Berkeley, Principles of Human Knowledge, Introduction, Principles, 1-16 I. General Points A. The advance of one philosophy over another.

1. Thinking the weak points. 2. Thinking what is unthought, what is presupposed. 3. Testing the presuppositions. B. What is unthought for Descartes 1. the notion of idea: Descartes use of it-very sloppy. Is it 1) mental image of a) self, b) others, 2) concept, 3) sign, etc. 2. The notion of the relation between idea (qua mental image) and reality. a. On the one hand copy, original b. On the other: no real context to compare the two. How do you get out of your head to see if the copy (idea/image) is like the original? The infinite regress if verification is comparing copy with original. 3. The notion of the relation between experience and reality. The distinction between primary and secondary qualities. The assertion that only the first, number, extension, shape, size, motion and duration apply to the object, all the rest are added by the subject. How do we know this? -the example of the wax -the conclusion: what is grasped by the understanding (the identity of the wax) applies to the object. -assumption: the understanding has some privileged (independent) access to reality which the sense have not. -but what exactly is the relation of the understanding to the senses? For Descartes, the problem is particularly difficult since without the senses (without the body) I could continue to be. My understanding then, seems independent of my senses. 4. The separation of primary from secondary qualities through the understanding. The assertion that underneath the secondary, there are the primary qualities which apply to matter in itself. The suspicion: materialism. The reality of the world is just material. All causality is just material causality. No free will, no God, etc. Berkeley a churchman interested in preserving faith II. Berkeley's response to Descartes begins with an attack on the understanding as an independent faculty through an attack on its ability to form abstract ideas He begins by noting that abstract qualities do not actually exist apart

2 We all agree that that the qualities or modes of things do never really exist each of them apart by itself, and separated from all others, but are mixed, as it were, and blended together, several in the same object. Introduction 7 (8) It is the mind that separates them: the mind being able to consider each quality singly, or abstracted from those other qualities with which it is united, does by that means frame to itself abstract ideas. For example, the mind can frame to itself by abstraction the idea of colour exclusive of extension, and of motion exclusive of both colour and extension. (ibid.). Difficulties:

What is the abstract idea of color which signifies all colors by being neither red, nor blue, nor white, nor any other determinate colour? 8, (9) What is the abstract idea of triangle which must be neither oblique nor rectangle, neither equilateral, equicrural, nor scalenon, but all and none of these at once? (15) 13 He asserts he cannot form such an abstract idea

The abstract idea of a man, for example has color, but no particular color, stature, but no particular stature. He asserts, Whether others have this wonderful faculty of abstracting their ideas, they best can tell: for myself, I find indeed I have a faculty of imagining, or representing to myself, the ideas of those particular things I have perceived, But the idea of man that I frame to myself must be either of a white, or a black, or a tawny, a straight, or a crooked, a tall, or a low, or a middle-sized man. I cannot by any effort of thought conceive the abstract idea above described. And it is equally impossible for me to form the abstract idea of motion distinct from the body moving, and which is neither swift nor slow, curvilinear nor rectilinear; and the like may be said of all other abstract general ideas whatsoever. What is going on: He is denying Descartes distinction between understanding and imagining. For Berkeley, the idea is a mental image. But as such, it must be something definite. For Frege, what these remarks prove is that the idea is not a mental image. He asserts that the predicates of the idea not those of image or indeed of anything falling under its range. Thus, just as the idea of black cloth is neither black nor made out of cloth, so the idea of triangle is not itself triangular. Berkeleys reply. But then, how do we grasp it? His answer: What we do is grasp an individual and then take it as referring to all similar individuals. So we prove a proposition by

