Empiricism, innatism, intuition and deduction

A posteriori

Knowledge that can only be acquired from experience of the external world

A priori

Knowledge that can be acquired without of the external world, through thought alone. For example you can work out 900/7 without having experience of the world to verify it.

Analytic truth

A proposition that is true by virtue of the meaning of the words and denial of these causes a logical contradiction. E.g a bachelor is an unmarried man

Contingent truth

Something that is true but that might not have been true. Eg london is the capital of england is contingent truth as it could have been made birmingham.

Deduction

A method of deriving true propositions from other true (using reason). An a priori method of gaining knowledge.

Hume’s Fork

Hume’s claim that there are only two judgements of reason: relations of ideas and matters of fact

Relations of ideas

Analytic truths known as a priori

Matters of fact

Synthetics truth known as a posteriori

Innatism

The view that there is some propositional knowledge that we are born with

Rational intuition

The ability to know that something is true just by thinking about it

Necessary truth

Something that must be true (in all possible worlds)

Rationalism

The view that there are some synthetic truths that can be known purely through a priori means

Synthetic truth

A proposition that is true in virtue of how the world is, denying a synthetic truth does not lead to a logical contradiction.

Empircism

The belief that there is no innate knowledge and everything we know is acquired after we are born

Intuition

Direct non-interferential awareness of abstract objects or truths