Реферат “John locke inquiry about human understanding”

CONTENT

І. John Locke is an outstanding English philosopher 

ІІ. The main philosophical treatise of John Locke

References

І. John Locke is an outstanding English philosopher

John Locke is one of the most famous philosophers. He was born and raised in a Puritan family of a district attorney in the town of Rington, studied at Westminster School, and then at Christ Church College, Oxford University, where he studied philosophy, natural history and medicine. After graduating from the university, he taught Greek, rhetoric and moral philosophy there. In addition to teaching, the young man was interested in natural history, exact sciences and experimental research. In particular, he was interested in chemistry and often helped Robert Boyle in his chemical experiments. At the same time, Locke conducted metrological observations and studied medicine [2].

In 1667, Locke left the university and settled in the family of Ashley Cooper, where he served as family doctor and tutor to the future Earl of Shaftesbury. Following in the footsteps of his protégé, Locke took a responsible position in one of the English government departments. The ups and downs of Earl Shaftesbury, as a statesman and political figure, directly affected the fate of his educators. In a series of controversial events, John Locke rose and fell in political status, but the constant in the life of this outstanding thinker was deep respect for science and scientists, friendliness and friendship, which John Locke was always proud of, regardless of his position or political status.

As a social philosopher and political scientist, John Locke is best known as the author of the liberal-democratic concept of the social organization of public life, based on the justification of the concept of private property as a necessary condition for distributive justice, the contractual interpretation of state power, and a radical rethinking of the idea of natural law [5].

Based on his recognition of the foundations of social life as a kind of state of nature, John Locke interprets this state no longer as a “war of all against all”, but as a state of equality in which all powers and legal dependencies exist. John Locke believed that all people have unlimited freedom and at the same time are subject to the influence of the freedom of other people. According to Locke, the first basic element of freedom is the principle of inviolability of private property.

The interpretation of “natural law” of social life required radical changes in its “theoretical model”. The “state of nature” in the Lockean interpretation took the form of “fair competition” based on equality and mutual recognition. At the same time, the philosopher considered equality not as the homogeneity of individuals from birth or from a special equalization of their characteristics, but as equality of opportunities and demands. John Locke summarizes the idea of ​​equality, completes the theoretical justification of the principle of social organization generated by practice: all people, regardless of natural inequality, should once and for all be recognized as economically independent subjects in a relationship of voluntary mutual use.

The main provisions of John Locke’s political and legal concept were sympathetically commented and deepened by Voltaire and I. Kant, A. Smith, D. Diderot and many other thinkers. These provisions not only did not lose their meaning during the 18th-19th centuries and today, but in a certain sense they may turn out to be eternal. Such provisions can neither become obsolete nor die until the institutions of civil society, the principles of constitutionalism and the separation of powers are established all over the world, until the concept of human rights ceases to develop and exert its normative influence on socio-political practice [3].