3 drawing a particular triangle, but we only use certain properties of the triangle in the proof. The proof then holds for all the other triangles that have these specified properties. In Berkeleys words, Although I use a particular triangle, e.g., a right angled isosceles triangle, in my demonstration, whose sides are a of a determinate length, I may nevertheless be certain it extends to all other rectilinear triangles, of what sort or bigness soever. And that because neither the right angle, nor the equality, nor the determinate lengths of the sides are at all concerned in the demonstration (18) Berkeley notes that the belief that we can have abstract ideas comes from the sense that general nouns must refer to abstract, universal ideas. But in fact: "A word becomes general by being made the sign, not of an abstract general idea, but of several particular ideas, any one of which it indifferently suggests to the mind. 10 (14) The universality of the word, that of indifferent signification of particular mental images. It is not annexed to a universal concept having this basis for its universality. 26. It sign like character comes from the sign like character of the image. Thus, it is like an idea, which, considered in itself, is particular, becomes general by being made to represent or stand for all other particular ideas of the same sort. 12 (15) The universality of the idea, that of indifferent signification, of other ideas Thus, as we noted with regard to the triangle. I prove a proposition by not taking into account certain features, i.e., by being indifferent to them. As Berkeley puts this: "the particular triangle I consider, whether of this or that sort it matters not, does equally stand for and represent all rectilinear triangles, and is in that sense universal. 15, (17) Its universality consists in in the relation it bears to the particulars signified or represented by it. (ibid.). abstraction, then, is simply taking some thing as a sign, and not considering everything which one does perceive. 16 (19) III. Berkeley uses this idea of abstraction to show that we cannot abstract the primary qualities of bodies from the secondary.

4 We cannot think of extension without some thinking of some extended, colored thing, we cannot think of duration without thinking of some concrete enduring process, etc. Thus, the primary qualities of things are inseparably united with the secondary; and if the secondary only exist in the mind, so do the primary. They cannot be the qualities of some non-mental reality. In Berkeleys words: Now, if it be certain that those original qualities are inseparably united with the other sensible qualities, and not, even in thought, capable of being abstracted from them, it plainly follows that they exist only in the mind. But I desire any one to reflect and try whether he can, by any abstraction of thought, conceive the extension and motion of a body without all other sensible qualities. For my own part, I see evidently that it is not in my power to frame an idea of a body extended and moving, but I must withal give it some colour or other sensible quality which is acknowledged to exist only in the mind. In short, extension, figure, and motion, abstracted from all other qualities, are inconceivable. Where therefore the other sensible qualities are, there must these be also, to wit, in the mind and nowhere else. 10 (35) IV. But if this is so, then the to be (esse) of objects is their to be perceived: (percepi). He asks: How can I distinguish the existence of sensible objects from their being perceived especially since it is impossible for me to conceive in my thoughts any sensible theory or object distinct from my sensation or perception of it. Principles, 5 (32) If I were to try to form an abstract idea of it, I would have to take some object and then abstract all of its sensible qualities. But then I would have nothing left. But this implies that object and the sensation are one and the same thing, and cannot therefore be abstracted from one another. 32 And if the object is its sensation, then its esse is its percepi, its being is its being perceived. This point holds generally: all the choir of heaven and furniture of the earth, in a word all those bodies which compose the mighty frame of the world, have not any subsistence without a mind, that their being is to be perceived or known 6 (32)

5 This is, in fact, all the empirical meaning that can be given to the word exist. The table I write on I say exists, that is, I see and feel it; and if I were out of my study I should say it existedmeaning thereby that if I was in my study I might perceive it, or that some other spirit actually does perceive it. There was an odour, that is, it was smelt; there was a sound, that is, it was heard; a colour or figure, and it was perceived by sight or touch. This is all that I can understand by these and the like expressions. 3 (30) Thus, empirically to exist means to be perceived. What about things that are not perceived by me? If we are to assert that they continue in existence, God must perceive them. so long as they are not actually perceived by me, or do not exist in my mind or that of any other created spirit, they must either have no existence at all, or else subsist in the mind of some Eternal Spirit- it being perfectly unintelligible, and involving all the absurdity of abstraction, to attribute to any single part of them an existence independent of a spirit. To be convinced of which, the reader need only reflect, and try to separate in his own thoughts the being of a sensible thing from its being perceived. 6 (32) Contrary to this view is Descartes position that the image (or idea) in our head is like the external reality. Against this Berkeley notes that the only thing like an idea is another idea (this is the only what we can conceive likeness; it has to be between two similar things). o an idea can be like nothing but an idea; a colour or figure can be like nothing but another colour or figure. If we look but never so little into our thoughts, we shall find it impossible for us to conceive a likeness except only between our ideas. 8 (330 But if the image exist only in our minds, then so does the thing that is like it. Again, I ask whether those supposed originals or external things, of which our ideas are the pictures or representations, be themselves perceivable or no? If they are, then they are ideas and we have gained our point; but if you say they are not, I appeal to any one whether it be sense to assert a colour is like something which is

6 invisible; hard or soft, like something which is intangible; and so of the rest. (ibid.). Once again, we return to the position that to be is to be perceived.

