Metaphysical Theater Presents
John Locke
John Locke ; 29 August 1632 – 28 October 1704) was an English philosopher and physician, widely regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers and commonly known as the "Father of Liberalism". Considered one of the first of the British empiricists, following the tradition of Sir Francis Bacon, he is equally important to social contract theory. His work greatly affected the development of epistemology and political philosophy. His writings influenced Voltaire and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, many Scottish Enlightenment thinkers, as well as the American revolutionaries. His contributions to classical republicanism and liberal theory are reflected in the United States Declaration of Independence.
John Locke metaphysics miracle of awareness
Portrait of Locke in 1697 by Godfrey Kneller, Locke was
Born 29 August 1632
Wrington, Somerset, England
Died 28 October 1704 (aged 72)
High Laver, Essex, England
Nationality English
Alma mater Christ Church, Oxford
Era 17th-century philosophy
(Modern philosophy)
Region Western philosophy
School
Empiricism Social contract Natural law
Main interests
Metaphysics, epistemology, political philosophy, philosophy of mind, education, economics
Notable ideas
Tabula rasa, primary/secondary quality distinction, social contract, consent of the governed, state of nature, Molyneux's problem. Lockean proviso, labor theory of property, law of opinion natural rights (rights of life, liberty and property)
Influences
Grotius, Descartes, Filmer, Pufendorf, Hobbes
Influenced
Hume, Kant, Berkeley, Voltaire, Rousseau, Shaftesbury, many subsequent political philosophers (including the Founding Fathers of the United States)
Signature
John Locke's kit-cat portrait by Godfrey Kneller, National Portrait Gallery, London baby does it make you Randy?
Locke's theory of mind is often cited as the origin of modern conceptions of identity and the self, figuring prominently in the work of later philosophers such as David Hume, Rousseau, and Immanuel Kant. Locke was the first to define the self through a continuity of consciousness. He postulated that, at birth, the mind was a blank slate or tabula rasa. Contrary to Cartesian philosophy based on pre-existing concepts, he maintained that we are born without innate ideas, and that knowledge is instead determined only by experience derived from sense perception. This is now known as empiricism. An example of Locke's belief in empiricism can be seen in his quote, "whatever I write, as soon as I discover it not to be true, my hand shall be the forwardest to throw it into the fire." This shows the ideology of science in his observations in that something must be capable of being tested repeatedly and that nothing is exempt from being disproven. Challenging the work of others, Locke is said to have established the method of introspection, or observing the emotions and behaviours of one’s self.
Life and work
Locke's father, also called John, was a country lawyer and clerk to the Justices of the Peace in Chew Magna, who had served as a captain of cavalry for the Parliamentarian forces during the early part of the English Civil War. His mother was Agnes Keene. Both parents were Puritans. Locke was born on 29 August 1632, in a small thatched cottage by the church in Wrington, Somerset, about 12 miles from Bristol. He was baptised the same day. Soon after Locke's birth, the family moved to the market town of Pensford, about seven miles south of Bristol, where Locke grew up in a rural Tudor house in Belluton.
In 1647, Locke was sent to the prestigious Westminster School in London under the sponsorship of Alexander Popham, a member of Parliament and his father's former commander. After completing studies there, he was admitted to Christ Church, Oxford, in the autumn of 1652 at the age of twenty. The dean of the college at the time was John Owen, vice-chancellor of the university. Although a capable student, Locke, John Metaphysical T
