Summary A-Level Philosophy Paper 1 Complete Overview
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Course
Paper 1
Institution
AQA
A document that overviews all of the topics featured in paper 1 of the A-level Philosophy course. Featuring:
- Epistemology
- Ethics
- Metaphysics of the Mind
- Metaphysics of God
Includes all counter-arguments and key theories.
PERCEPTION
Direct Realism:
- Realism: There is a mind-independent external world.
- Our senses give us direct access to the external world.
- It is often known as naive realism for being the common-sense view.
C: The argument from illusion / hallucination.
R: Disjunctivism: We see sense-data when experiencing hallucinations and illusions but
direct perception when having veridical experiences.
R: Relational properties.
C: Perceptual variation: What we perceive can vary, the objects do not vary, hence we
do not perceive directly.
R: Relational properties.
M: We can no longer know the real properties of objects. (A grey table could also appear
brown e.t.c.)
Indirect Realism:
- Realism: There is a mind-independent external world.
- We perceive mind-dependent representations of the external world.
- This is sense-data. (Private to us, mind-dependent)
- Secondary Quality Thesis: Primary (Exist within the object themselves and cannot be
removed - Secondary (Purely mind-dependent).
Arguments regarding the Secondary Quality Thesis:
SUPPORT: Divisibility argument (Grain example).
R: We cannot conceive of an object without any secondary qualities.
SUPPORT: Primary qualities are explanatorily basic. (We explain colour with size and
shape of light waves, it is only primary qualities that exist within objects)
R: Objects still may have causally inert secondary qualities.
SUPPORT: Secondary qualities vary depending on perspective.
R: So do primary.
C: Leads to external world scepticism.
R: Russell: Best hypothesis.
M: Abductive reasoning does not guarantee.
R: Locke: Involuntary nature of our experience.
M: Dreams are also involuntary but are mind-dependent.
R: Locke and Cockburn: Argument from coherence and predictions.
M: Descartes doubts.
R: RTB account of knowledge. (We do not have to be justified, we just have to know that it
has been formed through a reliable process).
M: We cannot know that our senses are a reliable process.
C: Berkeley: We cannot say sense-data represents the external world if we cannot
compare it.
R: This argument is weak as he gives no over ways to test if they are representative of the
external world.
Idealism:
- Physical objects are just bundles of ideas before the mind.
- The essence of an object is to be perceived.
, - The Master Argument: We cannot conceive of a mind-independent object as it
becomes mind-dependent when we think of it.
- C: He confuses the idea of a tree with a real tree.
C: Solipsism
R: Berkeley’s argument from analogy.
C: Cannot distinguish illusions from real perceptions.
R: Coherence of our senses.
C: What happens to unperceived objects?
R: God fills in the gaps.
M: God is not an adequate explanation.
R: Idealism proves God’s existence.
C: God could not feel pain.
R: God understands pain.
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