7 Berkeley, Principles of Human Knowledge, Principles, 17-66 Where is Berkeley coming from? His basic principle is empiricism: He believes that knowledge must be founded on experience, that words must have an empirical basis. Now those who believe that there is something out there that corresponds to the images in our minds think that it has its own being or substance. What does experience teach us about the notion of substance as a support of accidents? Berkeley writes: The general idea of Being appeareth to me the most abstract and incomprehensible of all others; and as for its supporting accidents, this, as we have now observed, cannot be understood in the common sense of those words." (39) His claim is that the notions of being, accident, material substance have "no distinct meaning annexed to them:" (39-40) This follows from the argument about the abstract notion of triangles: We treat indifferently (i.e., leave out of account) several aspects of the mental image of triangle to use what remains as a sign for other triangles which we imagine. If we do this with being, we would have to a abstract from everything sensual. Thus, we have nothing left on an empirical level. We also cannot grasp the notion of a being that "supports" accidents as a material substance is supposed to. Once we strip the being from such sensuous accidence, it has no possible imaginative representation. In other words, nothing is left. The claim here is that the notion of matter is in the same position. If we abstract all its perceivable qualities to get at the supposedly underlying prime matter, empirically, we are left with nothing at all. Behind his argument is a transformation of Aristotle's matter (uhly) to the infinitely divisible prime matter of the renaissance (which takes matter as a thing rather than a relation) For Aristotle, matter is a relation of informing, the thing that informs (or shapes) is the form, the thing that is informed (or shaped) is the matter. If we want to think of matter as a thing that has no form in itself, that is, receives all its form from something else, then this matter is totally abstract. It has no qualities. Berkeley is asking: what sort of properties can this prime matter have to empirically show itself? By definition, it cannot have any properties, since it is completely formless. There is also a second point from empiricism. Experience gives us the relations between appearing objects of experience

8 it gives us as it were a logic of experience--the uniformity of the flow of experiences. example: perspectival unfolding as registering distances example: the relation of sight and touch as confirming each other. The view of the outside world as there is a matter of following the logic of experience. The dissolution of the world in a tumult of experiences is the dissolution of this logic; it is the loss of any sense of "out there" In other words, the very notion of "out there" a matter of the "connections of experience" In Berkeleys distance or outness is neither immediately of itself perceived by sight, nor yet apprehended or judged of by lines and angles, or anything that hath a necessary connexion with it; but that it is only suggested to our thoughts by certain visible ideas and sensations attending vision, which in their own nature have no manner of similitude or relation either with distance or things placed at a distance 43 (52) such connections, however, only occur between experiences. The confirmation or lack there of, a matter of experience. Now, experience, which gives us the relations between appearing objects of experience, cannot by definition give us a relation between what appears and what does not. It cannot be used to postulate a cause or ground of appearance per se. In fact, by definition, the notion of the ground is other than the grounded. If it were the same as that which it grounds, it would itself be in need of the ground that it is supposed to provide. Given this, we can never empirically justify the postulating of a ground of experience through experience. A ground of experience is, by definition, other than experience. It cannot be experienced. From the empirical perspective is a non entity. Thus, the whole notion of matter as such a ground of experience, as the external source of our ideas must be given up. There is a further difficulty. As Berkeley writes: "even though we give the materialists their external bodies, they by their own confession are never the nearer knowing how our ideas are produced; since they own themselves unable to comprehend in what manner body can act upon spirit. 20 (40) Lockes formulation of this problem is: We are so far from knowing what figure, size or motion of parts produce a yellow color, a sweet taste, or a sharp sound, that we can by no means conceive how any size, figure, or motion of any particles, can possibly produce in us the idea of any color, taste, or sound whatsoever: there is no conceivable connection between the one and other (Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Amherst, New York: Prometheus Books 1995, p. 445).

