{
    "schema": "prokopton42-public-passage-v1",
    "id": "locke.essay_human_understanding",
    "canonical_url": "https://prokopton42.com/en/works/john-locke/essay-human-understanding/reference-b2-c23-s2/",
    "language": "en",
    "title": "An Essay Concerning Human Understanding",
    "author": "John Locke",
    "date": "1689-1700; revised lifetime editions",
    "summary": "The Essay examines the origin and composition of ideas, personal identity, and the limits of knowledge.",
    "learning": "Take a disputed term, trace the ideas composing it, then separate what experience warrants as knowledge from what remains probable judgment.",
    "long_summary": "This edition joins three English Gutenberg transcriptions to Pierre Coste’s historical French translation. Canonical identity follows book, chapter and section. Sections missing from one manifestation remain monolingual and are never attached to a neighbor.\n\nThe reading distinguishes sensation and reflection, simple and complex ideas, qualities, identity, knowledge and probability. The 1975 editorial PDF remains a doxographer witness outside dialogue.",
    "historical_context": "The corpus manifests do not yet establish the precise place and circumstances of composition. The images below document the author’s world or the text’s transmission. They do not claim to show the exact scene of writing.",
    "material_world_label": "World of 1989",
    "material_world": {
        "technology": "Personal computers, satellites, video, industrial robots, and expensive mobile phones exist, but the public Web does not yet.",
        "science": "Computing, genetics, climate science, cosmology, and medical imaging produce growing data and international collaboration.",
        "medicine": "CT, MRI, transplantation, vaccines, and intensive care advance; the AIDS epidemic exposes both medical capacity and its limits.",
        "transport": "Cars, high-speed rail, metros, aircraft, and containers globalize people and goods.",
        "agriculture": "Machinery, chemical inputs, breeding, and cold chains support high yields with increasingly debated social and environmental costs.",
        "communication": "Fixed telephones, fax, television, radio, and newspapers predominate. Email and computer networks remain mainly professional or academic.",
        "clothing": "Loose suits, jeans, trainers, women’s power suits, sportswear, and urban subcultures create highly varied silhouettes."
    },
    "material_world_scenes": [
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/30-1989-ce/world-01.webp",
            "title": "Technology, science, and care",
            "description": "Personal computers, satellites, video, industrial robots, and expensive mobile phones exist, but the public Web does not yet. Computing, genetics, climate science, cosmology, and medical imaging produce growing data and international collaboration. CT, MRI, transplantation, vaccines, and intensive care advance; the AIDS epidemic exposes both medical capacity and its limits."
        },
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/30-1989-ce/world-02.webp",
            "title": "Travel and communication",
            "description": "Cars, high-speed rail, metros, aircraft, and containers globalize people and goods. Fixed telephones, fax, television, radio, and newspapers predominate. Email and computer networks remain mainly professional or academic."
        },
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/30-1989-ce/world-03.webp",
            "title": "Farming and food",
            "description": "Machinery, chemical inputs, breeding, and cold chains support high yields with increasingly debated social and environmental costs."
        },
        {
            "asset": "/assets/timeline/landmarks/30-1989-ce/world-04.webp",
            "title": "Clothing, women and men",
            "description": "Loose suits, jeans, trainers, women’s power suits, sportswear, and urban subcultures create highly varied silhouettes."
