How does knowledge arise? Have we, as good people suppose, innate ideas;?

Question

as for example of right and wrong, and God - ideas inherent in the mind from birth, prior to all existence?

Thank you philosophers for all the answers. Have a wonderful day!

Answer 1

Well, if you're a rationalist you believe that all of our knowledge comes from reason alone; otherwise if you're an empiricist you'd argue that you have to perceive something before you actually know it. I think that the answer lies somewhere in the middle. I mean, for example let's take a book--Eleven Minutes by Paulo Coelho. If I didn't see Paulo Coelho's book while surfing the Internet, I'd probably never know that he wrote a book titled 'Eleven Minutes'(bookstores here in Japan don't sell much foreign literature; well not much written in good old english). And if I didn't buy(using my sense of budget) and read the book(using my sense of sight), I'd probably never know who Maria, the main character, is. So, in any case, I need my senses to know something. Points there for the empiricists. But while I'm reading the book, I have to process what I am reading: I have to digest and analyze the sentence patterns, the meanings of the words, read between the lines, connect cause and effect to see the whole plot, and infer a little about the next chapter. So, I have to use my reason to see this character 'Maria' and know about her. After all, true insight only comes from within, and even if I read it all day long but don't understand anything, then I won't gain any knowledge at all. Points there for the rationalists.

As for innate ideas, that is debatable. Though many argue that morality is hardwired to the human psyche(and some even argue that it is coded in our genes), we are far from anything conclusive. Basically, innate ideas are probably the result of nature and nurture. But ultimately, the only thing I'm sure that is innate in man is his boundless thirst for knowledge and insatiable curiosity

Answer 2

We are born atheists. It is through a socialization process that anyone learns of a local god or gods. If your argument were, the Nordic peoples, the Ancient civilizations and a long list of others would have been born with the same information about the same gods. Clearly, this is not inherent or intrinsic.

All knowledge requires language. No one can express any concepts without a language and without a fellow speaker to understand the concept. Language is not inborn, as each person can and does learn one or more languages appropriate to their local community. As language acquisition generally starts about the age of 2, we are born "dumb".

If we were born with a sense of right and wrong, different cultures would not have developed differently. Canabilism would not have developed. The Aztecs would have "bowled" with the heads of their enemies. As well, polyandry, polyandry and polygamy wouldn't have developed. After all, we would all been born with the same information about right and wrong.

But, it's nice to think of ourselves this way.

Answer 3

No, I am not a nazi. How does knowledge arise?


'In the social production of their existence, men inevitably enter into definite relations, which are independent of their will, namely relations of production appropriate to a given stage in the development of their material forces of production. The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political and intellectual life. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness. At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or – this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms – with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social revolution. The changes in the economic foundation lead sooner or later to the transformation of the whole immense superstructure.
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http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/preface.htm

'The adherents, no less than the assailants, of the doctrine of Innate Ideas have been guilty throughout of the like exclusiveness and narrowness as is here noted. They have drawn a hard and fast line between the essential and immediate union (as it may be described) of certain universal principles with the soul, and another union which has to be brought about in an external fashion, and through the channel of given objects and conceptions. There is one objection, borrowed from experience, which was raised against the doctrine of Innate Ideas. All men, it was said, must have these ideas; they must have, for example, the maxim of contradiction present in the mind-they must be aware of it; for this maxim and others like it were included in the class of Innate Ideas. The objection may be set down to misconception; for the principles in question, though innate, need not on that account have the form of ideas or conceptions of something we are aware of. Still, the objection completely meets and overthrows the crude theory of immediate knowledge, which expressly maintains its formulae in so far as they are in consciousness. Another point calls for notice. ‘We may suppose it admitted by the intuitive school, that the special case of religious faith involves supplementing by a Christian or religious education and development. In that case it is acting capriciously when it seeks to ignore this admission when speaking about faith, or it betrays a want of reflection not to know, that, if the necessity of education be once admitted, mediation is pronounced indispensable.

The reminiscence of ideas spoken of by Plato is equivalent to saying that ideas implicitly exist in man, instead of being, as the Sophists assert, a foreign importation into his mind. But to conceive knowledge as reminiscence does not interfere with, or set aside as useless, the development of what is implicitly in man; which development is another word for mediation. The same holds good of the innate ideas that we find in Descartes and the Scotch philosophers. These ideas are only potential in the first instance, and should be looked at as being a sort of mere capacity in man.'

Encyclopaedia of the Philosophical Sciences (1830) Part One

III. Third Attitude of Thought to Objectivity
IMMEDIATE OR INTUITIVE KNOWLEDGE


http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/sl/sl_v.htm#SL67n

http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/li_terms.htm

Stages of Cognitive Development. Piaget identified four stages in cognitive development:

Sensorimotor stage (Infancy). In this period (which has 6 stages), intelligence is demonstrated through motor activity without the use of symbols. Knowledge of the world is limited (but developing) because its based on physical interactions / experiences. Children acquire object permanence at about 7 months of age (memory). Physical development (mobility) allows the child to begin developing new intellectual abilities. Some symbollic (language) abilities are developed at the end of this stage.

Pre-operational stage (Toddler and Early Childhood). In this period (which has two substages), intelligence is demonstrated through the use of symbols, language use matures, and memory and imagination are developed, but thinking is done in a nonlogical, nonreversable manner. Egocentric thinking predominates

Concrete operational stage (Elementary and early adolescence). In this stage (characterized by 7 types of conservation: number, length, liquid, mass, weight, area, volume), intelligence is demonstrated through logical and systematic manipulation of symbols related to concrete objects. Operational thinking develops (mental actions that are reversible). Egocentric thought diminishes.

Formal operational stage (Adolescence and adulthood). In this stage, intelligence is demonstrated through the logical use of symbols related to abstract concepts. Early in the period there is a return to egocentric thought. Only 35% of high school graduates in industrialized countries obtain formal operations; many people do not think formally during adulthood.

http://chiron.valdosta.edu/whuitt/col/cogsys/piaget.html