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Title: An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (Great Books in Philosophy) by John Locke ISBN: 0-87975-917-8 Publisher: Prometheus Books Pub. Date: December, 1994 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.5
Rating: 5
Summary: Outstanding work from a Giant of a Mind.
Comment: The most important book in the History of Western Philosophy. Anyone wishing to understand the western tradition will have to grapple with this work eventually.
Its not that Locke got everything right, but he does at least point us in the right direction.
Rating: 4
Summary: Locked Into Reason 18th Century Style
Comment: John Locke's 1698 "Essay Concerning Human Understanding" is one of the foundational texts of Western philosophy. It is a phenomenal enquiry into how and why people become functional individuals. Bringing into philosophy a developmental model of personal becoming, Locke drilled pre-Berkeleyan common sense into a growing capitalist nation, one which was already moving away from the absolutist model of government and viewing self in the world espoused by Thomas Hobbes in "Leviathan." While clearly building on and stepping on his predecessors, most notably Hobbes and Rene Descartes, Locke deals broadly with ideas, language, and how people come into knowledge, and sets the stage for a new phase of philosophy entering the 18th century.
Locke begins the "Essay" by rejecting and dispensing with the notion of "innate ideas," which basically says that we are born in possession of certain principles, elements of knowledge, or maxims that help us orient ourselves in the world. Through long and drawn out (one downside of Locke is his insistency on detail and repetition) examples and arguments, he attempts to prove that when we are born, we have absolutely nothing intelligence-wise, to recommend us. This is what is popularly referred to as the 'tabula rasa' theory, that when first born, our minds are like "empty cabinets" or "white sheets" of paper - which experience and experience only furnishes with our ideas about the world. His goal here is to get people to question their assumptions about the world, to ask questions and decide for themselves based on reason and experience, how best to interact with the world.
Locke says that the only two sources of all human knowledge are sensation (that information which is passively thrust upon our senses) and reflection (when we consider and think about that sense data, and about our own thoughts). From these "simple ideas," we are able to combine and recombine thoughts to form "complex ideas" and use clear and distinct language to express them to other people. This social aspect of this philosophy is something that really fascinated me about Locke. While focusing on the individual's growing base of knowledge, he is all the while trying to orient people to functioning in society. Saying that the end of all knowledge serves two purposes, viz., honouring God, and being morally responsible, Locke goes on to show how human life often works counter to these goals, with a view to correcting them.
Another of his famous formulations, one all too familiar to Americans, as part of our national idealism, is that the basic state of nature of humanity consists in the "pursuit of happiness." Compared to Hobbes, for whom the state of nature consisted in the attempt to attain greater and greater power over others, Locke's state of nature seems relatively benign - however, he goes to great lengths to show how the pursuit of happiness often leads to reckless and wanton behaviours, ultimately destructive both to self and society. The idea that we must examine our desires and discipline them to the greater good is something that many of us lose sight of, and is an element central to his system.
Briefly then, a couple of other items that might be of interest to someone thinking about picking up Locke's "Essay": His philosophy of language is one that still has currency and influence on linguistic theory all the way to Saussure and the post-structuralists; Locke's manner of addressing cultural and gender diversity is progressive, but vexed, which makes for fascinating work in trying to determine his stances toward non-white European males. Locke's constant invocation of gold in his examples can be maddening, which can only mean that there is some significance therein; and finally, his other hobby-horse, so-called "monstrous births" and their status in the human race bears heavily and still importantly on the debate over a woman's right to choose. All this and so much more awaits you - over 600 pages of Lockean goodness. Beware though, Locke is extremely repetitive and can get bogged down in what, for us to-day, may seem common sense notions. But this is quintessential reading, nonetheless, for everyone interested in the formation of the modern self.
Rating: 1
Summary: Essay Concerning Very Little
Comment: I often ponder the meaning of life. I often consider what experiences I might accomplish over the course of my life. And I also consider those experiences I hope not to accomplish. Certainly, I wish reading Locke's essay had been on the latter list. This book is an exhibition of human wastelandism. If your hope is to become truly stupider, I suggest you read this breakthrough in stupidity and worthless Babel. And then eat the book. And then vomit the book up, and burn the book/vomit. And vow never to read another one of Locke's filth-bombs.
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Title: An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (Oxford Philosophical Texts) by David Hume, Tom L. Beauchamp ISBN: 0198752482 Publisher: Oxford Press Pub. Date: May, 1999 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: A Treatise of Human Nature: Being an Attempt to Introduce the Experimental Method of Reasoning into Moral Subjects (Oxford Philosophical Texts) by David Hume, David Fate Norton, Mary J. Norton ISBN: 0198751729 Publisher: Oxford Press Pub. Date: March, 2000 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Leviathan (Penguin Classics) by Thomas Hobbes, T. Hobbs, C. B. MacPherson ISBN: 0140431950 Publisher: Viking Press Pub. Date: June, 1982 List Price(USD): $9.95 |
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Title: Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant, Paul Guyer, Allen W. Wood ISBN: 0521657296 Publisher: Cambridge Univ Pr (Trd) Pub. Date: February, 1999 List Price(USD): $27.00 |
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Title: Locke: Two Treatises of Government Student edition by John Locke, Peter Laslett ISBN: 0521357306 Publisher: Cambridge University Press Pub. Date: November, 1988 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
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