John Locke Secondary Qualities
The mechanical philosophy, treats objects in a fairly counterintuitive way. Objects contain both
primary and secondary qualities, this idea was really pounded into the philosophical canon by
John Locke. Primary qualities consist of size, shape and motion, and pretty much everything
else is a secondary qualities. Colors, flavors, sounds, smells, warmth/cool are all qualities that
Locke vehemently claims to be secondary. This is because, as Locke argues, these qualities are
not really in the object, they are not a physical attribute of the body. Whereas primary qualities
are actually contained within the body. Some compelling arguments attempt to prove that all
qualities are actually in the body, making it clear that there is only one kind of quality, and it is a
primary one. But this claim is wildly off base. In fact, not only is it untrue that all qualities are
primary, but also all qualities are not primary. Berkeley s theories of ideas are much more
believable and far more rational. All perceived qualities are and must be secondary, as the term is...
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Take a grain of wheat, Locke says, again in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, divide
it into two parts, each part has still solidity, extension, figure, and mobility; divide it again and it
retains all the same qualities. ( VIII, 9) Locke is half correct in this situation. He is right in
asserting that an object, if divided will still have all the same qualities, but they will have
different versions of those qualities. Not only that, the body will change. If you take a grain of
wheat and split it in two, sure, it will retain all of the same qualities, but it will be a different
object. If you divide a grain of wheat in two, you will have two half grains of wheat. Neither of
these half grains is a full grain, they can t be. So they simply cannot have the same qualities, and
the quality is not in the
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