Does Locke succeed in proving that there are no innate principles or ideas in the human mind?
Submitted for PH201 (History of Modern Philosophy) Coursework
I shall argue that while Locke succeeds in showing that no principles have universal consent and thus cannot be innate, the possibility of innate ideas is not disproved, and persists in Chomsky’s view that knowledge of language arises from innate cognitive structures beyond sensory experience.
The doctrine of innate ideas holds that certain notions are present in the human mind at birth, independent of experience. It has its roots in Plato’s Meno, and is maintained by Descartes, who argues that some knowledge, like mathematical truths and the idea of God, cannot derive from sensory experience alone. It is this “established opinion amongst some men, that there are in the understanding certain innate principles […] stamped upon the mind” that (Locke, 1996, pp. 45-46) challenges in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. He claims no idea is assented to by all: even logical truths like, “What is, is” are not understood, and therefore not assented to, by children or the mentally defective. But “universal assent [is] the necessary concomitant of all innate truths” – any idea imprinted on the mind must be known to all who have minds, which certainly includes the aforementioned cases. It is not enough to argue that individuals could learn these truths – this only demonstrates that the capacity to learn is innate, which Locke readily accepts and is not seriously disputed. (Ibid., pp. 46-48).
Even if certain ideas have universal consent in a more qualified sense – for instance, everyone assents to an idea when they come to the use of reason, or whenever it is proposed and understood – this would not prove them innate. By proposing an alternative means by which “men […] may attain to all the knowledge they have”, Locke shows that such agreement could arise without assuming innate ideas (Locke, 1996, p. 46). In particular, he argues that the acquisition of ideas can be entirely accounted for by sensory impressions furnishing the mind with particular ideas, later abstracted into general concepts that the mind can compare. For example, a child can recognise that “sweet is not bitter”; and agreement on such principles can arise without innate ideas, but from shared experiences and common structures of human perception (Ibid., p. 51).
Rationalists critique Locke for relying on an overly narrow connection between knowledge and consciousness. (Locke, 1996, p. 47) contends that, “No proposition can be said to be in the mind, which it never yet knew, which it was never yet conscious of.” This assumption is challenged by Leibniz, who in his New Essays on Human Understanding argues that truths may be innate in the mind as dispositions or potentialities rather than as fully-formed propositions. His analogy of a veined block of marble contrasts with Locke’s tabula rasa (blank slate): in Locke’s view, the mind is like a homogenous block of marble, entirely neutral as to which ideas are shaped into it by external impressions; but for Leibniz, the mind is like a block of marble whose pre-existent veins predispose it to take on certain shapes, like the figure of Hercules, more readily than others (Leibniz, 1996, p. 52). There are innate structures or tendencies in the mind, “which external objects merely rouse up on suitable occasions.” This explains why humans, unlike other animals, can know general truths “such as we find in pure mathematics”. Animals are limited to knowledge derived from sensory experience; they lack the innate faculty possessed by humans for forming and understanding general propositions. (Ibid., pp. 49-51).
Just as the potential form of Hercules exists within the marble prior to being sculpted, innate knowledge can manifest as capacities and dispositions that unconsciously guide thought and action. This understanding of innate knowledge as latent dispositions rather than explicit propositions finds a contemporary parallel in Noam Chomsky’s account of universal grammar, which holds that humans are born with an innate linguistic capacity predisposing them to acquire language through underlying structural principles. In Language and Problems of Knowledge, (Chomsky, 1988) writes that “[a] person who speaks a language has developed a certain system of knowledge, represented somehow in the mind”, which raises the questions of how all humans (apart from extreme pathology), including very young children, can acquire that knowledge and make unbounded, creative use of it. He answers that Plato and Leibniz were correct: just as there is something about human’s biological endowment that ensures we grow arms rather than wings, there is something about it that predisposes infants to acquire language in accordance with the ‘universal grammar’, a general structure common to all natural languages. This innate endowment explains how children, despite limited and imperfect input, rapidly develop linguistic abilities and intuitively apply complex, structure-dependent rules – evidence of mental faculties that precede experiential learning.
Locke distinguishes ‘ideas’ as mental concepts, and ‘principles’ as propositions combining ideas to express thoughts. His argument that no principles (such as the law of non-contradiction) are innate to the mind is not refuted by Leibniz and Chomsky. But as (Jolley, 1999, p. 29) notes, “it does not follow from the fact that there are no innate principles that there are no innate ideas”. Locke believes that his empiricist account of concept formation explains knowledge acquisition in a way that renders the hypothesis of innate ideas unnecessary; but if Chomsky is correct that mere experience is insufficient in accounting for language acquisition and use, Locke’s framework is undermined – knowledge of the principles of universal grammar would be innate to the human mind.
The question thus turns on whether human linguistic creativity and learning can be explained by general-purpose cognitive mechanisms exposed to experience, or (per Chomsky) an innate biological structure is required. Some, like (Piantadosi, 2024), have argued that Large Language Models (LLMs) like ChatGPT challenge Chomsky’s view, as these systems exhibit novel and unbounded linguistic creativity without having innate grammatical principles programmed into them; rather, neural networks using transformer architecture “trained on huge datasets of internet-based text to predict upcoming linguistic material” suffice. It remains an open question whether human brains learn language in an analogous manner, or whether they encode an innate Chomskyan language faculty. Since the question remains unresolved (that is, the latter remains an open possibility), it is clear that Locke fails in definitively disproving the existence of innate ideas.
I have shown that Locke’s argument that no principles have universal consent proves that no principles are innate to the human mind. However, he fails to conclusively prove that no ideas are innate, as responses from Leibniz and Chomsky demonstrate that these may exist as unconscious dispositions or biological structures, guiding thought and learning in a way Locke’s concept empiricist framework does not fully account for.
Bibliography
Chomsky, N. (1988). Language and Problems of Knowledge: The Managua Lectures. MIT Press.
Jolley, N. (1999). Locke: His Philosophical Thought. Oxford University Press.
Leibniz, G. W. (1996). New Essays on Human Understanding. Cambridge University Press.
Locke, J. (1996). An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.
Piantadosi, S. T. (2024). Modern language models refute Chomsky's approach to language. In E. Gibson, & M. Poliak, From fieldwork to linguistic theory (pp. 353-391). Berlin: Language Science Press.
Plato. (1976). Meno. Hackett Publishing Company Inc.
Result
Mark: 65% (Mid 2.1)
Feedback:
The essay’s aim is to argue that although Locke is successful in claiming that universal consensus does not prove the existence of innate principles, the existence of innate ideas is not disproved. However, Chomsky’s view on universal grammar effectively shows that language emerges from innate cognitive structures. The essay also presents Leibniz’s piece of marble example as a counterpoint to Locke’s critique.
This essay answers the question at stake, attempts to provide strong arguments, and develops independent thought. It also engages with the relevant literature.
This is a good essay; however, if the following issues were addressed, it could have been further enhanced:
1) The structure is a bit uneven, which makes your argument a bit difficult to follow.
2) You have been a bit too ambitious with the number of topics you’re introducing, which makes some of your arguments a bit superficial.
Advice on how to improve for future assignments:
Try to structure your essays a bit more. Usually, we write one argument per paragraph (I know you tried), and the paragraphs have more or less the same length. Of course, there is some variation, but it is one way of ensuring your structure is correct. Also, remember that less is more! I’m very aware that you tried to approach your essay around one clear argument, which you did, but I think you can be even more restrictive when it comes to the 1,000-word essay. However, do not worry too much; you’re on the right track!