John Locke s arguments against innate ideas
In his essay An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, John Locke makes several arguments against innate ideas. His first argument is that if there were innate ideas, than they would be present in all men, and therefore these ideas would be universally recognized. This means that if we all had some knowledge that was implanted in us at birth, than everyone would accept these ideas. Although he does contest that there are ideas that are universally accepted, he doesn’t think that they are innate because that doesn’t necessarily mean that everyone accepts these ideas. An example of this would be a country passing a law against murder.