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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. How does Locke characterize perception?

2. What do we need to do with ideas over time, according to Locke?

3. Composition is the ability to do what, according to Locke?

4. How does Locke define simple ideas?

5. What does Locke say justifies moral principles?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe the two kinds of ideas Locke describes.

2. What does Locke set out to do in Book II?

3. How does Locke define retention?

4. What does Locke say about the innateness of moral principles?

5. What example does Locke use of natural principles?

6. In what way is understanding limited, according to Locke?

7. What does Locke mean when he says that the mind is a blank slate?

8. How does Locke use the concept of number in his discussion of primary qualities?

9. What is the difference between natural principles and innate principles?

10. In what way is knowledge limited, according to Locke?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In the beginning of "Essay Concerning Human Understanding," Locke says that variability in people's ideas undermines the possibility of innate knowledge. Analyzing Locke's writing, describe how Locke accounts for variability in his own philosophy. How does he keep it from being a disruptive force in his own philosophy?

Essay Topic 2

Locke's definition of experience and language is based solely on individual experience--but what is the role of the family in promoting certain knowledge and restricting or prohibiting other kinds of knowledge? Does Locke account for teachers and parents in his arguments about knowledge and experience?

Essay Topic 3

How would Locke account for the philosophy of deconstruction--or the notion that language is ultimately self-referential, and that meaning is eternally deferred, never arriving at an object per se? Is Locke's theory of language predicated on an ultimate arrival, or can it handle the notion that truth is, in Nietzsche's phrase, a mobile army of metaphors?

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