        }
    ],
    "intellectual_tradition": {
        "id": "modern-philosophy",
        "label": "Modern and contemporary philosophy"
    },
    "period": {
        "id": "modern",
        "label": "Modern era"
    },
    "languages": [
        "en",
        "fr"
    ],
    "manifestations": [
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            "coverage": "complete_for_attested_edition_boundaries",
            "file": "data/corpus/normalized/john_locke/essay_human_understanding/representations/en.ndjson",
            "language": "en",
            "records": 1079,
            "role": "source_language_transcription",
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        },
        {
            "coverage": "complete_for_attested_edition_boundaries",
            "file": "data/corpus/normalized/john_locke/essay_human_understanding/representations/fr.ndjson",
            "language": "fr",
            "records": 1093,
            "role": "historical_translation",
            "sha256": "a453c04e0a08b4ba12e7733e0203e7d5e55526ce44b30150d5a84d85cdefa12e"
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        {
            "coverage": "fills_missing_source_attested_coverage",
            "file": "data/corpus/normalized/john_locke/essay_human_understanding/representations/ai-generated/en-gpt-5-6-sol-corpus-passage-translation-v1.ndjson",
            "generated_on": "2026-09-30",
            "language": "en",
            "model": "gpt-5.6-sol",
            "official_status": "non_official",
            "prompt_version": "corpus-passage-translation-v1",
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            "records": 35,
            "role": "ai_generated_translation_non_official",
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            "source_id": "prokopton42-codex-translation:gpt-5.6-sol:corpus-passage-translation-v1",
            "translation_type": "ai_generated_translation"
        },
        {
            "coverage": "fills_missing_source_attested_coverage",
            "file": "data/corpus/normalized/john_locke/essay_human_understanding/representations/ai-generated/fr-gpt-5-6-sol-corpus-passage-translation-v1.ndjson",
            "generated_on": "2026-09-30",
            "language": "fr",
            "model": "gpt-5.6-sol",
            "official_status": "non_official",
            "prompt_version": "corpus-passage-translation-v1",
            "provider": "codex_subscription",
            "records": 21,
            "role": "ai_generated_translation_non_official",
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            "translation_type": "ai_generated_translation"
        }
    ],
    "concepts": [
        {
            "id": "care_of_soul",
            "label": "Care of the soul"
        },
        {
            "id": "degrees_of_knowledge_and_probability",
            "label": "Degrees of knowledge and probability"
        },
        {
            "id": "family",
            "label": "Family"
        },
        {
            "id": "ideas_from_sensation_and_reflection",
            "label": "Ideas from sensation and reflection"
        },
        {
            "id": "impressions_and_assent",
            "label": "Impressions and assent"
        },
        {
            "id": "knowledge",
            "label": "Knowledge"
        },
        {
            "id": "messiah",
            "label": "Messiah"
        },
        {
            "id": "mindfulness",
            "label": "Mindfulness"
        },
        {
            "id": "nominal_and_real_essence",
            "label": "Nominal and real essence"
        },
        {
            "id": "personal_identity_and_consciousness",
            "label": "Personal identity and consciousness"
        },
        {
            "id": "primary_and_secondary_qualities",
            "label": "Primary and secondary qualities"
        },
        {
            "id": "reason",
            "label": "Reason"
        },
        {
            "id": "salvation",
            "label": "Salvation"
        },
        {
            "id": "simple_and_complex_ideas",
            "label": "Simple and complex ideas"
        },
        {
            "id": "sin",
            "label": "Sin"
        },
        {
            "id": "spirit",
            "label": "Spirit"
        },
        {
            "id": "substance",
            "label": "Substance"
        },
        {
            "id": "truth",
            "label": "Truth"
        }
    ],
    "source_work_ids": [
        "locke.essay_human_understanding"
    ],
    "passages": 1114,
    "word_count": 257071,
    "word_counts_by_language": {
        "en": 257071,
        "fr": 297020
    },
    "editorial_status": "gpt_5_6_semantic_draft_v1",
    "structure": {
        "citation_scheme": "locke-essay-book-chapter-section-v1",
        "kind": "native",
        "levels": [
            {
                "key": "book",
                "label_fr": "Livre",
                "label_en": "Book"
            },
            {
                "key": "chapter",
