Past Test Questions: Epistemology (Theory of Knowledge)

Answers at end. Because these questions draw on different textbooks and topics covered in different semesters, not all of them apply to any particular course in a semester.

True/False (True=A, False=B)

 

1.       Epistemology is the study of the origin, structure, and extent of reality.

 

2.       Because rationalism does not rely on sense experience, it cannot provide justified true beliefs (i.e., knowledge) about a priori propositions.

 

3.       Because rationalism does not rely on sense experience, it can provide justified true beliefs (i.e., knowledge) about a posteriori propositions but not a priori propositions.

 

4.       Rationalism is a form of foundationalist epistemology because it claims that knowledge is possible only if it is based on a principle or principles that are known with certainty.

 

5.       Rationalists argue that, since sense experiences are often mistaken and thus cannot provide certainty, we must appeal to reason alone to establish the foundations for knowledge.

 

6.       Because rationalism does not rely on sense experience, it cannot account for how we know anything at all and therefore is not really a legitimate epistemological approach.

 

7.       According to Plato, things in our ordinary experience (e.g., trees) are merely copies or instances of the ideal, perfect Forms in virtue of which those ordinary things exist and are known.

 

8.       Plato’s theory of recollection is his way of explaining how we know perfect or ideal instances of things (e.g., what a perfect triangle is) even though we have never experienced such things with our senses.

 

9.       According to Plato, the eternal Forms or Ideas are the universal characteristics by which things are what they are and are known as what they are.

 

10.    In Plato's account, Meno’s Paradox refers to the problem of explaining how someone can remember anything about the realm of the Forms after the shock of being born into this world.

 

11.    Plato’s Forms are copies of the things we experience in this world.

 

12.    According to Plato, our knowledge about things in the sensible world is not based on sense experience but on our a priori apprehension of the Forms.

 

13.    In his account of the Divided Line, Plato says that objects of reason and understanding (e.g., mathematical objects and Forms) depend on objects of belief and imagination (e.g., sensible objects) to be known.

 

14.    In Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, the figures that cast shadows on the back wall of the cave are supposed to be understood as the Forms in terms of which things outside of the Cave are intelligible.

 

15.    According to Plato, to understand a thing means being able to conceive the thing in terms of the concept or logos by which it is intelligible.

 

16.    According to Plato, the Form of the Good is the ultimate cause or rationale for every meaningful or intelligible thing.

 

17.    For Plato, all knowledge (as opposed to opinion) is innate insofar as it is based on reasoning that cannot have been obtained through sense experience.

 

18.    Plato’s rationalism is a foundationalist epistemology because it assumes that real knowledge is possible only if it is based on some certain, unchanging priniciples (which in Plato’s case are the Forms).

 

19.    According to Descartes, a belief is justified only if it is based on an indubitable (undoubtable) principle.

 

20.    Descartes argues that we cannot know things about the world based on sense experience because we can be deceived by our senses or might simply be dreaming.

 

21.    In order for the self to exist, Descartes argues, there must be an infinite being (God) in terms of which the self’s knowledge of itself as a finite existence is intelligible.

 

22.    Because Descartes knows of God only through his sense experience of the world, his argument that if he exists then God must exist is based on a posteriori propositions.

 

23.    Descartes claims that when we know a physical object (e.g., wax) clearly and distinctly, we do not rely on our intellect or reason but rather think of the object solely by means of our senses.

 

24.    By means of his wax example Descartes wants to show how our ideas of substance and identity are not based on sense experience.

 

25.    Even though Descartes recommends that we extend doubt to everything we believe, he acknowledges that there are some beliefs (e.g., 2+3=5; shortest distance between points is a straight line) that we cannot doubt.

 

26.    By noting that he is at least a doubting (thinking) being, Descartes shows how he knows he exists.

 

27.    The point of Descartes’ appeal to an evil genius (as opposed to his discussion of illusions and dreams) is to raise doubts about his knowledge of a priori propositions and our ability to reason in general.

 

28.    The point of Descartes’ appeal to an evil genius (as opposed to his discussion of illusions and dreams) is to raise doubts about his knowledge of a posteriori propositions.

 

29.    The proposition “I think, therefore I am” provides Descartes with exactly what he as a rationalist needs to develop an epistemology, namely, a rule by which to distinguish a priori from a posteriori propositions.

 

30.    By means of his “methodic doubt,” Descartes is able to show that there is one thing we can know with absolute certainty--namely, that we cannot know anything with certainty.

 

31.    Descartes uses the methodic doubt to show that there is at least one thing that can be known with absolute certainty, namely, that he exists.

 

32.    In order to know that he exists, Descartes first has to prove that his bodily senses can be trusted when they reveal to him that he is behaving in a thinking manner.

 

33.    The methodic doubt by which Descartes hopes to achieve certainty and a foundation for claims of knowledge is, for him, both a real and reasonable doubt about the existence of things.

 

34.    Descartes’ “methodic doubt” is intended to raise doubts about illusions, dreams, and occasionally sense experiences--but not about beliefs concerning the self, God, or one's own body.

 

35.    According to Descartes, since sense experience is sometimes deceiving, it cannot be the ultimate and indubitable (undoubtable) basis for knowledge.

 

36.    According to Descartes, no all-good God would permit us ever to make mistakes about what we claim to know about the world using our senses.

 

37.    According to Descartes, the criteria or principles for determining whether a claim is true are clarity and distinctness.

 

38.    By assuming that knowledge is possible by reasoning alone, rationalists like Plato and Descartes conclude that the only things we ever know to exist are our minds and their ideas.