9 Leibniz makes the same point in his analogy of the mill. Perceptions, he writes ... are inexplicable by mechanical causes, that is to say, by figures and motions. Supposing that there were a machine whose structure produced thought, sensation, and perception, we could conceive of it as increased in size with the same proportions until one was able to enter into its interior, as he would into a mill. Now, on going into it he would find only pieces working upon one another, but never would he find anything to explain Perception (Leibniz, Monadology. Basic Writings, tr. George Montgomery. La Salle, Illinois: Open Court 1962, p. 254). But if this is the case, if you cannot tell me how you get from matter to ideas or perceptions, then why are you postulating matter at all. What good would it do you? With this, we have the general point that if there is no empirical knowledge of matter as something underlying (and hence distinct from) the visible features of the world, if experience cannot tell us anything about matter as the ground of experience, if reason cannot discover the relation between matter and our "ideas" (or perceptions), if, in fact, the connection between the two is inconceivable, then there is no basis at all to posit matter. Where then do we get our ideas? Ideas by themselves cannot be the cause. In Berkeleys words, A little attention will discover to us that the very being of an idea implies passiveness and inertness in it, insomuch that it is impossible for an idea to do anything, or, strictly speaking, to be the cause of anything. (43) The only thing can cause ideas is mind or spirit. We experience our minds ability to generate and change ideas. Now, I find that I can excite ideas in my mind at pleasure and vary and shift the scene as oft as I think fit. But whatever power I may have over my own thoughts, I find the ideas actually perceived by sense have not a like dependence on my will. (45). Where do these ideas come from? These idea therefore are produced by some other Will or Spiriti.e., God. (46) As he also puts this: The ideas of Sense are allowed to have more reality in them, that is, to be more strong, orderly, and coherent than the creatures of the mind; but this is no argument that they exist without the mind. They are also less dependent on the spirit, or thinking substance which perceives them, in that they are excited by the will of another and more powerful spirit; yet still they are ideas, and certainly no idea, whether faint or strong, can exist otherwise than in a mind perceiving it. (47)

10 The argument. There are two types of beings. There are ideas, whose being is to be perceived, and there are perceivers. Matter (and the external world in general) does not exist. We have no empirical evidence for it. It also does not fulfill any explanatory function with regard to ideas. If matter does not cause the ideas and if the ideas (since they are inert) do not cause the ideas, then the only alternative is that mind or sprit causes them. We do have evidence for this, since by our acts of will we can cause some of the ideas. A stronger mind or sprit must be the cause of the other stronger, more vivid ideas. This must be God. There is however a difficulty. This cause of the ideas, since it is not an idea, has no empirical content. We cannot, therefore, form any idea of it. Berkeley makes this point in terms of the fact that mind is active, while ideas are passive In his words, A spirit is one simple, undivided, active being- as it perceives ideas it is called the understanding, and as it produces or otherwise operates about them it is called the will. Hence there can be no idea formed of a soul or spirit; for all ideas whatever, being passive and inert (vide sect. 25), they cannot represent unto us, by way of image or likeness, that which acts. 27 (44) the words will, soul, spirit, do not stand for different ideas, or, in truth, for any idea at all, but for something which is very different from ideas, and which, being an agent, cannot be like unto, or represented by, any idea whatsoever. (45). One way to put Berkeleys point is in terms of time. If we have an idea (image of our mind) this is through reflection. But the self we reflect on is the self that has slipped into the past. The active self, the self that is presently reflecting is not seen. Husserl, a reader of Berkeley, put this as follows: "Whenever I am occupied with myself and my specific egological functions, I have this distinction between what I am occupied with and myself, i.e., between my being actively engaged and that with which I am actively engaged. ... The actively functioning 'I do,' 'I discover,' is constantly anonymous." When I turn my attention to the latter, "it is brought up by a new functioning ego," an ego which is not, itself, attended to (Ms. A VII, 11, pp. 90-92, Oct. 26, 1932). As Husserl elsewhere puts this: ... the ego which is the counterpart (gegenber) to everything is anonymous. It is not its own counterpart. The house is my counterpart, not vice versa. And yet I

11 can turn my attention to myself. But then this counterpart in which the ego comes forward along with everything which was its counterpart is again split. The ego which comes forward as a counterpart and its counterpart [e.g., the house it was perceiving] are both counterparts to me. Forthwith, I -- the subject of this new counterpart -- am anonymous (Ms. C 2 I, p. 2, Aug. 1931). My anonymity is my inability to grasp myself as now, as active. Note: once again we come up with the unknowable self. Cf. Descartes assertion about the nonextended self being unimaginable. With God as the source of the ideas, we have a transformation of the laws of nature: The set rules or established methods wherein the Mind we depend on excites in us the ideas of sense are called the laws of Nature (46). Science in studying such laws are actually studying the mind of God. All science studies are the regularities in the divine mind as it first put one idea and then another idea into our minds of objects of sense. Berkeley now turns to answer the objections to his view. 1. all that is real and substantial in nature is banished out of the world, and instead thereof a chimerical scheme of ideas takes place. 34 (48) Reply: there is still the distinction between real things and chimeras; they both equally exist in the mind, and in that sense they are alike ideas. Yet the ideas corresponding to real things are given to us by God. 2. there is a great difference betwixt real fire for instance, and the idea of fire, betwixt dreaming or imagining oneself burnt, and actually being so 41 (51) Reply: if real fire be very different from the idea of fire, so also is the real pain that it occasions very different from the idea of the same pain, and yet nobody will pretend that real pain either is, or can possibly be, in an unperceiving thing, or without the mind, any more than its idea. (52) 3. we see things actually without or at distance from us, and which consequently do not exist in the mind; it being absurd that those things which are seen at the distance of several miles should be as near to us as our own thoughts. 42 (52) Reply Only the connections of experience give us the idea of distance. See above. 4. If things only exist as long as they see them, then it follows things are every moment annihilated and created anew. The objects of sense exist only when they are perceived; the trees therefore are in the garden, or the chairs in the parlour, no longer than while there is somebody by to perceive them. 45 (54)

