An Essay Concerning Human Understanding
The understanding is like the eye in this respect: it makes us see and perceive all other things but doesn’t look in on itself. (ref)to-process ❧ Cf. Epictetus says that reason is the only faculty that is “reflexive” (or at least can reflect and evaluate itself).
My time will be well spent if by this plain, factual method I can explain how our understandings come to have those notions of things that we have, and can establish ways of measuring how certainly we can know things, and of evaluating the grounds we have for our opinions. (ref)to-process
what rules or standards should guide how confident we allow ourselves to be that our opinions are right? (ref)to-process
faith or opinion—that is, acceptance of something as true when we don’t know for certain that it is true. (ref)to-process
If I succeed, that may have the effect of persuading the busy mind of man •to be more cautious in meddling with things that are beyond its powers to understand; •to stop when it is at the extreme end of its tether; and •to be peacefully reconciled to ignorance of things that turn out to be beyond the reach of our capacities. (ref)to-process ❧ There are practical, rational successes at the end of this inquiry into understanding, knowledge, and opinion.
rest content with knowing only what our human condition enables us to know (ref)to-process ❧ Very skeptic, maybe a la Sextus Empiricus, where understanding the lack of knowledge is liberating. Also Stoic in that we don’t seek to (control) know more about those things.
6 (ref)to-process