 

39.    According to Jainism, our knowledge of sensible objects is based on our sense perceptions of them.

 

40.    An a priori statement is one whose truth/falsity is known without having to appeal to experience.

 

41.    An a posteriori statement is one whose truth/falsity is known without having to appeal to experience.

 

42.    Even though a posteriori propositions can sometimes be universal, they are never necessary (that is, they are always contingent).

 

43.    The word “empiricism” literally means the study of knowledge.

 

44.    Empiricism is not a legitimate “epistemological” position, because it is not really concerned with the study of the nature, sources, and limits of knowledge.

 

45.    Empiricism is the study of the nature, extent, origin, and justification of knowledge.

 

46.    Empiricists claim that purely mental (i.e., a priori) operations of reason do not provide knowledge about the world.

 

47.    According to Aristotle, through our senses we know things in the world because the things we sense are real things.

 

48.    Aristotle says that what makes things be what they are--namely, their essence--does not exist apart from individuals that exist in the world.

 

49.    According to Locke’s representationalist theory, our ideas of so-called primary qualities correspond to the way things are in the world, but our ideas of secondary qualities do not.

 

50.    By saying that the mind is a tabula rasa, Locke emphasizes the empiricist doctrine that prior to experience the mind is blank or empty.

 

51.    In saying that our mind at birth is a tabula rasa, Locke claims that all our knowledge is based on experience.

 

52.    For Locke, all knowledge is based on simple ideas of experience and their combinations, relations, or abstractions.

 

53.    To say that Locke is a representational realist means that he believes that at least some of our ideas actually represent things outside of the mind.

 

54.    In Locke’s representationalist epistemology, our ideas are said to represent things in the world that cause us to have the ideas we have.

 

55.    Even though Locke’s epistemology is called representationalism because he argues that our ideas represent things in the world, he does not believe that things in the world cause us to have any of our ideas.

 

56.    According to Locke, we can have knowledge of innate ideas (as opposed to ideas of sense experience) because they are based on primary qualities rather than secondary qualities.

 

57.    According to Locke, ideas of sensation and reflection are innate because they are based on primary rather than secondary qualities.

 

58.    According to Locke, we know about abstract general ideas like humanity or blueness because there are such general things in the world to which such ideas correspond.

 

59.    Primary qualities, for Locke, are ideas about things (e.g., being solid, taking up space, being in motion or at rest) which resemble the way those things really are.

 

60.    To distinguish primary and secondary qualities, Locke assumes that we can compare those characteristics of things that exist in objects themselves with characteristics that exist only in our minds.

 

61.    Berkeley uses his doctrine that “to be is to be perceived” to show how there is no real world.

 

62.    According to Berkeley, real physical objects are nothing other than ideas or sense data experienced by minds.

 

63.    According to Berkeley, because we can never know anything outside our own minds, we must conclude that there is no such thing as a real world.

 

64.    For Berkeley, “To be is to be perceived or to perceive” means that the only things that are real are ideas and the minds that have those ideas.

 

65.    In his critique of Locke, Berkeley argues that primary qualities cannot legitimately be distinguished from secondary qualities because primary qualities depend as much on perception as do secondary qualities.

 

66.    According to Berkeley, because we can never know anything outside of our own minds, the only defensible philosophic position is solipsism.

 

67.    A solipsist is someone who doubts whether anything else exists other than his or her own mind.

 

68.    Instead of saying that we often perceive what really exists, Berkeley argues that what really exists is what we or some other minds perceive.

 

69.    In Berkeley’s view, real physical objects are nothing other than the ideas or collections of sense data that are experienced by minds.

 

70.    Berkeley recognizes that to his claim “to be is to be perceived” he has to add “or to perceive” in order to allow for the existence of minds (which are not perceived).

 

71.    According to Berkeley, since only a mind can actually perceive ideas, and ideas are not real things, then only minds really exist.

 

72.    Philosophical skepticism claims that nothing exists.

 

73.    Skepticism and solipsism are fundamentally identical, in that both deny that we can know anything at all.

 

74.    Epistemology does not consider skepticism as a legitimate theory because skepticism claims that we can never be completely justified in our beliefs.

 

75.    According to Hume, because our ideas are copies of sense impressions, we cannot form ideas of anything (even imaginary creatures) without drawing ultimately on sense experiences.

 

76.    According to Hume, we know that "every event has a cause" is true because we have never experienced an event without a cause.

 

77.     “All human beings think clearly” is an example of a tautology.

 

78.    For Hume causal relations are properly described by means of a posteriori statements.

 

79.    Hume notes that our knowledge that the sun will rise tomorrow is necessarily certain because “the sun will rise tomorrow” is a matter of fact, not simply a relation of ideas.

 

80.    Hume argues that, because things are nothing more than clusters of ideas, there is no meaningful way to talk about an external world which causes our ideas.

 

81.    In Hume’s view, a priori propositions are always analytic, and a posteriori propositions are always synthetic.

 

82.    “Bachelors are fun-loving people” is a synthetic proposition because the predicate is contained in the subject.

 

83.    “Unicorns have horns” is not an analytic proposition because unicorns do not exist.

 

84.    According to logical positivism, meaningful statements are either based on sense experience or tautologies.

 

85.    Because a priori propositions are known to be true or false prior to experience, they are similar to analytic propositions, since analytic propositions are true or false based solely on definitions.

 

86.    Mathematical propositions (e.g., 7+5=12) are known a priori because their truth or falsity can be known without having to appeal to sense experience.

 

87.    Kant claims that our knowledge about things in the world depends on how the mind structures experience.

 

88.    Our knowledge of things in the world, according to Kant, is limited to how those things appear to us as structured according to the categories of the mind.

