Consciousness Invented

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What are Descartes best known philosophical ideas?
The method of hyperbolic doubt, though he may doubt, he cannot doubt that he exists 'I think therefore I am'
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What does Descartes reason?
he must have the basic characteristic of thinking, and this thinking is quite distinct from his body; the existence of a God; the existence and nature of the external world
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what did Descartes reject?
Religious authority in the quest for scientific and philosophical knowledge
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What did Descartes identify as consciousness?
the soul
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What did Descartes react strongly against?
The renaissance resurgance of ancient Greek scepticism in a relentness pursuit of certainty
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What did Bacon suggest was an appropriate method for science?
Induction
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What did Descartes insist was an appropriate method for science?
A deductive approach
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What was Descartes first ability of human reason?
Intuition- the apprehension of the simple natures of a subject
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What was descartes second ability of human reasoning?
The process of inferring the necessary relationships between simple natures
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What was Descartes final ability of human reasoning?
Enumeration - a review process used when deductions become so extensive that errors are made due to a faulty memory
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Why would it be possible for material substance to exist?
I have a clear and distinct idea of material substance, the essential or defining attribute of which is extension
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Why would it be possible that mental substances exist?
I have a clear and distinct idea of mental substance, the essential or defining attribute of which is thought
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To say that two things are not really distinct could mean what?
they exist seperately
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Matter and mind can what?
Exist separately, therefore they must be really distinct
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Why must they be distinct?
The brain and the body act seperately
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What did Descartes believe about humans?
That they are the only ones to have a dual spirit and body nature
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What did Descartes believe about other animals?
Animals have bodies and not souls and are biological automata or robots which behave according to their internal biological makeup
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What do some critics argue that Descartes believe?
Ghost in the machine
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What did Descartes believe about the connection between body and soul?
It is so intimate that they cannot be separated (and is one of God's miracles)
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What was Descartes explanation using wax?
Compare a piece of wax at two times: once while the wax is in a solid state, and later after the wax has been melted by a fire. Between these two states the wax loses hardness, All sensible properties might allow us to identify it as the same
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What was Locke's most important contribution to understanding psychology?
the mind was the book, essay concerning human understanding
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What does it address?
Nature of the self, the world, God and the grounds for our knowledge of them
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What is the essay made up?
Four books and only the fourth directly addresses the above
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What did Book 1 explain?
Against innate ideas, that something is innate is a hypothesis and requires empirical support
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If propositions are innate what should this be?
Immediately perceived, but children do not demonstrate evidence of this
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However, innate ideas might be what?
Dispositional (they are only expressed in certain situations/conditions)
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What did Locke argue?
Dispositional accounts lack an adequate criteria for distinguishing those innate proposition from those other ideas that the mind may come to know from experience
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If there are innate propositions what could you do?
Distinguish between innate proposition and ones that are acquired
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What did Book 2 look at?
Empiricism and the Tabula Rasa
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What was suggested in Book 2?
The mind is a tabula rasa (blank sheet) until experience (sensation and reflection) provides the basic materials out of which most of our more complex knowledge is constructed
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The mind engages in three different types of action, what are these?
Combination, relating and generalisation
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What is combination?
Combining simple ideas into complex ideas
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What is relating ?
Bringing two ideas, whether simple or complex, together so as to take a view of them at once without uniting them
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What is generalisation?
The production of our general ideas by abstraction from particulars, leaving out the particular circumstances of time and place, which would limit the application of an idea to a particular individual
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What does Book 4 cover?
What can we know
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What was said that knowledge is?
The perception of the connextion and aggreement or disagreement and repungancy of any of our ideas
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What did Descartes said?
It contrasts Descartes who claimed that knowledge is certainty
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What is stated in book 4 that we know
Our own existence, the existence of God, maths and morality with certainty
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Any other knowledge is what?
Probable rather certain
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It is not probable in the statistical maths sense but how is it probable?
The sense that evidence exists that leads the mind to judge a proposition true or false without a guarantee that the judgement is correct
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What is the decision made on?
The basis of rational thought and not just on the basis of associations
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What was Locke's influence on psychology?
Natural science pyschology is based on the idea that knowledge is based on sensory experience, but unlike the behaviourists, Locke emphasised rational reflection
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What were associations in Locke's view?
They inhibit rational thought leading to errors in thinking
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Although what is the content of the mind?
It is based on sensory impressions acquired though experience the operations of the mind are innate
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Who was Leibniz?
The great polymaths of the modern world
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What did he do?
Calculators, clocks, mining, cataloguing, calculus, advances in the theory of momentum
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What is Mind/body parallelism?
No state of a created substance has a real cause some state of another created substance, created substance has a real cause some previous state of that very substance
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What is an example of mind body parallelism?
Suppose someone falls over and hurts themselves (body--> causation), the experienced pain is not caused by the fall but some prior mental state that confirms with the physical event
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What was Hobbes main concern?
The problem of social and political order: How can human beings live together in peace and avoid the danger of fear and conflict
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What should give obedience?
unaccountable sovereign (authority)
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What did he say human nature was?
Corrupt: It is animalistic
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Humans are always what?
In state of competition with eachother for resources
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What did he say was the first law of human nature?
Appetites are insatiable, these appetites motivate us to action through seeking pleasure and avoiding pain, these appetites although to behave in certain ways: we can have pleasure from drinking, if everyone is in competitions, resources deplete
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What is the second law of human nature?
Reason enables use to avoid pain and seek pleasure thereby maintaining well being
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According to Herbet, What are societal relations designed to do?
Cancel out three motives that cause conflict, competition -desire for personal gain, diffidence - fear for safety and glory-desire for reputation
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What did he argue that nature is?
Corporeal and made out of small particles in motion and everything in nature is corporeal including the mind
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Humans are therefore what?
Mechanisms or mahines that operate according to material laws and thus can be understood by understanding those material laws
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What did Hobbes believe about free will and morality?
They are illusions
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What did Hobbes believe?
Once people used language 'rightly then the kinds of deductions that can be made in geometry can also be made about humans
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What was his view of language?
Extreme normalism wherein universals are no more that convenient names for remembered sense experienes
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What was Benedict De Spinoza?
He was a determinist, he believed in only one sort of matter which is God
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What was Spinoza's phrase?
Deus Sive Natura (God or nature)
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Therefore what was Spinoza?
A substance Monist
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For Spinoa what is the most important mistaken belief?
That we have free will
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what is the quote?
Men believe themselves to be free because they are conscious of their own actions and are ignorant of the causes by which they are determined
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By living according to our reason what?
our inclination to facilitate cooperation and our desire for social harmony will be expressed in the social world in which we exist.
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What does Descartes reason?

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he must have the basic characteristic of thinking, and this thinking is quite distinct from his body; the existence of a God; the existence and nature of the external world

Card 3

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what did Descartes reject?

Back

Preview of the front of card 3

Card 4

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What did Descartes identify as consciousness?

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Card 5

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What did Descartes react strongly against?

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