12 Reply: If you object to this, tell me what is meant by the actual existence of an idea apart from its being perceived. If anyone can conceive it possible either for his ideas or their archetypes to exist without being perceived, then I give up the cause (ibid.). Reply: When we dont see them, God sees them. He upholds and conserves the universe. 5. if extension and figure exist only in the mind, it follows that the mind is extended and figured 49 (57) Reply: those qualities are in the mind only as they are perceived by it- that is, not by way of mode or attribute (ibid.). Mode or attribute apply to matter informed by form. Matter does not exist 6. Are you not undermining science? Dont you undermine those mechanical principles which have been applied with so much success to account for the phenomena. 50 (58) Reply: You can continue to do science, but without the absurd presupposition of matter. But how Matter should operate on a Spirit, or produce any idea in it, is what no philosopher will pretend to explain; it is therefore evident there can be no use of Matter in natural philosophy. Besides, they who attempt to account for things do it not by corporeal substance, but by figure, motion, and other qualities, which are in truth no more than mere ideas, and, therefore, cannot be the cause of anything, as hath been already shewn (ibid.). The point is that matter is a metaphysical, not a practical presupposition of science. What its formulas do is simply predict the succession of experience. 7. But then language is turned upside down. We must no longer say upon these principles that fire heats, or water cools, but that a Spirit heats, and so forth. 51 (58). Reply: in such things we ought to "think with the learned, and speak with the vulgar." (ibid.). 8. Everybody agrees that there is matter. Reply: Not so long ago, everybody agreed that the sun revolved around the earth. 54 (60) At any rate, natural philosophers have already shown that the secondary qualities of objects are only ideas in us. I have only shown that this implies that the primary must also be in us, since the primary and the secondary are inseparable 56 (61)

13 11. What about the intricacy of nature. What is the difference between an empty watch and one with a mechanism inside of it according to your principles. God, for our benefit always follows the laws of nature. His mind is regular. 63 (65).

Note: implicit here is a pre-established harmony. Others have ideas of me as I act. They deduce my presence as a rational agent behind these ideas. Such ideas, however, come from God. Thus, I act and move my limbs "but that such motion should be attended by, or excite any idea in the mind of another, depends wholly on the will of the Creator. He alone it is who ... maintains that intercourse between spirits whereby they are able to perceive the existence of each other." (121) Thus, I act, but God causes the ideas which others have of me and from which they deduce my existence. I move from these ideas to the other person as causing them, but I also move to God. He is the one who imprints all these ideas on me. The other, then, is there for me only through God's agency. What is the relation between my mind and Gods mind implied by this? Since I see the ideas of sense, they are in my mind. My mind, however, does not uphold them by themselves, since they are not subject to my will. The divine mind supports them. Being "in" me but not controlled by me, the ideas must also be "in" God. Being "in" me, then, is being "in" God. Thus, God looks through every subject; his seeing assumes the form of the seeing that occurs in particular subjects with their particular points of view. Such subjects, insofar as their seeing is His seeing, are "in God." Being "in" him their minds (in identity with the divine) maintain the real objects that are out there. The question here is: How would one refute this view? Isnt Berkeley saying that if you want to refute me and maintain the existence of matter solve the mind-body problem? Of course, one can say with Hume, all we have are our ideas. We really cannot tell where they come from. It may be from God, from matter, or from ourselves.

