PSY 401 1st Edition Lecture 12 Outline of Last Lecture I. Middle Ages to the Renaissancea. Magellan’s Voyageb. Heliocentric ModelII. The Renaissancea. Niccolo Machiavellib. Leonardo da Vincic. New discoveriesd. Rediscovery of Greek philosophy e. Spurred subsequent intellectual activity Outline of Current Lecture I. Skepticisma. Michel Eyguem de Montaignei. Essayii. “Apology for Raymond Sebond”iii. Humanis and Animals iv. PsychologyII. Empiricism a. Francis Baconi. Novum Organumii. Ultimate authority=empirical observationiii. The IdolsCurrent Lecture I. Skepticism: no beliefs can be proven true, therefore it is best to believe nothing a. Michel Eyguem de Montaigne (1533-1592)i. Created the Essay (writing style) These notes represent a detailed interpretation of the professor’s lecture. GradeBuddy is best used as a supplement to your own notes, not as a substitute.ii. “Apology for Raymond Sebond” (1576) 1. Brought back skepticism (Pyrrho)2. Cannot trust reason or experience: people did not seem reasonablea. Noticed people from different areas and cultures could notagree on large topics (religion)i. Saw how people tried to rationalize why their side was correct- believed so much they started war based on their reasoning iii. Humans and Animals 1. Humans: vain, stupid, immoral (wars over religion and philosophy)a. Inferior species2. Animals: noble, simple, ignorant (do not hold grudges, etc.) iv. Psychology1. Child rearing: during the time parents had the right to abuse and even kill their children a. Montaigne believed that punishment was not a good way to deal with childrenII. Empiricism: knowledge from sensory experience a. Francis Bacon (1561-1629)i. Novum Organum (1620)1. New instrument of the mind2. Makes argument for the empirical methodii. Ultimate authority=empirical observation1. Argues against skepticism2. We should believe in our common sense3. Just because our sense can be fooled, does not mean we should reject all sensory information (just ignore illusions)4. Inductive method: gather data then make theoriesa. Very short ‘discussion sections’, not so much theorizing and connecting to larger theory (mostly look at data)iii. The Idols: sources of error that can lead us to erroneous conclusions1. Idol of the Cave: (confirmation bias) cultural/personal bias a. People tend to ignore contradicting data if they have preconceived ideas or theories 2. Idol of the Tribe: bias from limitations on human reasons (decisionmaking) a. People like to impose order and reason on ambiguous datab. Too quick to make generalizations or generate theories 3. Idol of the Marketplace: bias of verbal labels a. Language influences how we interpret things (significance, cause vs. correlation, laws vs theory)b. Labeling theory: fill expectations of label4. Idol of the
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