THE TABULA RASA

THE TABULA RASA

"I have always thought that the actions of men are the best interpreters of their thoughts." JOHN LOCKE 

By Alex P. Vidal

My better understanding of tabula rasa was enhanced after reading part (it's a thick essay) of John Locke's Essay concerning Human Understanding. 
I wasn't actually interested about this English empiricist until I learned a few years back from my Ilonggo philosopher friend that Locke was regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers; that he influenced our favorite philosopher Voltaire, and that his contributions to classical republicanism and liberal theory are reflected in the United States Declaration of Independence.
I often mistook Locke for Jean-Jacques Rousseau, a French romanticist who authored The Social Contract, a book that theorized the best way in which to set up a political community in the face of the problems of commercial society.

SIMPLER

Tabula rasa is one of the simpler great ideas which means "blank slate," which, according to certain philosophers, is the original state of the human mind.
Locke studied the origin of ideas and their relationship to reality in the Essay concerning Human Understanding. He theorized that all ideas come from experience and that knowledge is simply relations among ideas. Locke's theory tells us we can't have ideas until we have experiences, so in effect the newborn's mind is empty. He called it "white paper" (tabula rasa literally "erased tablet" predates him and suggests, contrary to his doctrine, that something was once there to be erased).
Michael Macrone explained that the upshot of Locke's "white paper" is that not only are we born without concrete ideas, we also lack abstract concepts such as morality, God, and freedom. "Such things must be learned, as language is, and they are learned either by experience or by reflection and reason. These views lead Locke to reject idealism and the whole notion of innate ideas in favor of common sense philosophy," explained Macrone.

UNDERSTANDING

Though reason has its place in human understanding, Locke said, it doesn't dominate experience. Mind is not over matter, because matter, through experience, provides the mind with ideas.
"Our simplest and most basic concepts (such as 'loudness,' 'hardness,' and 'sweetness') are furnished by sense, and all more concrete ideas are built upon them," Macrone explained. "Other ideas come to us through reflection, including awareness of our own thought processes; 'thought' itself as well as 'perception,' 'belief,' 'consciousness,' 'doubt,' and so on are furnished by reflective experience. That such ideas are simple, however, doesn't mean they're innate."
The doctrine of tabula rasa derives mostly from simple logic. If we are all born with an innate idea of God, then we would all have the same idea of God. But of course we don't. Similarly, if we were born with the idea of moral right, we would all agree on what is right and what is wrong. But we don't.

ANALYTIC

Macrone stressed: "Analytic truths such as 'whatever is, exists' and '2+2=4' are not ideas obvious to everyone--for example children and idiots."  Locke also thought the premises if rationalism--mind over matter--were much too complex to be useful or valid. Like Occam, Macrone emphasized, Locke thought simpler is better, and any account of knowledge that doesn't require innate ideas is simpler.
While tabula rasa seems a simple idea, Locke's argument ends up rather complicated. He sometimes contradicts himself and is eventually forced to admit that certain "faculties" must be innate. 
Among these, Macrone pointed out, are the five senses and the capacity to reason, which do count as "ideas" in some circles. Whatever the difficulties of his argument, Macrone said it did not steer British philosophy into what remains its characteristic empiricism. He failed to convince the French, however, who by and large remain rationalists. Just another reason so many English worry over European union and the Channel Tunnel.