14 Berkeley, Principles, sections 67-117. Berkeley sums up his argument in 73. First, therefore, it was thought that colour, figure, motion, and the rest of the sensible qualities or accidents, did really exist without the mind; and for this reason it seemed needful to suppose some unthinking substratum or substance wherein they did exist, since they could not be conceived to exist by themselves. Afterwards, in process of time, men being convinced that colours, sounds, and the rest of the sensible, secondary qualities had no existence without the mind, they stripped this substratum or material substance of those qualities, leaving only the primary ones, figure, motion, and suchlike, which they still conceived to exist without the mind, and consequently to stand in need of a material support. But, it having been shewn that none even of these can possibly exist otherwise than in a Spirit or Mind which perceives them it follows that we have no longer any reason to suppose the being of Matter. (72) Only the third part of the argument is added by Berkeley. The second part comes from Descartes and Galileo and generally from modern science. The argument against extension, etc. existing apart from the mind comes from Berkeleys argument against abstraction. If we could prove that we do have the power to abstract and consider extension, motion, time, and substance by themselves, we would not have to make this step. The argument against abstraction comes from the identification of the concept with a mental image. We cannot have a mental image of extension without including the secondary qualities of the object. We have to imagine an extended, colored thing. To assert that we do have this ability is to assert that we have some form of intellectual intuition, that we can intuit concepts. Without this, we cannot make the separation of primary from secondary qualities and posit matter as having inherently primary qualities such as position, motion, extension, shape, etc. If we strip matter of such primary qualities, what is left? Berkeley writes: if any man shall leave out of his idea of matter the positive ideas of extension, figure, solidity and motion, and say that he means only by that word an inert, senseless substance, that exists without the mind or unperceived, which is the occasion of our ideas, or at the presence whereof God is pleased to excite ideas in us: it doth not appear but that Matter taken in this sense may possibly exist. 67 There are two references here. To the theory of the occasionalists. These were followers of Descartes, who to explain how an nonextended mind could get ideas from the things of the world

15 said that God placed them in us on the occasion that the thing outside of us was positioned to affect us had we been extended (not that we are extended). In other words, God acts as intermediary. To Kants thing in itself. The only thing we can say about the things in themselves is that they are the occasions of our having ideas. They provide us with a transcendent affection, impressions, which we synthesize according to our categories. What the thing in itself might be, however, we have no idea. We also cannot explain how it affects us. Kants argument in this regard concerns space and time. Both are our product. Our sense of time comes from our retaining impressions by reproducing them. This is a serial process in which the impression is reproduced, and this reproduction is reproduced, etc. This gives us the sense of the dying away of the impression, which we take as its sinking into the past. The dependence of our sense of space on time makes it also our product. Apart from space and time, however, we have no way of interpreting the thing in itself Berkeleys corresponding treatment of space and time are interesting. He simply notes that the abstractions necessary to conceive of space and time as such are not possible. As he puts it: whenever I attempt to frame a simple idea of time, abstracted from the succession of ideas in my mind I am lost . I have no notion of it at all 98 (87). In fact, time is nothing, abstracted from the succession of ideas in our minds. (ibid.). If there is no succession, there is no sense of time. Time, in other words, is founded on the succession. Kant adds to this by saying that it requires reproduction of the changing content of the now. As for space, Berkeleys argument is also based on the impossibility of the corresponding abstraction. In his words, So likewise when we attempt to abstract extension and motion from all other qualities, and consider them by themselves, we presently lose sight of them. What we have here is a twofold abstraction; first, it is supposed that extension, for example, may be abstracted from all other sensible qualities; and secondly, that the entity of extension may be abstracted from its being perceived. 99 The second follows from the first since if we take away all its sensible qualities, extension is not perceivable. But then, why posit it? A key point in this argument is the assertion that that the objects of sense are nothing but those sensations combined, blended, or (if one may so speak) concreted together; none of all which can be supposed to exist unperceived. (ibid.). The question is whether the object is in fact this. Is the object just the collection of the perceptions (or sensations) that we have in our minds? Or is it the point of their unification, the X of which we say that the perceptions are of it, the X that we distinguish

