Lea Clark

Philosophy 100

Blog Post 2

Rationalism and Empiricism is a very controversial debate; each has a different view of where our ideas come from. Empiricists have the idea that all ideas come from past experiences, while rationalist have the belief that some ideas are innate and the rest come from experience. I agree with the belief of the empiricists; all ideas come from past experiences. A newborn baby knows nothing about the world they are born into. They learn from experiencing new things and can apply what they’ve learned in the future. Therefore, the same concept would apply for composing new ideas.

            Everyone is born with no knowledge of anything. No one has had experiences that would teach him or her anything at that point in their lives. Babies learn by experimenting. A baby might pick something up and put it in their mouths that to older people would not seem normal. However to a baby it is their way of figuring out what this object is because they are unfamiliar with it. From the second you are born, you begin to discover the world around you and have new experiences every day and gain more knowledge.

            Descartes describes in his wax example moving a solid piece of wax close to fire and seeing it melt. Although the wax melting and changing from a solid to a liquid does not mean that it is a different piece of wax. People know this from experiencing it; you never see Descartes physically switch out the piece of wax, the shape and state of it may have changed, but it remains the same piece of wax.

Explanatory Breadth: I think empiricism explains explanatory breadth better than rationalism. Empiricism states that ideas come from experiences while rationalism believes some ideas are innate. Rationalists fail to see that people are born with no knowledge and that ideas do not come from nothing.

Explanatory Depth: Empiricism is explained more in explanatory depth than rationalism. Since empiricists believe ideas come from experience, it can be further into depth based on what the empiricist has experienced. Since rationalists believe ideas are innate the same would not apply to them.

Simplicity: Again I think empiricism fits more into this category. Empiricism is less likely to have errors due to past knowledge and being broken down into an easier form to understand. Where a rationalist might have more errors because they have nothing to base their ideas off of.

Conservatism: Empiricism is more consistent than rationalism. Rationalism could go down a bunch of different paths because it argues all ideas are innate. But empiricism states that ideas are form experiences.

1.     Empiricism and rationalism are the most plausible explanations of the origin of ideas.

2. Empiricism has much more explanatory depth and simplicity, whereas, rationalism has a little more explanatory breadth.  

3. Therefore, empiricism is the best explanation of the origin on ideas