 

89.    Kant combines rationalism and empiricism by claiming that while sense data provide us with the content of knowledge, the categories of reason organize that content.

 

90.    Kant's epistemology is called “transcendental idealism” because he says that knowledge "transcends" (or is beyond) what any human being can understand.

 

91.    Even though Kant agrees with the rationalists that the mind brings something to experience and is not a blank slate (tabula rasa), he agrees with the empiricists that knowledge depends also on experience.

 

92.    According to Kant, all synthetic a priori judgments are false.

 

93.    According to Kant, we know that all actual and possible experienced events (even future events) have causes because that is the way that our minds structure experience.

 

94.    According to Kant, synthetic a priori propositions are true because the predicates of such propositions are not contained in the subjects of those propositions.

 

95.    Logical positivists argue that, if only sense data reports and tautologies are meaningful, then neither a priori nor a posteriori propositions can be meaningful or true.

 

96.    According to realist critics of skepticism (e.g., Moore), there is no way that we can really know whether there is an external world.

 

97.    Critics of foundationalist epistemology (e.g., Richard Rorty) argue that, since neither reason nor experience can provide an ultimate foundation for knowledge, nothing can be known to be true.

 

98.    By characterizing objects as “permanent possibilities of sensation,” John Stuart Mill claims that we can never know physical objects.

 

99.    Even though J. S. Mill describes objects as “permanent possibilities of sensation,” he does not deny that physical objects exist in the world.

 

100.    According to Thomas Kuhn, truly "scientific" knowledge does not have to be falsifiable or even part of any theory, because science is merely a matter of the personal opinions of groups of scientists.

 

 

Multiple Choice

 

101.        According to Plato the Forms in terms of which all sensible objects exist and are known must exist apart from the sensible world because:

(a)     Forms are generalizations of our sense experiences based on our use of imagination when we are asked the right kinds of questions.

(b)     Forms would not exist unless there were individual things in the sensible, experienced world by means of which the Forms could be known.

(c)     as Plato shows by his Divided Line, ordinary objects in the world (e.g., your desk) cannot exist unless they are known with certainty by relying on our senses.

(d)     we truly know something only in terms of its unchanging, perfect essence, and everything that appears to us in the sensible world changes or is imperfect.

 

102.        In his discussion of the Divided Line, Plato says that, in contrast to mere belief or opinion, knowledge is a belief for which we give reasons or justifications by appealing:

(a)     to what our senses reveal to us about how things appear to us, not how they really are.

(b)     beyond the Forms to images of goodness, beauty, and truth obtained from particular objects.

(c)     to what we sincerely believe is true about the Forms based on our experiences in the world.

(d)     beyond sense experience to unchanging ideas (Forms) that are perceived as rationally ordered.

 

103.        In Plato's Divided Line, an ordinary sensible thing (e.g., your desk) is an object of belief but is not an object of understanding or reason. To think of it as an object of understanding or reason, we would have to conceive of it:

(a)     based on what we can picture using our senses or based on what we know from sensation.

(b)     as a thing that exists only in our minds or that exists in the physical, sensible world apart from minds.

(c)     in purely mathematical terms or in terms of the Form that identifies it as an object in the first place.

(d)     as a concept that is more real than the Form that identifies it as an object in the first place.

 

104.        Plato indicates that the knowledge of pure reason is preferable to conceptual understanding, because knowing that something is a certain kind of thing is not as good as knowing:

(a)     how we come to learn what to call a thing in virtue of our own experiences.

(b)     the logos or rationale of the thing, that is, why it is the way it is.

(c)     why we differ among ourselves about what we claim to know.

(d)     the difference between knowledge and opinion as outlined in Plato's Divided Line image.

 

105.        Plato defines knowledge as justified true belief. This assumes that we might be able to claim to know something as true which might actually be false. But, in fact, it is impossible for us really to know something that is false, because:

(a)     to know something that is false is to know no real thing, nothing (i.e., not to know at all).

(b)     what we know as true is ultimately based on what we claim to know as true.

(c)     we cannot give a justification or reason for believing in something that is false.

(d)     in contrast to our knowledge of the unchanging Forms, beliefs about particular objects can change.

 

106.        Plato's suggestion that knowledge is innate or remembered when triggered by experience is in response to a paradox he sets up for himself. The paradox, now referred to as Meno's Paradox, has to do with the question of:

(a)     how knowledge of the Forms can ever be anything other than a generalization of experience.

(b)     how a person can remember anything about the Forms after the shock of being born into this world.

(c)     how anyone can recognize the correct answer to a question without already knowing the answer.

(d)     how concepts bound to the realm of becoming have meaning only when associated with the realm of Being.

 

107.        In Plato's idealism, the unchanging Ideas or "Forms" in terms of which sensible objects both exist and are known must transcend (that is, exist beyond) the changing realm of appearances; because if Forms changed, then:

(a)     the only things in the sensible world that we could ever experience would be concepts.

(b)     the sensible realm (in contrast to the intelligible realm) would consist only of copies of real things.

(c)     nothing in the experienced world could be or be identified as one determinate thing or another.

(d)     the sensible world would consist of unchanging Forms.

 

108.        In Plato's allegory of the cave, the Forms and mathematical objects (e.g., triangles) are represented by things outside the cave and shadows or reflections of things outside the cave. Inside the cave the objects carried by the figures in front of the fire and the shadows cast on the wall by those objects represent:

(a)     the things we normally experience using our senses, the realm of appearances.

(b)     things such as mud and hair that do not seem to have a Form by which they are intelligible.

