Berkeley's idealism
- Created by: Hermione23
- Created on: 08-06-20 13:02
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- Berkeley's Idealism
- The specification:
- Immediate objects of perception (eg tables,chairs) are mind-dependant objects
- Arguments include Berkeley's attack of primary / secondary quality's and his 'master' argument
- Issues: Illusions and hallucinations, idealism leads to solipsism, problems with the role played by God?
- Responses to the issues
- The immediate objects of our perception are mind-dependant objects
- All that exists are minds and ideas (sense-data)
- No external world beyond our perception
- Attack on Primary and Secondary properties
- Inseparability
- We cannot conceive of an object which has no properties other than primary qualities
- Apple cannot be perceived by its secondary qualities (taste) cannot be perceived at all
- Idea of an apple via its sensible qualities (primary) and if we take them away nothing remains of it
- If an object can only be perceived as both primary and secondary qualities, then our idea of primary and secondary qualities are inseparable
- If such qualities are inseparable in my mind then they're inseparable in reality
- Perceptual Variation:
- Secondary qualities subjected to perceptual variation (objects can appear to have different colours, tastes etc) and therefore mind-dependant
- Primary qualities also subjected to perceptual variation. Therefore primary qualities are also mind-dependant
- If place a hot and a cold hand in tepid water the water feels hot to the cold hand and cold to the hot hand, but the water cannot be both hot and cold
- Attack:
- P4)If colours really existed in physical objects then to change the colour it would be necessary to change the object itself. Different kinds of light change the colour of an object without changing the object
- P3) Diiferent animals perceive colours of objects differently
- C1) Therefore all colours are appearances not properties of physical objects
- P2) Solid physical object, viewed through a microscope, appears to have different colours rather than those it has normally
- P1) Cloud from distance looks pink but up close loses its colour
- Inseparability
- Esse est percipi
- To be is to be perceived
- All concepts have to come from experiance
- Colour blind person cant have the concept of the colour red if they've never seen it
- Can't experience matter, its beyond our veil of perception
- Can't experience matter, cant have the concept of it
- To talk about existence of matter is meaningless and contradicting
- Physical objects have to exist independently of perception
- Master Argument
- Though of mind-independent objects only takes place in someone's mind- contradictory
- Perceive a tree which exists outside my mind in doing so creates the idea inside your mind
- Issues:
- Thinking of a tree isn't mind-independent its impossible that there is a thought of a tree when no one is thinking of the tree
- Thoughts can exist outside of the mind
- Thinking of a tree is mind-dependant doesn't mean the tree is
- Confuses the thought with what a though is about
- To be is to be perceived
- P1) We perceive ordinary objects
- P2) We only perceive ideas
- C1)Ordinary objects are ideas
- Role of God:
- P1) As (the ideas that comprise) physical objects are mind-dependant, there're 3 possible causes of my perceptions: ideas, my mind, another mind
- P3)If physical objects depended on my mind then I would be able to control what I percive
- P4) But I cant. Perception is different to imagining. Perception is more passive, the sensations just occur we cant control them. Imagination is voluntary, perception isnt
- C1)Therefore physical objects don't depend on my mind
- C2) Therefore physical objects must exist in another mind, which wills that I perceive them
- P2) Ideas don't cause anything
- C3)Given the complexity and systematicity of our perceptions, that mind must be God
- Issues with Berkeley's idealism:
- Illusions
- Response: We aren't misperceiving. It would be absurd to infer that the pencil would be crooked in all conditions
- Illusions mislead us about the ideas that we might associate with what we perceive
- To avoid the issue we should say the pencil looks cooked instead of it is crooked
- Perceive ideas there must be an idea that corresponds to the illusion but it would be absurd to say that an object is as it looks in an illusion
- Hallucinations
- Imagination is involuntary and perception is not
- But Hallucinations are involuntary like perceptions
- Hallucinations as products of the imagination
- Produces criteria to distinguish hallucinations from perceptions
- Hallucinations are irregular, dim, confused
- even if they're vivid and clear as perceptions they're not coherently connected with the rest of our perceptual experiance
- Response to the response: Criteria isn't strong enough, difference is that in perception, you experience something outside your mind and in hallucinations you dont
- Solipsism
- We don't perceive minds we perceive ideas, so how can we be sure that other peoples minds (including Gods) exists
- Berkeleys idealism leads to the conclusion that all that exists is my own experiance
- Response: He dosnt specifically respond but says: I have no idea of a mind but because I am a mind, I know that I exist
- The idea that only ones mind is sure to exist
- Problem with role played by God:
- Response: I perceive is a copy of the idea in Gods mind, What I perceive with changes is what God wills me to perceive
- God and I cannot have the same perceptual experience- God doesn't feel sensations such as pain
- Ordinary objects of my perception change and go out of existence, Gods mind is said to be unchanging and eternal
- My perceptions and sensations are apart of my mind, what I perceive and feel is part of my mind not gods
- Illusions
- The specification:
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