Garcia 1

Catalina Garcia

Sir Cicero Cortel

Philosophy

30 August 2018

The Concept of the Human Mind: A Comparison between Descartes and Locke

The human mind is a diverse, remarkably complex, and difficult concept to find a

concrete explanation for. The complexity of the mind, including its depths that still cannot be

fully plumbed today, has enabled individuals for hundreds of years to interpret it in different

lights. Thus, numerous perspectives and theories on the human mind were produced, especially

in the field of Philosophy. With the extensive amount of ideologies and philosophies on this

concept, many of these ideas contradict and refute each other. The main questions of theories of

the mind mostly regard these three concepts: the acquisition of knowledge, the relationship of the

mind and body, and the nature of consciousness and identity or one’s ‘self’. Several philosophers

such as René Descartes and John Locke attempt to find answers to these questions in

metaphysics and epistemology and their contradicting arguments are some of the most

significant ideologies from the 17th-century philosophers.

René Descartes, widely regarded as the father of modern philosophy, views the human

mind as an immaterial, non-extended substance that engages in various activities such as rational

thought, imagining, feeling, and willing (Encyclopedia Britannica). In his work ‘Meditations on

First Philosophy’, he presents the idea of Dualism, which makes a distinction between the mind

and body and proposes that solely the mind of a human makes up its ‘self’. Descartes is also one

of the founders of the Rationalist movement, which argues that it is reason, not experience, that
 Garcia 2

is most important for our acquisition of knowledge. However significant his ideas had been to

modern Philosophy, Descartes was still contradicted and disproved by multiple philosophers, one

of which being John Locke, another famous philosopher and political theorist from the 17th

century. Through his work ‘An Essay Concerning Human Understanding’, Locke offered his

analysis of the human mind and its acquisition of knowledge. Using an empiricist theory,

according to which we acquire ideas through our experience of the world (Connolly), Locke’s

main ideologies can primarily be considered the opposite of Descartes.  

The existence of innate ideas is one of the main concepts under the subject of the human

mind that the two philosophers interpret and attempt to offer explanations for. This concept

serves as a ground for the Rationalism versus Empiricism dispute, as it concerns “the extent to

which we are dependent upon sense experience in our effort to acquire knowledge” (Markie).

With his Rationalist view, Descartes’ approach to the subject is that the acquirement of

knowledge depends on absolute certainty since nothing is “exactly such as we perceive by the

senses, for the comprehension by the senses is, in many instances, very obscure and confused.”

(Descartes 46). The method of doubting the senses promises only to avoid error (Newman), and

this way of thinking led to one of the main ideas of Rationalism that can be coined as the Innate

Knowledge Thesis, which Peter Markie expounds on as how knowledge is not being learned

through either sense experience or intuition and deduction, but instead a part of our nature. Some

of these principles which are revealed to us by ‘natural light’ (and therefore are immediately

known by us) include the idea of the existence of the ‘self’ and the existence of God, which

according to Descartes cannot be doubted as he states that “for what the natural light shows to be

true can be in no degree doubtful” (22). Certain events we experience as well may ‘trigger’ a
 Garcia 3

process that brings this knowledge to our consciousness, but the experience by the senses

themselves does not provide the knowledge itself.

In contrast with the ideas of Descartes, John Locke does not believe that it is possible for

humans to possess innate knowledge, stating in his infamous publication ‘An Essay Concerning

Human Understanding’ that “we are utterly incapable of universal and certain knowledge and are

left only to observation and experiment” (549). Instead, Locke presents the approach of

Empiricism, which is that all human ideas come from “sensation and reflection” and that “all our

knowledge is founded on experience” (87). Locke also proposes the concept of the mind as the

tabula rasa or  “blank slate”, referring to the human mind at birth as a “white paper, void of all

marks and ideas” wherein knowledge is added to it only by the use of sense experience (87). He

expounds more on the topic of the existence of innate ideas and counters Descartes claiming that

for ideas to be considered innate, “infants, and all beings with a soul, must have them in their

minds, grasp that they are true, and agree that they are true” (30). For there are no principles

conscious in the mind that everyone agrees upon (e.g. the existence of God or a divine being), in

complete contrast with the ideas of Descartes, Locke concludes that it is impossible for there to

be innate knowledge in the human mind.