(c)     the Forms we remember after we have sensible experiences and recover from the shock of being born.

(d)     things that are understood when we try to use reason alone without the benefit of relying on our senses as well.

 

109.        According to Plato, we attain knowledge only by seeing beyond this world of particular, changing objects to the true essences or Forms in terms of which things in this world are intelligible. For example, we know what triangularity is not from comparing sensible triangles but by thinking of the ideal of triangularity in terms of which these sensible figures are recognized as triangles. From this Plato concludes that all knowledge (as opposed to opinion) is innate, because:

(a)     from the moment we are born we know what things are in the world in terms of ideas that we get through our senses.

(b)     since we are born with senses (that is, our senses are innate), we can know things about the sensible world with certainty as long as we rely on the senses alone.

(c)     our knowledge of the world is not really of the sensible world itself but of the world grasped mathematically and ideally.

(d)     since our knowledge of things is based on changing, sensible experience, it depends on a clear understanding of what words mean.

 

110.        "When a person starts on the discovery of the absolute by the light of reason only, and without any assistance of sense, and perseveres until by pure intelligence he arrives at the perception of the absolute good, he at last finds himself at the end of the intellectual world. . . . Dialectic, and dialectic alone, goes directly to the first principle and is the only science which does away with hypotheses in order to make her ground secure." Here Plato indicates how hypothetical knowledge cannot provide the foundation of dialectical knowledge, because hypotheses simply:

(a)     explain sense experiences in terms of general concepts which themselves are not explained.

(b)     show how particular objects of experience cause us to recall innate ideas.

(c)     describe sense experience without providing an explanation for dialectical methods.

(d)     reject the use of reason, preferring instead dialectic, to achieve knowledge.

 

111.        After noting that we sometimes have been deceived by our senses, Descartes argues that we cannot rely on any sense experience as the basis for knowledge because:

(a)     even in our dreams we experience the same kinds of objects that we experience while awake.

(b)     without our sense experiences we would not know what words like "doubt" mean.

(c)     a posteriori propositions always depend for their truthfulness on sense experience.

(d)     we never know which sense experiences are accurate, so we should play it safe and doubt them all.

 

112.        Descartes' evil genie hypothesis is not intended to raise doubts about whether our senses can be trusted or whether our bodies and the physical world exist. By highlighting the possibility of sense deception and dreaming, he has already raised those doubts. The point of the evil genie hypothesis is to:

(a)     argue that God can exist only if we assume that a comparable evil power (the devil) exists as well.

(b)     raise doubts about a priori beliefs and reasoning abilities that do not depend on sense or being awake.

(c)     provide a means whereby we can escape from the skepticism created by universal doubt.

(d)     show how dreaming lacks the coherence of being awake and thus cannot be confused with it.

 

113.        Descartes appeals to the device of the evil genius to make sure that we do not uncritically accept a priori propositions without first allowing for the possibility that we might be wrong about them. Why?

(a)     Unlike a posteriori propositions that depend for their truth or falsity on experience, a priori propositions are known as true or false prior to experience.

(b)     A priori propositions are both necessary and universal, whereas a posteriori propositions are not.

(c)     If there is the slightest possibility that we could be wrong about the foundation of our knowledge, then everything based on that foundation is questionable.

(d)     The evil genius is Descartes' way of ensuring that he does not forget how his whole project of methodic doubt is itself prior to any experiences (and thus a priori).

 

114.        According to Descartes, illusions and dreams often appear as real as ordinary sense experience, but they obviously cannot provide us with any certainty about the world. Because sense experience is also often mistaken, it too cannot provide a dependable ground for knowledge. Given such a situation, he concludes, the most responsible thing that a true searcher for truth can do is to engage in methodic doubt--that is, a doubt about:

(a)     those things for which we have good reason to doubt.

(b)     only those things for which we have no good reason to doubt.

(c)     contingent but not necessary truths.

(d)     everything, even if such a doubt seems unreasonable.

 

115.        Descartes argues that the cogito (I think, I exist) is the foundation for all subsequent knowledge because it:

(a)     provides an indubitable principle on which all other claims of knowledge can be based.

(b)     is the first step in Descartes' method of doubt.

(c)     is not really known to be true but is rather something that everyone believes.

(d)     can be doubted just as much as anything else we might claim to know.

 

116.        As the product of his methodic doubt, the proposition "I think, therefore I am" provides Descartes with exactly what he as a rationalist needs to develop an epistemology, namely:

(a)     a criterion or rule by which to distinguish a priori from a posteriori propositions.

(b)     an indubitable, certain principle on which to ground all other claims of knowledge.

(c)     a way of distinguishing empiricist principles from rationalist principles of knowledge.

(d)     the basis for an a posteriori proof for the existence of God.

 

117.        Descartes' wax example indicates how we can know what a thing (e.g., wax) is:

(a)     in purely mathematical terms, without having to rely on what our senses tell us about it.

(b)     only after it has changed into something which it originally is not.

(c)     in terms about which even the evil genius could not have tricked us.

(d)     without having to relate scientific truth to religious belief.

 

118.        Descartes' wax example is intended to show that the wax is the same substance before and after it is melted, and this observation indicates how:

(a)     our senses portray the physical characteristics of wax in purely non-sensible ways.

(b)     our knowledge of sensible objects (e.g., wax) is based on what reason, not sense, identifies.

(c)     without sense experiences, we would not know whether the wax before and after melting is the same.

(d)     knowing that something is wax is the same thing as sensibly experiencing something as wax.

 

119.        To know anything with certainty about the world, Descartes first has to prove that God exists because:

(a)     without God there is no reasonable hope for an afterlife and thus no reason to act morally.

