The self-luminousness of consciousness: Locke’s awareness principle as a defence of an empiricist account of the origin of ideas

ABSTRACT Locke endorsed Descartes’ claim that the mind is conscious of its own ideas. According to Locke, an idea can be said to be in the mind only if either the mind is currently aware of it, or it has been aware of it in the past. Curiously, Locke uses this Cartesian claim as the main theoretical tool to criticize a central tenet of Descartes’ philosophy: the doctrine of innate ideas. The reasons why Descartes and Locke are equally committed to the claim that the mind is conscious of its own ideas but hold two opposite positions on the origin of ideas have not been the focus of discussion in the literature on this topic. This paper intends to fill this gap. After presenting Descartes’ and Locke’s views on consciousness, I argue that Locke shares with Descartes an understanding of consciousness that would allow Locke to admit of innate ideas and, so, shift the burden of proof on him to explain why he still denies innate ideas. I conclude that to understand Locke’s denial of innate ideas we should focus on his conception of the nature of ideas and that these findings leave Locke’s response to nativism inconclusive at best