16 from our perceptions? If this is the case then the object = x is unperceived. It is, as Descartes says, grasped by our understanding as a common referent. This referent is a one-in-many, the single thing that shows itself in many perceptions, all of which are perceptions of the one thing. Note: implicit here is the point Frege makes on conceptualization. The properties of the object (as a one in many, as a concept) are not those of the things that exemplify it (the individual perceptions). Thus, the object is not its image as given by such perceptions. The same holds for the features of the object such as extension, figure, etc. Different perceptions from different perspectives show the extension and figure differently. But this does not mean that the extension that shows itself through them is itself different. The same holds for the level of abstraction that goes beyond the primary qualities to the matter that supports them. In other words, if we admit our power to grasp a one in many, that is, to conceptualize, then we deny Berkeleys points that abstraction is impossible, that we cannot separate off primary from secondary qualities, and that we cannot posit matter as underlying such qualities. Berkeley, however, has another arrow up his sleeve. This is that we cannot derive from experience the causes of experience. Experience only gives us regularities of succession. The rules we derive from such regularities cannot, by definition, explain experience. They cannot, because they presuppose it. As Berkeley puts this point: Those men who frame general rules from the phenomena and afterwards derive the phenomena from those rules, seem to consider signs rather than causes. 108 This means that from the regularities of experience, for example, that we constantly experience A following B, all we can conclude is that B points to or signifies A, not that B causes A. A final point: Fichte, Kants most famous student, writes that the ground, by definition, lies outside of the grounded. If it were the same as the grounded, it would equally need the same ground. This means, Fichte observes, the ground of experience must be outside of experience. It must be nonperceivable. Fichte and Kant accept this. They call the ground noumenal as opposed to phenomenal. Berkeley asserts that there is no external ground in the sense of matter. He does, however, make the ground to be mind or spirit and he admits that we can have no idea of this ground. The question remains: why should we posit such a ground? Dont the arguments against positing matter as such a ground also work against spirit?

17 Principles of Human Knowledge, Principles, sections 118-156 The last part of the Principles is dedicated to addressing issue of how we can know such a thing as mind or spirit. On the one hand, Berkeley asserts that it is manifestly impossible there should be any such idea of spirit. On the other he also asserts a spirit has been shewn to be the only substance or support wherein unthinking beings or ideas can exist. 135 The question is: why dont the objections raised against the notion of material substance apply to spirit. Dont we have to reach it through an illegitimate process of abstraction. As Berkeley puts this: if there is no idea signified by the terms soul, spirit, and substance, they are wholly insignificant, or have no meaning in them. 139 Berkeley answers: those words do mean or signify a real thing, which is neither an idea nor like an idea, but that which perceives ideas, and wills, and reasons about them. What I am myself, that which I denote by the term I, is the same with what is meant by soul or spiritual substance (ibid.). The question, however, is what is this I? For Berkeley, a soul or spirit is an active being, whose existence consists, not in being perceived, but in perceiving ideas and thinking (ibid.). This perceiving that characterizes spirit is totally opposed to the being perceived that characterizes the idea. The idea is passive, the spirit is active. In fact, Spirits and ideas are things so wholly different, that when we say they exist, they are known, or the like, these words must not be thought to signify anything common to both natures. There is nothing alike or common in them: and to expect that by any multiplication or enlargement of our faculties we may be enabled to know a spirit as we do a triangle, seems as absurd as if we should hope to see a sound. 142 (118). How do spirits exist? How are they known? They exist as active. We know them through their actions. Berkeley thus claims that we have some notion of them (ibid.). He writes, I have a notion of the operations of my soul, but I cannot interpret this in terms of the ideas borrowed from sensible things. So when I speak of the nature and operations of the mind I cannot speak of those things in terms borrowed from sensible ideas. I cannot, for example, speak of the will as a motion of the soul. 144 How can I speak of it? This is the great problem for transcendental philosophy. To speak about something is to fix it, to objectify it. All our descriptions come from objects. Here, two questions must be raised. The first is whether such objects do not all come from the ideas of sense, that is, from the external world. If we examine the contents of our