(b)     a perfect (all-good) God would not allow us to be wrong when we know things clearly and distinctly.

(c)     if God's existence is doubtful, so is Descartes' existence; so he has to prove that God exists.

(d)     as the most important thing in the world, God is the first thing that must be shown to exist.

 

120.        The knowledge of his own existence is the basis, Descartes claims, for all subsequent knowledge. But before he can justify his knowledge of anything about the world, he first has to prove that an all-good God exists because:

(a)     even if God does exist, he might not be all-good and could make us think (mistakenly) that we exist.

(b)     our knowledge of the world is independent of God's existence, but knowing about God is useful in life.

(c)     if God exists, only he (and not Descartes) would be able to have clear and distinct ideas of the world.

(d)     unless God exists, there is no guarantee that clear and distinct ideas about the world can be trusted.

 

121.        Descartes' methodic doubt expands from raising questions about sense experiences to more general doubts about whether my body or the world exists (it might be a dream) and finally to doubts about:

(a)     how one culture's beliefs about what is real can be compared to the beliefs of other cultures.

(b)     what causes our ideas to seem so real, when we know in fact that our ideas are merely imaginations.

(c)     whether our reasoning abilities can be trusted (an evil genie might trick us regarding a priori claims).

(d)     the value of doubting itself, in an epistemological comparison of rationalism and empiricism.

 

122.        According to the "epistemological turn" epitomized by Descartes' philosophy, epistemology takes precedence over metaphysics. In other words, in Descartes' philosophy:

(a)     that which is real is more important than that which is imaginary.

(b)     before we can know what exists, we must know what we can know and what knowing means.

(c)     knowing something to be true comes after believing something to be true.

(d)     nothing exists without first being known by human beings to exist.

 

123.        Rationalists often claim that knowledge of ideas or principles is possible only if we are born with such ideas or principles. Which of the following IS NOT a position defending innate ideas?

(a)     Certain ideas or propositions are remembered as truths acquired before our births (Plato).

(b)     All people in all cultures have similar beliefs (e.g., about causality): that proves innate ideas (Locke).

(c)     Ideas and truths are knowable in virtue of innate dispositions of the mind (Leibniz).

(d)     Our past unethical behavior has blinded us to our naturally innate knowledge of all things (Jainism).

 

124.        Both Plato and Descartes are often identified as rationalists because they agree generally on doctrines that distinguish them from empiricists. Which of the following IS NOT a typical rationalist doctrine?

(a)     Though sense experience is sometimes deceptive, it is necessary for true knowledge.

(b)     Sense experience cannot be trusted to provide knowledge.

(c)     Reason alone must be the means for getting knowledge.

(d)     Knowledge is based ultimately on innate ideas and a priori principles.

 

125.        Which of the following IS NOT a typical objection raised against a rationalist view such as Descartes'?

(a)     A priori propositions may be true, but they tell us nothing about the way the world is.

(b)     Sense experience may not be certain, but we are often justified in claiming to know things based on it.

(c)     We never really know physical objects other than as intelligible (mathematical, quantifiable) objects.

(d)     There is no agreement on which ideas or beliefs are self-evident or innate.

 

126.        According to critics of foundationalist epistemology (like Richard Rorty), evidence for one's beliefs can be conclusive without being necessarily conclusive or based on some indubitable (undoubtable) principle such as Descartes' cogito. That is, it is sometimes legitimate to say that we "know" something even when:

(a)     we don't believe it.

(b)     what we know is not based on any evidence.

(c)     all evidence contradicts our belief.

(d)     we might still be wrong.

 

127.        Which of the following is an a priori proposition?

(a)     All material objects are extended (that is, they take up space).

(b)     Some material objects are heavier than others.

(c)     All physical objects are seen sometime or other by some human being.

(d)     Some material objects are living creatures.

 

128.        Empiricists charge that if claims of knowledge are limited to things we know with logical certainty, we will never be able to know anything about existing things in the world, because:

(a)     the actual existence of things in the world is known only through experience, not reason.

(b)     simply by thinking or reasoning we can know specifically which things exist and how.

(c)     things in the world cannot be known to exist unless they exist previously in some mind.

(d)     the existence of things depends on their having been created by some prior cause, God.

 

129.        According to empiricists, even though the kind of information provided by a priori propositions is indubitable, it is not very useful in expanding our knowledge about the world, because:

(a)     the world is nothing other than what we experience it to be.

(b)     such propositions are concerned with the world as it is in itself, not with how we experience the world.

(c)     any information provided by such propositions is ultimately based on someone's personal experience.

(d)     such propositions are true (or false) by definition and do not describe any facts about the world.

 

130.        John Locke argues that our knowledge of the world is not based on innate ideas, for if ideas were innate:

(a)     they would be known a posteriori and thus come into our consciousness through experience.

(b)     we could know them only in terms of primary qualities and not in terms of secondary qualities.

(c)     they would be based on simple ideas rather than complex ideas, relations, or abstractions.

(d)     everyone would have them and would know they have them (yet neither of these is the case).

 

131.        In his assault on innate ideas, Locke notes that some thinkers argue that maybe all people (including children) have such innate ideas but simply are not aware of knowing such truths. To this particular point Locke responds:

(a)     it makes no sense to say that we know something that we do not know.

(b)     even children know what they know only by means of experience.

(c)     even if all people agreed about a belief, that would not necessarily make it innate.

(d)     because we should limit our assent to the evidence, we should believe in innate ideas only to the extent that we have evidence for them.

