AQA A level Philosophy Epistemology 3 - Idealism

Idealism

 The immediate objects of perception are mind-dependent objects.

 These objects do not represent reality, they are reality. There are no mind-independent objects.

Berkeley’s primary secondary quality distinction

P1 When we perceive an object, we don’t perceive anything in addition to its primary and secondary qualities

P2 So, everything we perceive is either a primary quality or a secondary quality

P3 Secondary qualities are mind-dependent

P4 Primary qualities are also mind-dependent

C Therefore, everything we perceive is mind-dependent

Berkeley’s master argument

 There cannot be any objects that are unconceived of (exist independent of any mind) 

 

 If you think of an object that is not being conceived of, you have now thought of the object, so it is now being conceived of (exists dependent on a mind).

 So, nothing can be unconceived-of.

 So, there are no mind-independent objects.

Berkeleys likeness principle

an idea can be like nothing but an idea, our ideas exist only within a mind, therefore these ideas cannot resemble or represent mind independent objects because a sensory experience cannot represent the non sensory matter

Issues with Berkeleys idealism

Issue 1: It doesn’t give an adequate account of illusions and hallucinations

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According to Idealism, objects have the properties that we perceive them to have (because the objects are the ideas), so when a stick appears to bend in water, the stick must be bent. But our common-sense experience of the world informs us the stick is not really bent so we don’t want to say that the stick is bent.

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Again, hallucinations are a problem for the Idealist because when hallucinating, we are perceiving ideas, but Berkeley claims that ideas are objects. So, if we perceive a pink dragon, then there must be a pink dragon. 

Issue 2) Leads to solipsism (scepticism about other minds)

 Berkeley said that we can have knowledge only of our minds and their ideas: but what of other people’s minds? We arrive at our knowledge of other people through perception, but if other people are simply ideas then they cannot have minds and perceptions of their own.  Thus, if all I can know is that I (mind) exist, together with the experiences of my mind, then since my knowledge is limited to my experiences, shouldn’t I believe that my mind and its experiences are all that exist?  In other words, shouldn’t I be a solipsist? Solipsism is the belief that all that exists is my mind and its experiences.  I have no knowledge of, and therefore no reason for believing in, the existence of minds other than my own. So, I assert that mine is the only one.

Issue 3) God cannot be used to play the role he does

 Berkeley is often accused of bringing God in purely to escape the difficulties that idealism leads to. It is important to note, however, that Berkeley does not assume that God exists, and then wheel him in to resolve philosophical difficulties in his theory. Rather, the existence of God is an inference, supported by the arguments.

 However the exact relationship between ideas in the mind of God and what we perceive is puzzling…

God as source of ideas

 Berkeley began by saying “the mind hath knowledge only of its own ideas”. If knowledge is only of sense experiences and God (the cause of our experiences) is not himself a sense experience, how can we know God, since God is not a sense experience? And, if we can know something other than sense-experience, namely God, why can’t we just have a world of external physical objects as the cause of our experiences?

God and the continued existence of objects

 Has Berkeley really has solved the sceptical problem about the continued existence of physical objects? Assuming that I can be certain that a table exists when I perceive it, what about when I look in another direction or go out of the room?  I no longer perceive it, so how do I know it still exists? Berkeley’s answer that I know it exists because God is still perceiving it is problematic, because I do not know that God is perceiving it. The most I can say is that if it still exists, it may be because God, or some other mind, is perceiving it. So, sceptical doubt remains concerning the existence of objects that I am not perceiving.