Who is John Locke?
John Locke was a British philosopher who lived between 29 August 1632 and 28 October 1704.
Locke is one of the most important thinkers of the 18th century. It is considered to be the true founder of the Enlightenment and Reasoning Age in Europe, since it is the first thinker to spread the conception of thought to organize our actions according to reason.
John Locke was born in Wrington, near Bristol. It comes from a family dealing with fabric trade. His father preferred the notary public rather than dealing with trade; Locke’s later theories of learning suggest his father’s great influence. Locke studied at Oxford University, where he studied medicine through natural sciences. After his death, he worked as a writer and a political figure. He was first found in the Duchy of Brendenbur as clerk in the British embassy. After his return to England, he worked for 8 years as a private doctor with an English aristocrat named Shaftsbury. Locke had left the UK in 1683 when Shaftsbury had to flee to the Netherlands.
Locke argues that in all of his works, all kinds of tradition and authority must be saved, only mind can guide human life. Liberalism with these thoughtsIn addition, it has been the pioneer of a natural understanding of religion, rational pedagogy. His most important works ” An essay Concerning Human Understanding ” are ‘Some Thoughts Concerning Education’. There are two essays on the government. As the first to shake the absolutist administrations, he has gone down in history, and as a result of the tremors he has caused to absolutism, there have been deep cleavages over time and the foundations of the three great revolutions have been formed. He was a philosopher, who was the basis of the British, American and French revolutions. He is one of the advocates of natural law doctrine.
EmpiricismThe founder of Locke, who was opposed to the idea of innate ideas, argued that all sorts of things in our minds are derived from sensory data. The human mind is initially like a blank paper (tabula rasa). This paper begins to fill with the sensory data obtained from the external bodies, thus revealing the simplicity and sense of the senses. The mind achieves complex idioms by manipulating these simple idioms in various ways. In addition, the inner sensations and processes on what is acquired from the senses give birth to what we call the ideas of thought. The object of such is a complex issue. The subjects that make up this matter become the qualities of the object, which are divided into primary and secondary. Töz is accepted as the carrier of all these features. He also accepts a spiritual substance that is the bearer of mental things, except for subjective substances. God is such a complex entity. Knowledge arises from the relationships between these states and is divided into three degrees according to the way in which the interobserver agreement or discrepancy is perceived; intuitive, identifiable and sensory.
According to Locke, morality can also be defined as mathematics, because the essence of the objects to which the moral judgments correspond is known. It is none other than good and bad, pleasure and pain, or what causes pleasure and suffering, and whether our voluntary actions coincide with ethical laws. There are three kinds of laws: 1. The law of law, the second law of citizenship, 3. The law of morality.
The natural state of man is not everyone’s war against everyone, but a state of freedom, but there is a natural law governing this situation. This law is the law of mind; teaches that human beings are equal and independent. The natural rights of people are natural rights, the right to self-protection and to defend their lives, the right to freedom and the right to property. Because humans are naturally free, no one can be complied with the political power of another without their consent. However, people give up their rights to establish a safer environment and negotiate their rights and powers to the majority of society. In this way, they relate their individual will to the desire of the society in order to pass from the state of nature to the citizen society. The government established in this way must protect the rights and freedoms of the society and work for its welfare.
Prepared by: Sociologist Ömer YILDIRIM
Source: Ömer YILDIRIM’s Personal Lecture Notes. Atatürk University Department of Sociology 1st Grade “Introduction to Philosophy” and 2nd, 3rd and 4th Grade “History of Philosophy” Lesson Notes (Ömer YILDIRIM); Open Education Philosophy Textbook