WHERE DOES KNOWLEDGE

TRULY COME FROM?

 Frontiers of Western Philosophy

Empiricism
John Locke Bishop George Berkeley David Hume
(1632-1704 CE) (1685 – 1753 CE) (1711 – 1776 CE)
 What is EMPIRICISM?
Empiricism – belief that knowledge is the
result of experience.

no experience = no knowledge
 Empiricism
Empiricism: all of our knowledge comes
through the use of the five senses.
 Empiricism
Empiricism: all of our knowledge comes
through the use of the five senses.

The external world causes visual perception which causes knowledge

 Empiricism
Empiricism: all of our knowledge comes
through the use of the five senses.

I seem to see
a tree.

A belief is a basic empirical belief if and only if

it is a direct result of sensation.
 Empiricism: all of our knowledge comes
through the use of the five senses.

Arguments for Empiricism:

1. Empirical beliefs seem more reliable than

others.
 Empiricism
Empiricism: all of our knowledge comes
through the use of the five senses.

Arguments for Empiricism:

1. Empirical beliefs seem more reliable than

others.

2. Only empirical beliefs can tell us what the

external world is like.
 Empiricism
Empiricism: all of our knowledge comes
through the use of the five senses.

Arguments for Empiricism:

1. Empirical beliefs seem more reliable than

others.

2. Only empirical beliefs can tell us what the

external world is like.

3. The success of science confirms the reliability of

the senses.
 Arguments against Empiricism:

1. The senses do not always present the world as it

really is in itself.

2. The senses can only confirm particular cases, not

general truths. (This is the problem of induction.)

....
This This This This
swan is swan is swan is swan is
white. white. white. white.
 Arguments against Empiricism:

1. The senses do not always present the world as it

really is in itself.

2. The senses can only confirm particular cases, not

general truths. (This is the problem of induction.)

....
?
This This This This
swan is swan is swan is swan is All swans
white. white. white. white. are white.
3. Dispute between rationalists and empiricists
(experience vs. reason alone)
Rationalists maintained that some concepts are
innate, and hence not derived from experience, and that
reason, or intuition, by itself, independently of experience, is
an important source of knowledge, including of existing 2
things. They also maintained that one could have a priori
knowledge of the existence of God.
Empiricists, on the other hand, denied that any
concepts are innate, claiming instead that all of them are
derived from experience.
 Descartes was an avid experimentalist, in his
abstract philosophy he elevated rational intuition over
sense experience as a source of knowledge. He also
claimed that humans have innate ideas, such as an idea of
God, which do not come from experience. And he claimed
that through reason alone, independently of appeal to
experience, one could demonstrate the existence of God
and the existence of immaterial souls–one such soul,
intimately conjoined with a body, for each human person
Implication to Education

1. There are those that see children as

empty vessels that need to be filled with
experiences that in turn will lead to the
successful attainment of knowledge.
2. Empiricists tend to support the idea that
all children can learn if they are provided the
appropriate opportunities.
3. No Child Left Behind and All Children
Can Learn are slogans that develop as a
result of this frame of reference. Empiricists
strive for a prioritized curriculum and a finite
list of standards. They insist upon all
students learning the "basics" first as the
basics represent the most important aspects
of desired knowledge
4. educationalist Benjamin Bloom though
expanded on the technical– rational
model (Bloom and Krathnohl 1956). His
Cognitive Taxonomy of Learning specifies
different levels of knowledge (from knowledge,
the lowest, to evaluation, the highest) and
shows how they can be demonstrated in
observable and verifiable behaviours,
rather than in mental acts
1. knowledge- demonstrated in outlining, recounting, defining and
enumerating ideas;

2. comprehension demonstrated in paraphrasing, recognizing, illustrating and

explaining ideas;

3. application demonstrated in transferring, employing and organizing

ideas;

4. analysis demonstrated in breaking down, categorizing, comparing and

contrasting ideas;

5. synthesis demonstrated in summarizing, generalizing about, integrating

and constructing ideas and arguments;

6. evaluation demonstrated in appraising, discriminating between and

assessing ideas or resolving problems and arguments.