out their origins, their icons, their holy books, and their histories, then critically analyze the credibility of each religion and tie that into the existence of God. That's how you will percieve whether God is real or not. And the other main point that I learned in this Meditation: I cannot be mistaken in matters I plainly understand. So if I know something's true, then it's true. A little obvious wouldn't you think? Rene Descartes has officially unimpressed me, hopefully John Locke will give me something to think about.

triangles? med 5

For almost 2 pages, Descartes talks about triangles. He compares god to a triangle. What really gets me is that he talks about a right triangle but he never mentions an equilateral triangle. Is he saying god is unequal?? With that said, he then talks about the thought of a mountain but with that you also need a valley. I believe he's trying to put the point across that he know the mountain and valley exist but how does he know god exists. But in the next sentence he goes on explaining that existence is inseparable from god, therefore he must exist? or god forces him to think that he exists? complete confusion.