Philosophy Paper

George Berkeley was an Irish philosopher who believed in idealism. He thought that we experience the world through our minds and ideas. Berkeley argued that everything is a perception. God perceives everything and the world exists only in our minds. Berkeley put it as, “Esse Is Percipi,” which means, to be is to be perceived.

To Berkeley, idealism was the theory that external perceptions exist not in the material object, but through our own ideas and thoughts. We are the perceiver and we are all perceptions of God. (Schott) Berkeley argued against materialism because he denied the fact that matter could exist on its own but our ideas of the material object make the object exist. John Locke said that we experience the world through primary and secondary qualities. Our primary qualities are our perceptions and our secondary qualities are the physical properties in the object. Berkeley agrees with this theory for the most part however, he says that in order to access our primary qualities it must be through our secondary qualities. The only way we can know shape, size, or color of an object is if we feel it or see it, which are our secondary qualities. Our primary qualities exist too, only in our minds. (Palmer, 205)

Berkeley can argue against materialism in many ways. A materialist will say that our senses are physical properties because we can feel if something is hot or cold. Berkeley argues this by saying that if you feel something hot, then your hand will feel coolness and if your hand is cold, then you will feel warmness. Since an object cannot be hot and cold at the same time, the perception of temperature is in the perceiver. (Southwell) Color is another issue that can be argued. For example, if two people see the same object and have different perspectives of the object, then the color could be different from person to person. Berkeley argues by saying that two colors cannot exist in the object at the same time, so color must exist in...