Maverick Philosopher

Footnotes to Plato from the foothills of the Superstition Mountains

Category: Berkeley

  • Berkeley’s Unperceived Table

    Ed writes, A question: if Berkeley is out of his study, and says ‘My table is in my study’, is he speaking truly or falsely? If truly, then ‘my table’ and ‘my study’ must have referents, and the referents must stand in the relation ‘in’. But neither referent is perceived, so neither exists, according to…

  • Can one see that one is not a brain-in-a-vat?

    This is a repost from 21 December 2009, slightly emended. I've added a clarifying addendum. ………………………….. John Greco, How to Reid Moore: So how does one know that one is not a brain in a vat, or that one is not deceived by an evil demon? Moore and Reid are for the most part silent on…

  • Argumentum ad Lapidem?

    No way, I say.  Over at Substack. Ed comments: "He did not maintain that rocks and trees do not exist; he did not deny or even question whether they are; he offered an unusual ontological account of what they are, namely, ideas in minds, including the divine mind." (BV) True, but careful examination of Berkeley’s…

  • Berkeleyan and Kantian Idealism: How Do They Differ?

    The good bishop, as Kant called him, held that reality is exhausted by "spirits" and their ideas. Thus on Berkeley's scheme everything is either a spiritual substance or mind, whether finite or infinite (God), or else an idea 'in'  a  mind. Ideas are thus modes or  modifications of minds.  As such they do not exist…

  • Idealism: Subjective, Objective, Transcendental

    This from a recent comment thread: I think we should all agree on what counts as ‘subjective idealism’. I characterise it as the view that the objects we commonly take to be physical objects are in some way, or wholly, mind dependent. This a reasonable interpretation of Kant. Let's leave the interpretation of Kant for…