 

132.        In calling the mind a "tabula rasa," Locke wants to emphasize that all knowledge, even knowledge of mathematical truths, is based on solely on:

(a)     innate ideas.

(b)     experience.

(c)     formal training or education.

(d)     language.

 

133.        "The particular bulk, number, figure, and motion of the parts of fire or snow are really in them, whether anyone's senses perceive them or not; and therefore they may be called real qualities, because they really exist in those bodies. But light, heat, whiteness, or coldness, are no more really in them than sickness or pain is in manna bread." In this passage Locke locates the distinction between primary and secondary qualities in the difference between:

(a)     the parts of bodies that we cannot sense and the parts that we can sense.

(b)     qualities of bodies that exist independently of sensation and qualities that rely on sensation.

(c)     the power to perceive things in our own bodies and the power to perceive things in other bodies.

(d)     those qualities that no one ever perceives and those qualities that we always perceive.

 

134.        Substance, Locke claims, is that "I know not what" in which the primary qualities of a thing inhere. Without assuming the existence of substance and primary qualities, Locke would not be able to conclude that his knowledge is in any way:

(a)     the same as the knowledge that God has in coordinating events in the universe.

(b)     the same as the knowledge that God has in ordering our sense data into specific things.

(c)     the same as other people have when they have his experiences.

(d)     based or grounded in a reality apart from experience.

 

135.        For Locke, all knowledge is based on ideas that represent things outside the mind which cause our experiences. The problem with this "representational realism," Berkeley notes, is that:

(a)     it implies that the only thing that really exists is God's mind.

(b)     it suggests that our knowledge of the world is really based on innate ideas instead of mental images.

(c)     it assumes things outside our minds as causes of our ideas even though we know only our ideas.

(d)     it fails to indicate whether things in the world are known a posteriori or a priori.

 

136.        In his critique of Locke, Berkeley notes that primary qualities (e.g., solidity, extension, motion/rest) cannot legitimately be distinguished from secondary qualities (e.g., colors, scents, sounds) because:

(a)     primary qualities exist in the mind of God, whereas secondary qualities exist only in human minds.

(b)     primary qualities depend for their existence as much on minds as do secondary qualities.

(c)     neither primary nor secondary qualities exist in any mind (finite or infinite).

(d)     primary qualities of things are known a posteriori, whereas secondary qualities are known a priori.

 

137.        According to Berkeley, primary qualities are as dependent on being perceived as secondary qualities, and thus Locke's attempt to distinguish them is pointless. So why did Locke make the distinction in the first place?

(a)     To show how some of our ideas really do represent material things as we perceive them.

(b)     To show how God is the source of our ideas of primary qualities but not ideas of secondary qualities.

(c)     To show how our different ideas can never provide certainty or knowledge about the world.

(d)     To show how some ideas of primary qualities (e.g., solidity, shape) can also be understood as ideas of secondary qualities (e.g., color).

 

138.        Instead of saying that we often perceive what really exists, Berkeley argues that:

(a)     what really exists is what we or some other mind perceives.

(b)     that which really perceives (i.e., mind) is all that really exists.

(c)     that which is perceived (i.e., idea) is that which does the perceiving.

(d)     we seldom perceive what really exists; when we do, we do not recognize it as such.

 

139.        Berkeley writes, "I ask whether those supposed originals or external things, of which our ideas are the pictures or representations, be themselves perceivable or not?" In answering this question, he concludes that really existing things must be ideas, because:

(a)     ideas are caused in us by the external things ("supposed originals") that our ideas represent

(b)     external things are perceivable and the only things that are perceivable are ideas.

(c)     God cannot perceive ideas because he cannot perceive our minds.

(d)     to say that something exists means that it is perceivable, not that it is perceived (even by God).

 

140.        Berkeley suggests that his theory prevents the skeptic from denying the existence of God, because in Berkeley's philosophy the existence of God is necessary to show why:

(a)     we feel that something external to us causes us to have particular perceptions.

(b)     the skeptical attitude towards knowledge undermines the doctrine of secondary qualities but not that of primary qualities.

(c)     the laws of nature are human generalizations of our experiences.

(d)     our interest in perception is one which has a religious or theological character.

 

141.        According to Berkeley, even if you and I do not have the same mental experiences when we think "red," we are still able to agree on what red is because:

(a)     as a secondary quality, the color red is something that is purely private and individual.

(b)     we learn to associate our experiences with words that we agree upon intersubjectively.

(c)     we in fact do have the same mental experience, even if we don't know it.

(d)     red is a simple idea, whereas redness is an abstract idea.

 

142.        Berkeley expands his definition of the meaning of real things to include perceivers as well as things perceived because:

(a)     we can perceive our own minds but not the minds of others.

(b)     God perceives those things which no other minds perceive.

(c)     we can perceive each others' minds but not our own.

(d)     nothing can be perceived without its being perceived by some mind(s).

 

143.        If all I ever know is that I exist and have ideas, but cannot be sure about whether those ideas refer to anything outside of myself, then I am trapped in my own consciousness. Such a position is referred to as:

(a)     conceptualism.

(b)     phenomenalism.

(c)     solipsism.

(d)     representational realism.

 

144.        "There is no question of importance whose decision is not comprised in the science of man; and there is none which can be decided with any certainty before we become acquainted with that science." Here Hume notes that since everything is known through our ideas and reasoning, then:

(a)     an empiricist epistemology is better than a rationalist epistemology insofar as empiricism gives us knowledge of the world and rationalism gives us knowledge of ourselves.

(b)     by acknowledging that certainty is unachievable, we show the fruitlessness of trying to develop a philosophy of human nature.

