front 1 Metaphysics | back 1 The study of the nature of reality, or the nature of being. |
front 2 Rationalism | back 2 Reason is the foundation of knowledge (opposite of empiricism) |
front 3 Empiricism | back 3 Experience and experimentation is the foundation of knowledge (opposite of rationalism) |
front 4 Mind-Body Problem | back 4 Descartes; mind and body are two entities and substances; how mind and body interact (contradiction) |
front 5 Dualism | back 5 Mind and body are distinct |
front 6 Monism | back 6 mind and body are the same |
front 7 Materialism/Physicalism | back 7 Daniel Dennett; All that exists is purely material/physical. |
front 8 Priori Knowledge | back 8 Knowledge without evidence from experience |
front 9 Posteriori Knowledge | back 9 Knowledge based on evidence from sensory experience |
front 10 Faculty | back 10 Inherent mental capacity |
front 11 John Locke | back 11 Empiricist and political liberist; identity is memories; immaterial nonsubstance theory |
front 12 Descartes | back 12 "The Meditations on First Philosophy"; "Cogito Ergo Sum"; Cartesian dualism; skeptic |
front 13 Skepticism | back 13 Certain knowledge is impossible; raise doubt to defeat doubt; |
front 14 Cogito Ergo Sum | back 14 Descartes; I think, therefore I am" |
front 15 Self | back 15 source of consciousness; responsible for thoughts and actions |
front 16 Enduring Self | back 16 The self remains the same over time |
front 17 Epistemology | back 17 Theory of knowledge and the mind's relation to reality; How do we know that we know? |
front 18 Essential Self | back 18 internal self found through introspection and self-consciousness; essence precedes existence; Plato and Descartes |
front 19 Existential Self | back 19 external self found through actions and interactions with others; existence precedes essence; Sartre |
front 20 Intersubjectivity | back 20 Intersection between people's cognitive perspectives; saves Descartes' solipsism; "I think" inherently assumes the other; knowing self requires knowing other |
front 21 Consiousness | back 21 Awareness or experience of the world |
front 22 Essence | back 22 Intrinsic properties that characterize an entity |
front 23 Material | back 23 Substance out of which something is made |
front 24 Temporality | back 24 Condition of being bounded in time |
front 25 Spatiality | back 25 Condition of being involved in or having the nature of space |
front 26 Tripartite Soul | back 26 Plato; rational, spirited, and appetitive parts of the soul; Unity through reason's ability to lead the spirit and appetite |
front 27 Incorporeal | back 27 Immaterial substance |
front 28 Corporeal | back 28 Material substance |
front 29 Solipsism | back 29 Self is the only thing that can be known to exist |
front 30 Reductive Physicalism | back 30 mental states are reducible to brain states; abilities come from physical processes of the brain |
front 31 Substance Dualism | back 31 Notion that mind and body are two different substances |
front 32 Qualia | back 32 knowledge from experience |
front 33 Sentience | back 33 capacity for sensation or feeling |
front 34 The Problem of Other Minds | back 34 fundamental difficulty we have in perceiving the consciousness of others |
front 35 Mysterianism | back 35 Mind-Body problem is unsolvable by human beings; not enough cognitive ability |
front 36 Panpsychism | back 36 the mind exists as a property of all matter; all matter has consciousness |
front 37 Ship of Theseus | back 37 thought experiment; an object that has had all its components replaced remains fundamentally the same object; addresses the problem of identity over time |
front 38 Philosophical Zombie | back 38 indistinguishable from humans but lacks conscious awareness of itself or surroundings; David Chalmers; physicalism is an insufficient approach to hard problem of consciousness |
front 39 Hard Problem of Consciousness | back 39 how brain processes result in our personal conscious experience (qualia). How does physical processes give rise to subjective experience? |
front 40 Immaterial Substance Theory | back 40 Theory of Identity that asserts the self as an immaterial substance like a mind or soul; Plato and Descartes |
front 41 Material Substance Theory | back 41 Theory of Identity that asserts the self as a purely material being. Supported by the brain function or even DNA; Thomas Nagel |
front 42 Immaterial Nonsubstance Theory | back 42 Theory of Identity that asserts the self is sourced from psychological continuity, such as memories; Continuation of psychological state; John Locke |
front 43 Allegory of the Cave | back 43 Plato's description of individuals who live their lives in accordance with the shadows of reality provided by sensory experience instead of in accordance with the true reality beyond sensory experience |
front 44 Realm of Forms | back 44 Composed of eternal things which are permanent and perfect. It is the source of all reality and true knowledge. |
front 45 Realm of Appearances/Particulars | back 45 The physical realm that we exist in as bodies. This realm is what makes up the external world as being composed of particular instances of objects that correlate to a perfect and true form in the realm of forms. |
front 46 Determinism | back 46 Every event, action, and decision results from something independent of the human will |
front 47 Tabula Rasa | back 47 John Locke's concept of the mind as a blank slate ultimately bombarded by sense impressions that, aided by human reasoning, formulate ideas |
front 48 Foundationalism (Descartes) | back 48 epistemological view that all knowledge ultimately rests upon a firm base of self evident truth |
front 49 Perspectivism (Nietzsche) | back 49 belief that a person's knowledge is based entirely on (and limited by) his perspective; thus it is impossible to achieve any absolute truth |
front 50 Will to Power (Nietzsche) | back 50 Instinctual desires are what makes us who we are, and the only way to obtain true potential is to understand and follow the desires to completion; Free will focuses on needs and becomes a true version of self |
front 51 Ubermensch | back 51 the ideal superior man of the future who could rise above conventional morality to create and impose his own values |
front 52 Phenomenology | back 52 The study of individuals' own unique, first-person, conscious experience. Use of experiences proves something. |
front 53 Symbolic Logic | back 53 an application of mathematical methods to the processes of thought; uses conventional symbols to represent terms, propositions and relations among them |
front 54 Law of Identity | back 54 if a statement is true, then it is true |
front 55 Law of Non-Contradiction | back 55 A statement cannot be both true and false |
front 56 Law of Excluded Middle | back 56 Any statement is either true or false |
front 57 Hobbes | back 57 English materialist and political philosopher who advocated absolute sovereignty as the only kind of government that could resolve problems caused by the selfishness of human beings |
front 58 Hume | back 58 Scottish philosopher whose skeptical philosophy restricted human knowledge to that which can be perceived by the senses. |
front 59 Principle of Sufficient Reason | back 59 everything must have a reason or cause |
front 60 Self-evident truth | back 60 true by definition; contains its own evidence or proof, and doesn't need further demonstration; universal |
front 61 objective | back 61 not influenced by person feelings or opinions |
front 62 subjective | back 62 based on personal feelings, tastes, or opinions |
front 63 free will | back 63 human beings are free to make their own choices |
front 64 Existentialism | back 64 existence of individual is free; person is responsible agent determining their own development through acts of the will |
front 65 existential anguish | back 65 existential response to the burden of responsibility |
front 66 existential despair | back 66 the recognition that life has no absolute value or meaning, that any meaning that does exist we create for ourselves, and that, ultimately, we all face death |
front 67 Existential abandonment | back 67 realization that there is no god and therefore no moral code to abide by |