Another of the philosophical debates relating to the concept of the human mind that the

two attempt to offer explanations for, regards the relationship of the mind and body. The concept

of Dualism in Metaphysics is the belief that the reality of the world contains two fundamentally

different substances: material (physical) and immaterial (mental). When regarding the

philosophy of Mind, dualism is the position that the nature of the mind and body are

categorically distinct and separate from each other (Encyclopedia Britannica). This implies that

since the mind and body are to be considered two different entities, dualists oppose any theory
 Garcia 4

that identifies the mind with the brain, which is a physical mechanism. This thesis of mind-body

dualism is one of René Descartes’ deepest and most significant theories regarding the concept of

the human mind. Aside from highlighting the distinction between the mind (the ‘thinking

substance’) and the body (the ‘extended substance’), he makes sure to also state that bodies are

not essential to thinking beings, as they may even exist without them (45). Descartes is also able

to illustrate a certain link between the two entities wherein certain sensations are transferred with

the use of this link and allows an individual to identify their body as their own. “Nature teaches

me that by these sensations of pain, hunger, and thirst, I am not only lodged in my body as a pilot

in a vessel, but that I am intimately conjoined, and as it were intermingled with it, that my mind

and body compose a certain unity.” (46). With the notion of dualism, Descartes is able to

indicate the very clear division between the mind and the body yet still emphasize the important

‘link’ or the closely intermingled relationship of the two substances.

Though their primary philosophical ideas are mostly contradicting, the possibility of

similarities should not be excluded. Locke may also be considered a substance dualist as he

agrees with Descartes that man is of two separate and distinct substances, which was illustrated

when he stated that our idea of body is “an extended solid substance” and our idea of soul, “an

immaterial spirit, a substance that thinks” (Locke 290), almost identical to Descartes’

descriptions of the two. From both descriptions of the two substances, it can be said that both

philosophers see the ‘self’ as things that think, however, unlike Descartes’ singularizing of the

rational mind alone making up his “essence” (45), Locke presumes that the substance of which

we are composed of includes both the thinking thing and the body “it is not the idea of a thinking

or rational being alone that makes the idea of a man, but of a body, so and so shaped, joined to

it” (318). In this case, both the body and mind are real beings that interact, so the soul
 Garcia 5

experiences changes on account of its being acted on by bodies outside, and therefore it can be

said that all our ideas are the results of the action of our bodies on our minds (Krishnananda).

Now that the general ideas of the philosophers on the nature of ‘self’ have been

presented, it may serve as grounds for the discussion of man’s personal identity. The term ‘self’

can sometimes be used to describe personal identity, but in this current situation, it refers to the

substance or essence that individuals believe to make up their being (Descartes’ self is a thinking

thing, Locke’s is both the thinking thing and the body). Personal Identity can simply be

described as the manifestation or the expression of the ‘self’ and the changes it may undergo, as

well as its relation to our existence (Korfmacher). One of the most intuitively convincing

principles that René Descartes has contributed to modern philosophy in relation to this subject is

the cogito ergo sum argument. He states that “I exist as often as I think” (15), which presents an

explanation for existence based on the premises that since we think, and all beings that think

exist, therefore, it proves that we exist. Descartes’ understanding of humans as conscious,

thinking substances is described as man being “a being that doubts, affirms, denies, wills,

refuses, imagines, and perceives” (20). To put it in simpler terms, what can be gathered from

Descartes’ cogito argument is that he asserts that to exist is to be a conscious, thinking being,

thus from this it can be said that he essentially describes man’s personal identity in terms of

thinking.

Locke’s theory of personal identity is not entirely opposing Descartes’ ideas, although the

extent that he expounds on in the subject of identity is much more supported and contains a more

detailed account on what exactly personal identity consists of, which is why it can be considered

one of the more prominent philosophical principles about identity that people discuss. Locke

highlights the connection between consciousness of present events and certain memories from
 Garcia 6

the past in relation to his definition of a person’s identity, presenting the idea that what makes a

person the same person as themself at an earlier time is that he remembers the earlier person’s

experiences (Michaelian and Sutton). Before anything else though, we must consider Locke’s

definition of a thinking intelligent being, which is an individual “that has reason and reflection,

and can consider itself as itself, the same thinking thing, in different times and places” (318).

This means that the self must have mental qualities such as thinking and reasoning, and this idea

is also in alignment with that of Descartes. However, Locke expounds more on this by

continuing to define personal identity as the “sameness of a rational being” (319), thus asserting

that as long as one is the same self, then one possesses the same personal identity, which means

that any change in the self will reflect a change in personal identity, and vice versa. He then

brings consciousness into the discussion, because for one to be a ‘self’, one must be a thinking

thing, and since consciousness always accompanies thinking, this then means that one’s personal

identity extends only as far as their consciousness: “As far as this consciousness can be extended

backwards to any past action or thought, so far reaches the identity of that person; it is the same

self now it was then” (319). Consciousness in this sense can be referred or even equated to one’s

memory and experiences, and because one can remember solely one’s own experiences, not

those of anyone else, therefore for Locke, consciousness and memory are a necessary condition

of the self, and, therein, personal identity (Piccirillo).