(c)     to know anything about human nature with any certainty, we first have to know about the world apart from our ideas and processes of reasoning.

(d)     by understanding human nature (which includes how our ideas of things are ordered), we can understand everything that is knowable.

 

145.        Hume points out that, if all knowledge is based on experience, then our knowledge that every event has a cause has to be based on our experience of every event. But since we have not had experiences of future events nor even of every past event, how can we be sure that all events (including future events) will have causes? Hume's answer:

(a)     since we know that past events will be like future events, we can be sure they will all have causes.

(b)     we can't be sure: all we do is "imagine" events will have causes, we develop that habit or custom.

(c)     it is impossible even to imagine an event without imagining it as having had a specific kind of cause.

(d)     we know with certainty (innately) that no future or past events ever had causes.

 

146.        Locke says that we know external objects only indirectly through ideas that are caused by objects. Berkeley denies that external objects exist at all, claiming that real things are ideas caused in our minds by God. Hume goes even further in saying that:

(a)     external objects are created by God in such a way so as to make us have ideas of them.

(b)     God creates us so that there are minds that can be caused to think about external objects.

(c)     our minds are structured in a way that makes us think that God causes us to have ideas.

(d)     even the claim that God causes our ideas is not justified because cause itself is questionable.

 

147.        Hume argues that we do not know a priori that all events have causes, and our a posteriori knowledge of causal relations is limited to temporal priority and contiguity. This latter "knowledge" does not guarantee that every event (y) must have some cause (x), because:  

(a)     thus far in our experience, every event y has always had a cause x, and even if it is not a certainty, there is a high probability that future events will also have causes.

(b)     we do not experience any necessary connection between prior, contiguous events x and subsequent events y that we think of as their effects.

(c)     the meaning of the word event, unlike that of effect, contains within it as part of its definition the notion of having a cause.

(d)     even if we do not know what the cause of an event is, then at least God knows; and that is all that we need to guarantee the cause-effect relationship.

 

148.        For Hume (unlike Locke or Berkeley), we cannot know the cause of our ideas because the concept of cause:

(a)     is a pattern of regularity that God has created in our minds to allow us to live in the world.

(b)     refers only to the relation between ideas that I have and the ideas that other people have.

(c)     refers only to how our ideas are associated, and thus cannot be applied outside of our ideas.

(d)     the three components of cause (temporal priority, contiguity, and necessary connection) are innate.

 

149.        According to Hume, I cannot know (or predict with any certainty or high probability) that things in the future will occur in particular ways, because:

(a)     the future will not resemble the past: that is what distinguishes the future from the past.

(b)     I have no experience on which to base the claim that the future will resemble the past.

(c)     knowledge of the future would require an infinite intellect; for Hume, only God knows the future.

(d)     to have an idea of the future, I would have to have an idea of my future self (which is impossible).

 

150.        According to Hume, we will never be able to know anything about whether there is a world outside of our ideas which causes those ideas because:

(a)     all of our ideas are based on sense impressions, and we have no way of comparing those impressions with their supposed external causes.

(b)     ideas are copies of sense impressions, and since the external world is itself a copy of an ideal world in our minds, we can never know what the external world is like.

(c)     the world outside of our ideas causes those ideas only in regard to "matters of fact" and not in regard to "relations of ideas."

(d)     the external world is the realm of matter, selves, and freedom--which are all unknowable because we have only sensible impressions of them but not ideas.

 

151.        Hume's analysis of cause and effect undermines any claim to know that our ideas are caused by things in the world, because (according to Hume):

(a)     the notion of "cause" applies only to things outside our experience, not to our ideas.

(b)     whenever we experience things that have no causes, we conclude that they are miracles.

(c)     the cause-effect relation is a relation of ideas and cannot be applied to anything outside our ideas.

(d)     the cause of our ideas must be something other than our ideas.

 

152.        Which of the following IS NOT a typical objection raised by critics against Locke's or Hume's empiricism?

(a)     Our experience is a web of beliefs, not a collection of discrete experiences.

(b)     Ideas are not intermediaries through which we experience things; we experience things themselves.

(c)     Knowledge of the world, including ideas of cause-effect and the self, is ultimately based on experience.

(d)     Natural inclinations are as philosophically respectable as sense experience or truths by definition.

 

153.        Critics of Hume's skepticism acknowledge that there is always a purely logical or theoretical possibility that our so-called knowledge of the external world is unjustified. But for such critics (e.g., Moore, Malcolm) that is irrelevant, because to say that we know things about the external world simply means that:

(a)     we have no good reason to doubt what we believe and cannot imagine really being wrong about it.

(b)     even if we were wrong about we know, we would not realize it and so it would not matter.

(c)     we believe that what we claim to know is based on all the other things we believe about the world.

(d)     our doubts about what we know about the world are based solely on weak (vs. strong) beliefs.

 

154.        By combining rationalism and empiricism, Kant says we can explain how knowledge is possible by noting how:

(a)     sense data provide us with the content of knowledge, the categories of reason organize that content.

(b)     categories of reason provide us with sense data, which are then organized either mentally or physically.

(c)     a priori truths are innate, whereas a posteriori truths are based on experience.

(d)     knowledge must understood as a web of constantly changing beliefs, not a static collection of ideas.

 

155.        Kant joins elements of empiricism and rationalism by suggesting that, in addition to synthetic a posteriori propositions and analytic a priori propositions, there is a third kind of proposition that provides knowledge, namely, synthetic a priori propositions (such as "every event has a cause"). In this third kind of proposition:

(a)     the predicate is contained in the subject, and the truth of the proposition is known only by appealing to experience.

