(1632-1704) British philosopher who founded the scientific principle of determinism.
English philosopher. His Essay concerning Human Understanding 1690 maintained that experience was the only source of knowledge (empiricism), and that “we can have
knowledge no farther than we have ideas” prompted by such experience. Two Treatises on Government 1690 helped to form contemporary ideas of liberal democracy.
For Locke, the physical universe was a mechanical system of material bodies, composed of corpuscules, or “invisible particles”. He believed that at birth the mind was a blank, and that all ideas came from sense impressions.
His Two Treatises on Government supplied the classical statement of Whig theory and enjoyed great influence in America and France. It supposed that governments derive their authority from popular consent (regarded as a “contract”), so that a government may be rightly overthrown if it infringes such fundamental rights of the people as religious freedom.
Locke was born in Somerset and studied at Oxford. He practiced medicine, and in 1667 became secretary to the Earl of Shaftesbury. He consequently fell under suspicion as a Whig and in 1683 fled to Holland, where he lived until the 1688 revolution brought William of Orange to the English throne. In later life he published many works on philosophy, politics, theology, and economics; these include Letters on Toleration 1689–92 and Some Thoughts concerning Education 1693.

(1805-1860) English railroad engineer, an associate of railroad pioneers Isambard Kingdom Brunel and George and Robert Stephenson. He built many railroad lines in the UK and France.
Lock was born near Sheffield, Yorkshire, and left school at 13. In 1823 he went to work for George Stephenson, and learned much about surveying, railroad engineering, and construction. From 1847 he was Liberal Member of Parliament for Honiton, Devon.
Locke's first task undertaken alone was the construction of a railroad line from the Black Fell colliery to the river Tyne. He then began surveys for lines running between Leeds and Hull, Manchester and Bolton, and Canterbury and Whitstable. Locke built as straight as possible, used the terrain, and avoided the expense of tunnels whenever he could. Building the London to Southampton line, which opened 1840, he cut through the chalk Downs. He also built the Sheffield-to-Manchester route through the millstone grit of the Pennines. In 1841 he began work as chief engineer on the Paris-to-Rouen line, the first of several contracts in France.