UNIT 1 - Chapter 4 - Short Answers Study

Renaissance and Renaissance Humanism

• The Renaissance means "Rebirth" and is associated with the breakdown of church authority.
• Factors contributing to the Renaissance include:
  • Acceptance of reason and the examination of nature as ways of knowing God.
  • Humanist philosophy and its emphasis on human potential and open inquiry.
  • Exploration and contact with other cultures.
  • The invention of the printing press.

Renaissance Humanism

• Emphasized four major themes:
  • Individualism: Concern with human potential and achievement, believing in the power of the individual to make a positive difference in the world.
  • A personal relationship with God: Advocating for a more personal and less formal religion.
  • Interest in classical wisdom: Studying the works of ancient Greek and Roman poets, philosophers, and politicians.
  • Criticism of Aristotle's philosophy: Believing that the church had relied too heavily on Aristotle's philosophy and that it was capable of error.

Key Figures of Renaissance Humanism

• Francesco Petrarch: Referred to as the "father of the Renaissance," he attacked Scholasticism and urged the study of classics for their own sake.
• Giovanni Pico: Believed that humans have the capacity to change themselves and the world.
• Desiderius Erasmus: Opposed fanaticism and superstition, and argued in favor of human free will.
• Martin Luther: Criticized the church's corruption and emphasis on ritual, and urged a return to personal religion.

The Scientific Revolution

• The Ptolemaic system: A geocentric model of the universe that placed the earth at the center.
• Nicolaus Copernicus: Proposed the heliocentric theory, which placed the sun at the center of the solar system.
• Johannes Kepler: Determined the elliptical paths of the planets around the sun and discovered the laws of planetary motion.

The Debate between Ptolemaic and Copernican Systems

• The Copernican system was more harmonious and mathematically simple, but it was not more accurate in predicting celestial events.
• The opposition to Copernicus's view was widespread and harsh, as it challenged the traditional view of the universe.

Galileo and the Scientific Method

• Galileo believed in the importance of experimentation and observation to verify mathematical laws.
• He saw the universe as a machine governed by mathematical laws, and believed that consciousness could not be studied by the objective methods of science.
• Primary qualities: Objective, absolute, and capable of precise mathematical description.
• Secondary qualities: Subjective, relative, and purely psychological experiences.

Isaac Newton and the Laws of Motion

• Extended the work of Galileo and showed that the motion of all objects in the universe could be explained by his law of gravitation.
• Viewed the universe as a complex machine created by God, but governed by natural laws.
• Developed differential and integral calculus, and did pioneering work in optics.

Newtonian Physics

• 6 key principles:
  • God does not actively intervene in the world.
  • The material world is governed by natural laws.
  • There is no place for purpose in natural law.
  • Occam's razor should be used to explain phenomena.
  • The universe can be explained in terms of space, time, matter, and force.
  • The entire physical universe can be explained by these four constructs.

Impact of the Scientific Revolution

• Eventually led to the removal of God from the scientific explanation of the universe.
• Contributed to the rise of deism, which holds that God created the universe but does not intervene in its workings.### Natural Laws and Scientific Inquiry
• Natural laws are absolute, but our understanding of them is imperfect and subject to human ignorance.
• Scientists often need to settle for probabilities rather than certainty to account for this imperfection.
• Classification is not explanation; it is necessary to understand the physical attributes of an object and the forces acting on it to explain its behavior.

Francis Bacon and Inductive Reasoning

• Bacon (1561-1626) advocated for an inductive, practical science that rejects misconceptions and theoretical influences.
• He believed that nature can only be understood by studying it directly and objectively, without scriptural, faith-based, or philosophical authority.
• Induction is the method of reasoning that moves from the particular to the general, after observing individual instances.
• Bacon's approach to science was inductive, involving experiments of light (to discover causal relationships) and experiments of fruit (to explore how to utilize the laws of nature).

Bacon's Idols of Error

• The idols of the cave: personal biases arising from intellectual endowment, experiences, education, and feelings.
• The idols of the tribe: biases due to human nature, which can distort perceptions and lead to seeing events as we would like them to be rather than how they really are.
• The idols of the marketplace: biases resulting from being overly influenced by the meaning assigned to words, which can distort one's understanding of the world.
• The idols of the theater: biases resulting from blind allegiance to any viewpoint, whether philosophical or theological.

René Descartes and the Nature of Knowledge

• Descartes (1596-1650) believed that much human behavior can be explained in mechanical terms, and that the mind and body are separate but interacting entities.
• He believed in the existence of innate ideas, such as unity, infinity, and perfection, which are placed in the mind by God.
• Descartes's method consisted of intuition and deduction, where an unbiased and attentive mind arrives at a clear and distinct idea, and then deduces other valid ideas from it.
• He concluded that rational processes are valid, and that knowledge of the physical world gained through the senses can be accepted because God would not deceive us.

Descartes' Analysis of Reflexive Behavior

• In Descartes' lifetime, evidence showed that his analysis of reflexive behavior was incorrect, including the fact that nerves are not hollow and that there are two distinct types of nerves: sensory and motor nerves.
• Observations of animals continued to move and react to stimulation even after decapitation, and animals could acquire new responses, posed problems for Descartes' analysis, but he never modified his position.

Mind-Body Problem

• Descartes confronted the ancient mind-body problem by stating that humans possess a body that operates according to physical principles and a non-physical mind that interacts with the body.
• He was a dualist, subscribing to interactionism (Cartesian dualism), which posits that the mind and body are separate but influencing entities.
• The question of how this interaction occurs remains a challenge.

Legacy of Descartes

• His mechanistic analysis of reflexive behavior can be seen as the beginning of stimulus-response and behavioristic psychology.
• The reaction to his notion of innate ideas led to the development of modern empiricism and modern sensationalism.
• His investigation of animal bodies led to the birth of physiological psychology and comparative psychology.
• By making subjective experience respectable, Descartes paved the way for the scientific study of consciousness.
• Descartes is considered the father of modern philosophy and modern psychology, with reactions to his ideas shaping the development of these fields.