Ideas are not innate

Ideas are not innate

Introduction

An idea is a thought that is generated in the mind. They are a representation of what a person is thinking about; the idea one has can give away their personality and their way of thinking. Every person has an opinion about a situation and they are either similar or different from each other. People have conflicting arguments about what motivates one to come up with ideas; whether they are innate or they are influenced by outside sources. John Locke was a renown philosopher who introduced the concept of tabula rasa. This is the belief that when one is born, the mind is a blank slate and ideas are later formed as one grows up. He argued that ideas are formed from experiences and interaction with the environment from which one grows up. The theory of tabula rasa states that behavioral patterns are learnt and memorized as one grows up rather than influenced by the parental genes. This paper will defend the philosophy of John Locke that ideas are not innate and prove that ideas come from outside of us.

Discussion

Babies are by definition curious creatures. They become immediately aware of the environment they are born in and as soon as they gain cognition, they start wanting to know why things happen the way they do. The answers given to children at this curious age thereafter shape their personalities. That is why early childhood years are the most important and influential on a person because it is at this stage that personality is molded. These traits that form personality are not acquired by genes but by observation. When a child is raised in a violent environment, it is more likely that they will be aggressive because it is a behavior they observe. It is however very unlikely for a child to get aggressive traits simply because the parent was aggressive. If the aggressive parent raised the child, the child is highly likely to learn aggressive behaviors but if the child was raised non-aggressive person, they do not get the aggressive traits. Children are treated like fragile creatures because they are still in the learning process of what is morally acceptable or not. The child can later form their own beliefs depending on the experience they have had. The reason as to why parents are advised to mold their children when they are still young is because their behaviors can be influenced easily by the environment they are in and therefore they can be corrected easily.

The theory of tabula rasa is evident in education. The mind is blank slate and that is why children are taken to school in order to develop their desire and ability to think and impact new knowledge on them. From early childhood development education, children are molded knowledge wise by their teachers. They pick the knowledge and behavior from their teachers as well as from fellow students. The children are taught how to interact with fellow students and life skills that they can use when they are faced with ethical crises. This goes to prove that the mind is a blank slate that needs outside sources in order to learn.

The concept of tabula rasa is further emphasized by the human need to get a mentor. A mentor is a person who impacts knowledge and skills to a young person. A good mentor can motivate one to reach their maximum potential. This implies that a person is born without built-in mental content and there is the need to gain knowledge from all available sources. One learns from a mentor and in most cases, they take up the behaviors of the mentor because they are most likely to lead to similar success.

The case is similar in most autobiographies and biographies, the success is attributed to most childhood experiences. In most autobiographies, they give a detailed account of their childhood and how the experiences impacted on their childhood. Interactions at home and at school and how they contributed to shaping their personalities. All this goes to prove how experiences contribute to personality rather than in-born traits that are passed genetically.

In addition, also during adulthood, people learn from experiences. A huge part of personality is formed during childhood but some of traits can be shed during adulthood. Take for instance a person who observed and learnt aggressive traits from a young age and later got into crime. When such a person later gets sentenced to a life in prison, they learn from their experience and they can resolve to change their bad behavior. This shows that learning is an endless process and the mind is an endless field that can accommodate more and more ideas as one continues to learn for experience.

Conclusion

It is true that one is born with a blank mind and therefore all knowledge comes from experience. Outer experience plays a large role in impacting knowledge. Contact and observation of the environment one is in shapes the character and personality of a person. It is important to raise children in a morally acceptable environment in order to shape and influence positive personal traits. It is also important to understand that the learning process never stops. Even though basic traits are impacted during childhood, one continues to learn and adjust to the environment.