LOCKE - THE ANSWERS

<BODY> <CENTER><FONT SIZE=5><B><FONT SIZE=6>LOCKE</FONT><BR> PRACTICAL MAN OF THE WORLD</B></FONT></CENTER><P> <FONT SIZE=4><B>All is Revealed</B></FONT><P> <FONT SIZE=4><B>WAY OF IDEAS</B></FONT><BR> Locke's stated purpose in his "Essay Concerning Human Understanding" was to stop people "meddling with things" that exceed the mind's comprehension. Locke asks us to "suppose the mind to be a white paper, void of all characters" and then asks "Whence has it all the materials of reason and knowledge?". The answer - "All that we know comes from sense experience, and from reflection upon experience." The perceiver responds not to the object, but to "ideas", qualities of the object. The implication of Locke's "Way of Ideas" is that our knowledge is limited "to the paucity and imperfections of the ideas we have, and which we employ about it".<P> <FONT SIZE=4><B>MATERIALIST</B></FONT><BR> Locke was a <A HREF="../t03/g030.html" TARGET="_top">materialist</A> both in the purest sense used by philosophers and in the more modern understanding of the world. There was no such thing as the <A HREF="../t03/g025.html" TARGET="_top">innate ideas</A> conceived of by the <A HREF="../t03/g043.html" TARGET="_top">rationalist</A>. All knowledge is based on the senses and experience. Described by some as the "first modern man", Locke's <A HREF="../t03/g012.html" TARGET="_top">empiricism</A> addressed the interests of the scientists, merchants, statesmen and industrialists. His was the first philosophical system to expound their view of life, to articulate their aspirations and justify their actions. Science should develop theory on the basis of careful observation. The state should be one in which people are free "to order their actions, and dispose of their possessions, and persons as they think fit."<P> ("Two Treatises of Government", II Ch 1) <P> <HR width=100%> <A HREF="http://www.creatorix.com.au"><IMG SRC="../creatorix.gif" WIDTH="85" HEIGHT="40" BORDER="0" ALT="Creatorix" align=right></A> </BODY>