Among the various points and ideas that were presented by Rene Descartes and John

Locke regarding the primary questions related to the topic of this paper, many different

conclusions can be drawn about the concept of the human mind because of how broad the topic

of the mind is and its wide range of subjects that are covered. Firstly, the question regarding how

humans acquire knowledge, Descartes presents the notion that our ideas are all innate, and that
 Garcia 7

our senses are not always how we perceive them to be which is why we must not rely on our

them for knowledge, while on the other hand, Locke argues that our sense experience throughout

our lifetime is the primary source for gaining our knowledge. The second question, regarding the

relationship between the mind and body, both philosophers agree that the mind and body are two

separate and distinct substances, the mind being the thinking substance and the body being the

extended solid substance. The third question, regards the nature of the ‘self’ and personal

identity, wherein both philosophers agree that the ‘self’ is a thinking being, however, Locke also

includes the physical body in his definition of what makes up the ‘self’ of a person. Both also

explain personal identity in terms of thinking, although Locke’s ideas are a more expounded

version of Descartes, continuing on by adding the relationship and importance of consciousness

and memory with the identity of a person.

Thus, the conclusion about the concept of the human mind that can be drawn based on

the various ideas presented by the two philosophers is that to be considered a person is to

essentially possess a mind. Whether through innate ideas like the rationalist Descartes proposed,

or through Locke’s empiricist theory of knowledge through sense experiences, having the mind

is something that enables us humans to obtain knowledge. This knowledge that we possess in our

minds enables us to think, reason, imagine, or feel, which then defines us as thinking, intelligent

beings (either we are considered solely that or perhaps joined together with the physical body),

and through the assumption that the ‘self’ consists of a being that thinks, it can be said that

consciousness is a necessary and substantial factor of our personal identity, as consciousness

always accompanies thinking. Locke and Descartes are often said to be philosophers whose ideas

contradict completely, but through careful analysis on each of their takes on the components that

belong to the concept of the human mind, a connection between the ideas to create a solid,
 Garcia 8

concrete idea on how the mind essentially conditions a person to actually be a person, was still

able to be formed.
 Garcia 9

Bibliography

Descartes, Rene. Meditations on First Philosophy. Trans. John Vetich. Chicago: Open Court,

1903. PDF File.

Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. Mind–Body Dualism. Encyclopædia Britannica,

Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 19 June 2017, www.britannica.com/topic/mind-body-

dualism.

Locke, John. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Pennsylvania State University. 1999.

PDF File.

Jorgensen, Larry M. Seventeenth-Century Theories of Consciousness. Stanford Encyclopedia of

Philosophy, Stanford University, 29 July 2010,

www.plato.stanford.edu/entries/consciousness-17th/.

Kemerling, Garth. “Descartes: Overcoming Doubt.” Descartes: Method, 1997,

www.philosophypages.com/hy/4c.htm.

Korfmacher, Karsten. “Personal Identity.” Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy,

ISSN 2161-0002, www.iep.utm.edu/.

Krishnananda, Swami. “Studies In Comparative Philosophy.” The Divine Life Society,

www.swami-krishnananda.org/com/com_lock.html.

Markie, Peter. Rationalism vs. Empiricism. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford

University, 6 July 2017, www.plato.stanford.edu/entries/rationalism-empiricism/.

Michaelian, Kourken and Sutton, John, "Memory", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

(Summer 2017 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.),

www.plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2017/entries/memory/.
 Garcia 10

Newman, Lex. “Descartes' Epistemology.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford

University, 3 Dec. 1997, www.plato.stanford.edu/entries/descartes-epistemology/.

Piccirillo, Ryan A. “The Lockean Memory Theory of Personal Identity: Definition, Objection,

Response.” Inquiries Journal, Elon Journal of Undergraduate Research in

Communications, 1 Aug. 2010, www.inquiriesjournal.com/articles/1683/the-lockean-

memory-theory-of-personal-identity-definition-objection-response.

Robinson, Howard. “Dualism.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford University, 29

Feb. 2016, www.plato.stanford.edu/entries/dualism/.

Skirry, Justin. “René Descartes: The Mind-Body Distinction.” Internet Encyclopedia of

Philosophy, ISSN 2161-0002, www.iep.utm.edu/descmind/.