(b)     the predicate is not contained in the subject, and the truth of the proposition is known only by appealing to experience.

(c)     the predicate is contained in the subject, and the truth of the proposition is not known by appealing to experience.

(d)     the predicate is not contained in the subject, and the truth of the proposition is not known by appealing to experience.

 

156.        Kant "saves" science from Hume's skeptical description of causal regularity (as merely a habit or custom) by proposing that our knowledge that all events have causes is due to the fact that:

(a)     our minds are structured to experience all events (as phenomena) as having causes.

(b)     events in the realm of the Forms always have causes, even if we don't experience them.

(c)     just as our experience is caused by something, so also is our knowledge of that experience.

(d)     our habit of thinking of things as causally related is an inductive generalization of past experience.

 

157.        According to Kant, the way to respond to Hume's critique of causality is to show that certainty about propositions like "every event has a cause" is possible in virtue of the fact that:

(a)     our experience of events itself is caused by something apart from all experience.

(b)     the "law" of causality (every event has a cause) is merely an inductive generalization.

(c)     the mind (reason) structures all (even future) experiences in determinate, unchanging ways.

(d)     even though every "effect" has a cause, not every "event" has a cause.

 

158.        In order to avoid Hume's conclusion that we cannot know that things in the future will always have causes, Kant argues that we know that all events in the future will have causes because:

(a)     our belief that future events will have causes is so strong that it alone is sufficient to guarantee that future events will, in fact, have causes.

(b)     all minds are organized in such a way that, in order for events (including future events) to be experienced at all, they must always be experienced as having a cause.

(c)     cause-and-effect is a law of nature independent of human experience; regardless of whether we or any other minds experience them, events in the future will have causes.

(d)     future events themselves are caused by past and present events; so we know that if future events occur at all, they will have been caused by something.

 

159.        Kant's critics claim that, if we know things in the world only insofar as they are experienced (as phenomena) and not as they are in themselves, we will never know if our ideas really describe the world. To this he replies:

(a)     we can know with certainty even things supposedly beyond our sense experience (e.g., God, soul).

(b)     reason is not limited to any one set of categories; we can always choose another culture's categories.

(c)     the world is what we really experience; to think of things "in themselves" is impossible, contradictory.

(d)     our knowledge depends not on experience but on the particular language games of our culture.

 

160.        Critics of Kant argue that his attempt to guarantee knowledge by proposing that all minds organize experience according to universal categories ignores how:

(a)     even anomalies in experience can be explained to the extent they appear to us (i.e., as phenomena).

(b)     sense data alone do not give us knowledge of the world: our minds are not blank slates.

(c)     we know things about the world not by means of innate ideas but only through perceptions.

(d)     ways of organizing experience vary in different cultures and languages (the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis).

 

161.        According to the psychological atomism implicit in logical positivism, our knowledge of the world is built up from discrete sensory impressions. However, as Gestalt theorists point out, perceptions are not simply isolated sense data, because perceptions--indeed, all experiences--are intelligible in virtue of:

(a)     other equally isolated sense data that are themselves innate ideas.

(b)     whether ideas are caused by material substances in the world or by God directly.

(c)     logical constructs of neutral (neither mental nor physical) sense experiences.

(d)     the linguistic background or social field of expectations by which they are identified.

 

162.        According to Logical Positivists, only those statements that can be tested by experience or are true by definition are meaningful. The most that one would be able to say about ethical or religious claims would be:

(a)     they report on how we feel about something, but they do not express any truth.

(b)     such claims may be true or false; it's just that we may not know whether our beliefs are justified.

(c)     they are purely logical truths--that is, truths of reason (or by definition), not matters of fact.

(d)     they have meaning insofar as they provide the hypothetical or theoretical bases for thought.

 

163.        According to positivists (also known sometimes as phenomenalists), the meaning of a sentence consists in its being either a tautology or understandable in terms of past or predicted sense experiences. In other words, a sentence (like "God exists") is meaningful only if:

(a)     for the person who utters it, the sentence has meaning, regardless of what others think.

(b)     it represents the truth, even if we don't know which experiences to believe.

(c)     it is true by definition or is testable by appeal to sense experience.

(d)     it expresses a belief that is innate, known to all rational beings.

 

164.        Positivists (also known sometimes as phenomenalists) claim that physical things are simply constructs of sense data that we talk about in ways different from those things that we identify as mental or spiritual things. Specifically, to say that a thing is a physical object means that:

(a)     it is proper to speak about the thing in terms of dimensionality, size, and shape.

(b)     the thing's primary qualities (extension, shape, and solidity) do not depend on the mind.

(c)     appearances of the thing, even in hallucinations or dreams, must be accepted as real.

(d)     claims about it are ultimately understandable as being tautologies.

165.        According to the "problem of induction" (often credited to Hume), we cannot use past experiences to predict the probability of future events or experiences, because such predictions would:

(a)     not be based on generalizations of past experiences but rather on primary (vs. secondary) qualities.

(b)     assume the future will resemble the past; but without experience of the future, we cannot conclude this.

(c)     rely more on custom/habit (i.e., things outside the mind) than on the unchanging structure of the mind.

(d)     be merely hypothetical (and thus not intelligible in terms of any conceivable paradigm).

 

166.        According to Thomas Kuhn, when a scientific revolution occurs (i.e., when one set of theories and practices that have traditionally defined a discipline is replaced by another), not only are new methods adopted, but also:

(a)     no new paradigm replaces the former paradigm.

(b)     the new paradigm is used to reassert the truth of the old paradigm.

(c)     new insights are gradually added to the old ones.

(d)     the very objects studied by the discipline change.

 

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