Rationalism vs. Empiricism: A Philosophical Exploration of Knowledge
Rationalism and Empiricism
Throughout the history of philosophy, the primacy given to the senses or reason as the foundation of knowledge has given rise to two classical positions: rationalism and empiricism.
Rationalism
Rationalism defends the primacy of understanding over sensory knowledge. Rationalists argue for the existence of innate ideas in the mind. These ideas bloom during different sensory experiences, and from them, reason, in its exercise, obtains other truths by applying a deductive method.
Empiricism
Empiricism defends the primacy of sensory knowledge over reason. Unlike rationalists, empiricists reject the existence of innate ideas. All mental contents come from sense experience and are therefore acquired. The sensible approach is presented as truth or falsity, and induction as a model of knowledge.
Hume
For Hume, knowledge originates in experience, in data from the senses. He calls these direct sensory experiences impressions. When the senses are no longer directly stimulated, the weaker remaining mark is an idea. Hume called the set of impressions and ideas perceptions. Impressions are characterized by their simplicity and immediacy. For Hume, therefore, we cannot know what is beyond impressions. Knowledge is only sensitive knowledge.
The passage of impressions to ideas takes place through memory. Knowledge, for Hume, is based on habit, which is facilitated by relationships between perceptions. Knowledge from experience is neither universal nor necessary.
Kant’s Transcendental Idealism
Kant’s initial question differs from his predecessors: not “what is knowledge?” but “how far is knowledge possible?”
Matter and Form
Kant agrees with Hume that all knowledge begins in sense experience, but disagrees that all knowledge comes from experience. We receive impressions through the senses, but these impressions are sorted by the person who receives them. Kant calls the impressions matter of knowledge and the organizing principle provided by the subject form.
A Priori and A Posteriori
A posteriori knowledge is acquired through experience. A priori knowledge is known without experience. The content of knowledge is a posteriori; the form is a priori. Matter is a posteriori because it is constituted by the data we receive from our senses. The form is a priori because the knowing subject brings it to bear on those impressions, organizing them.
The union of matter and form is the object known.
Kant and the Rationalism-Empiricism Opposition
Rationalists argue that the subject can gain knowledge through reason alone, without experience. Kant argues that while the subject provides form without recourse to experience, this form is activated by the presence of experience.
Empiricists argue that knowledge is just experience, impressions. Kant recognizes the value of experience but emphasizes the need for the structure of form.
Human beings cannot know the thing itself, only the phenomenon, i.e., sensory data ordered and structured by the subject.
Knowledge and Truth
The desire for knowledge, common to all human beings, implies a desire to reach the truth. Traditionally, there are two senses of truth: ontological truth (referring to a concrete reality) and logical truth (referring to a judgment).
Ontological Truth
Truth understood as a property of things originates in ancient Greek philosophy. It’s truth as aletheia, the unveiling of what is hidden. Truth, as a property of things, is opposed to the merely imagined or thought.
Logical Truth
Logical truth is expressed in judgments. A judgment is a proposition that links a predicate to a subject by the copula “is.” In this sense, truth is the fit between what we say and the reality about which we speak.
Skepticism and Relativism
Skepticism
Radical skepticism claims truth does not exist, or if it does, humans cannot know it. This position originated in ancient Greece. Reality is only apparent, and no truth can be asserted. Skeptics refrain from judgment to avoid error.
Healthy skepticism is a cautious stance that doesn’t accept claims at face value but looks for credibility.
Relativism
Relativism argues there are no absolute truths; truth or falsity depends on the circumstances. Truth is relative.
Unlike skepticism, relativism doesn’t deny reality but asserts that truth depends on the knowing subject and the circumstances. Moderate relativism is a healthy critical attitude that helps confront truth and avoid dogmatism.