Introduction: empiricism and rationalism

Summary

Every list of the great empiricists would include John Locke (1632–1704), George Berkeley (1685–1753) and David Hume (1711–1776), but many commentators argue that they do not agree on a doctrine we can call empiricism. But this is premature. There is a basic and important thesis they share. Locke states it clearly in a note about proofs of the existence of God. He says:

Real existence can be proved only by real existence; and, therefore, the real existence of a God can only be proved by the real existence of other things. The real existence of other things without us can be evidenced to us only by our senses; but our own existence is known to us by a certainty yet higher than our senses give us of the existence of other things, and that is internal perception, self-consciousness, or intuition; from whence therefore may be drawn, by a train of ideas, the surest and most incontestable proof of a God.

(Locke 1972: 316)

These remarks are a comment on René Descartes (1596–1650), who holds that God's existence can be proved from our concept of him. By definition he is a perfect being and, according to Descartes, the idea of perfection could only come from an actually perfect being. Locke claims that we cannot prove the existence of anything without appealing to experience.