                "label_fr": "Chapitre",
                "label_en": "Chapter"
            },
            {
                "key": "section",
                "label_fr": "Section",
                "label_en": "Section"
            }
        ],
        "leaf_fr": "Section",
        "leaf_en": "Section"
    },
    "canonical_passage_id": "passage:locke.essay_human_understanding:B2.C23.S2",
    "canonical_ref": "B2.C23.S2",
    "canonical_parent_ref": null,
    "canonical_parent_id": null,
    "representations": [
        {
            "language": "en",
            "text": "So that if any one will examine himself concerning his notion of pure substance in general, he will find he has no other idea of it at all, but only a supposition of he knows not what SUPPORT of such qualities which are capable of producing simple ideas in us; which qualities are commonly called accidents. If any one should be asked, what is the subject wherein colour or weight inheres, he would have nothing to say, but the solid extended parts; and if he were demanded, what is it that solidity and extension adhere in, he would not be in a much better case than the Indian before mentioned who, saying that the world was supported by a great elephant, was asked what the elephant rested on; to which his answer was—a great tortoise: but being again pressed to know what gave support to the broad-backed tortoise, replied—SOMETHING, HE KNEW NOT WHAT. And thus here, as in all other cases where we use words without having clear and distinct ideas, we talk like children: who, being questioned what such a thing is, which they know not, readily give this satisfactory answer, that it is SOMETHING: which in truth signifies no more, when so used, either by children or men, but that they know not what; and that the thing they pretend to know, and talk of, is what they have no distinct idea of at all, and so are perfectly ignorant of it, and in the dark. The idea then we have, to which we give the GENERAL name substance, being nothing but the supposed, but unknown, support of those qualities we find existing, which we imagine cannot subsist SINE RE SUBSTANTE, without something to support them, we call that support SUBSTANTIA; which, according to the true import of the word, is, in plain English, standing under or upholding.",
            "edition": "Project Gutenberg transcription of Locke author text",
            "source_id": "gutenberg-10615",
            "translation_type": "source_language_transcription"
        },
        {
            "language": "fr",
            "text": "De ſorte que qui voudra prendre la peine de ſe conſulter ſoi-même ſur la notion qu’il a de la pure Subſtance en général, trouvera qu’il n’en a abſolument point d’autre que de je ne ſai quel ſujet qui lui eſt tout-à-fait inconnu, & qu’il ſuppoſe etre le ſoûtien des Qualitez qui ſont capables d’exciter des Idées ſimples dans notre Eſprit, Qualitez qu’on nomme communément les Accidents. En effet, qu’on demande à quelqu’un ce que c’eſt que le ſujet dans lequel la Couleur ou le Poids exiſtent, il n’aura autre choſe à dire ſinon que c’eſt que la choſe dans laquelle la ſolidité & l’étenduë ſont inhérentes, il ne ſera pas moins en peine que l’Indien dont * nous avons déja parlé, qui ayant dit que la Terre étoit ſoûtenuë par un grand Elephant, répondit à ceux qui demandèrent ſur quoi s’appuyoit cet Elephant, que c’étoit ſur une grande Tortuë, & qui étant encore preſſé de dire ce qui ſoutenoit la Tortuë, répliqua que c’étoit quelque choſe, un je ne ſai quoi qu’il ne connoiſſoit pas. Dans cette rencontre auſſi bien que dans pluſieurs autres où nous employons des mots ſans avoir des idées claires & diſtinctes de ce que nous voulons dire, nous parlons comme des Enfans, à qui l’on n’a pas plûtot demandé ce que c’eſt qu’une telle choſe qui leur eſt inconnuë, qu’ils font cette réponſe fort ſatisfaiſante à leur gré, que c’eſt quelque choſe ; mais qui employée de cette maniére ou par des Enfans ou par des Hommes faits, ſignifie purement & ſimplement qu’ils ne ſavent ce que c’eſt ; & que la choſe dont ils prétendent parler & avoir quelque connoiſſance, n’excite aucune idée dans leur Eſprit, & leur eſt par conſéquent tout-à-fait inconnuë. Comme donc toute l’idée que nous avons de ce que nous déſignons par le terme général de Subſtance, n’eſt autre choſe qu’un ſujet que nous ne connoiſſons pas, que nous ſuppoſons être le ſoûtien des Qualitez dont nous découvrons l’exiſtence, & que nous ne croyons pas pouvoir ſubſiſter fine reſubſtante, ſans quelque choſe qui les ſoûtienne, nous donnons à ce ſoûtien le nom de Subſtance qui rendu nettement en François ſelon ſa véritable ſignification veut dire * ce qui eſt deſſous ou qui ſoûtient.",
            "translator": "Pierre Coste",
            "edition": "Pierre Mortier, Amsterdam, 1735, third edition",
            "source_id": "wikisource-rev-14176341",
            "translation_type": "historical_translation"
        }
    ],
    "content_checksum": "8cc6b632391725f5cade0148a9dcb4c65cd59bedd51a8261bb9266dbe7370c69"
}