Quite
recently I’ve written a post on tabula rasa. You may probably wonder
if there is a theory of mind which would be opposite to tabula rasa theory. The
answer is: of course there is – this view is called innatism and claims that not all knowledge comes from experience
(John Locke, however, argued that it does). Since, according to innatism
theory, mind is not a blank slate there
is some knowledge that you are born
with. Despite the fact that innatism is not a very popular theory there are
various branches of this view; the main difference is usually: what knowledge is innate.
 |
| Noam Chomsky (1928) |
Notions of good and evil is usually considered by
innatists to be the part of innate knowledge. Numerous philosophers claimed
that you are able to distinguish between good and evil regardless of your
background. Descartes stated that
some ideas are placed in people’s minds by God (including notions of good and
evil). Nevertheless various terrorists are convinced that what they do is
actually good (or they think it’s not good but serves a greater good). Think
about the recent case of Anders Breivik who killed 69 unarmed adolescents at Utøya
island, Norway. He has never had any regrets (or at least didn’t express them
publically) of what he did – do you think it is caused by the fact that he is not able to distinguish between good
and evil or by his mental illness? Or is a mental illness the result of his not being able to say what is
right and what is not?
