Rene Descartes on the other hand was known to be the vicar of modern science. He initiated a new clear means of thinking about science and philosophy through ignoring all notions centered on supposition or emotional conviction and concurring with the ideas proved by direct observation (Dunn, 1999). The ultimate aim of this paper is to examine how John Locke attempted to justify modern science in terms of bringing in his own ideas and views as a way to bridge the gap between Descarte’s res cogitans and res extensa. It also examines the way he was opposed by several other scholars

John Locke was one of the most influential especially in An Essay about Human Understanding (1690), fundamentally rejected the Cartesian theory of the continuation of innate notions – like that of God, or time without end – and upheld that the infant during birth has no any form of knowledge and he compared it to a blank page, and in severe terms, it does not stay alive yet. It is important to note that when he selects the subject of his title, Locke never used the term “mind” which could propose a notion of something really stays alive like an object or a permanent structure (Dunn, 1999). In opposition to that, he chose the term “understanding” which proposes the idea of a continuous process. What he meant here is that a child is never born with any knowledge and he only gets to understand things once he grows up. This is because Locke believed that knowledge is mainly based on learning from “experience”.

According to him, a newly born baby has no form of experience therefore has no type of knowledge. Although Locke understood that experience depicts two forms – one centered on “reflection” or reasoning and the other on “sensation”, he openly implied that all automated experiences are secondarily derived from those obtained through the senses (Dunn, 1999). This happens even if the mind may generate completely new forms of automated expereince.