18 consciousness do we find any other objects. Does introspection reveal the operations and acts of the mind. The second question is, assuming that it does, can we objectively describe these without falsifying them. Dont all the terms of our descriptions come from the external world. Kant asserts that the most we can do is deduce regressively what the subject must be doing, what actions it must perform in order to present us with a coherent view of the world. But in itself, the subject does not appear, does not stand under the categories we gain from the objective, external world. Example: The act of temporalization as reproduction. Kant undercuts his account of this saying that it concerns the subject as it appears, not the subject that acts and causes appearance. In other words, we can only view the act through the time that it itself makes possible. What the act is inherently (apart from the way it causes itself to appear) we do not know. Husserl, by contrast, asserts that the objectification that comes from reflection on our acts is not a falsification. He does, however, admit that: Time constituting phenomena, therefore, are evidently objectivities fundamentally different from those constituted in time. They are neither individual objects nor individual process, and the predicates of such objects or processes cannot be meaningfully ascribed to them. In other words: This flow [of time constituting phenomena] is something we speak of in conformity with what is constituted, but is not itself something in objective time. (79). Thus, retentions dont endure, they are not identities in change, they dont change, there is no fast or slow in the retentional process. We know the process through its effectswhich is the dying away or paling of what we retain. We interpret this as departure in time. What about our grasp of other minds? As Berkeley notes, we cannot grasp them directly, since all we see are their bodies. But yet we have an indirect knowledge of their minds. In his words, we cannot know the existence of other spirits otherwise than by their operations, or the ideas by them excited in us. I perceive several motions, changes, and combinations of ideas, that inform me there are certain particular agents, like myself, which accompany them and concur in their production. Hence, the knowledge I have of other spirits is not immediate, as is the knowledge of my ideas; but depending on the intervention of ideas, by me referred to agents or spirits distinct from myself, as effects or concomitant signs. 145 In other words, I perceive my ability to control my body, that is, to generate ideas of its successive motions. I see another person acting as I would in a given situation, that is, I

19 see several motions, changes, and combinations of ideas, that inform me that someone else is controlling his body as I would. I then assume that he is a subject like myself. The whole is like a proportion. My notion of myself controlling my body is to the appearing of my body as the other mind or spirit controlling his body is to appearing of his body. I cannot see the other mind or spirit, I just deduce it from the other three terms. Here, we have to note that since all ideas that we get from sense perception come directly from God, our perceptions of the other person come directly from him. Thus, he provides the evidence through which I infer that there are other spirits like myself. In Berkeleys words, He alone it is who, upholding all things by the word of His power, maintains that intercourse between spirits whereby they are able to perceive the existence of each other. 147 According to Berkely, the evidence we have for other human minds is less strong than the evidence we have for the mind of God. As Berkeley puts this: the existence of God is far more evidently perceived than the existence of men; because the effects of nature are infinitely more numerous and considerable than those ascribed to human agents. There is not any one mark that denotes a man, or effect produced by him, which does not more strongly evince the being of that Spirit who is the Author of Nature. (ibid.). So just as the intelligence that is apparent in the actions of a person points to the person as a mind controlling his body, so the order and intelligibility of the world points to God as controlling the world. Again we have a proportion. My mind : my appearing body :: Gods mind : the appearing of the world. The intelligibility and orderliness of the world points to God as a mind even more assuredly than the intelligibility and orderliness of the ideas (perceptions) I get from another person points to him as a mind. As Berkeley puts this with regard to perceiving a human being: A human spirit or person is not perceived by sense, as not being an idea; when therefore we see the colour, size, figure, and motions of a man, we perceive only certain sensations or ideas excited in our own minds; and these being exhibited to our view in sundry distinct collections, serve to mark out unto us the existence of finite and created spirits like ourselves. Hence it is plain we do not see a man- if by man is meant that which lives, moves, perceives, and thinks as we do- but only such a certain collection of ideas as directs us to think there is a distinct principle of thought and motion, like to ourselves, accompanying and represented by it 148 And the same holds for God: And after the same manner we see God; all the difference is that, whereas some one finite and narrow assemblage of ideas denotes a particular human mind, whithersoever we direct our view, we do at all times and in all places perceive manifest tokens of the Divinity: everything we see, hear, feel, or anywise perceive by sense, being a sign or

20 effect of the power of God; as is our perception of those very motions which are produced by men (ibid.) Of course, if we make this argument, then we have to explain away all the things that appear as defects of nature. As Berkeley observes monsters, untimely births, fruits blasted in the blossom, rains falling in desert places, miseries incident to human life, and the like, are so many arguments that the whole frame of nature is not immediately actuated and superintended by a Spirit of infinite wisdom and goodness 150 The rest of the book is spent trying to show that all these are the unavoidable effects of the regularity of nature, which is for our own good. The same sorts of arguments closed Descartes Meditations. Let me end by noting several points in Berkeley. The first is the immortality of the soul. All our ideas of mortality come from the ideas of external sense, i.e., of natural objects that are divisible, corporial, extended and hence corruptible. But the active soul is distinct from such. We cannot predicate such features of it. Thus, we cannot say that it is mortal. In his words, the soul is indivisible, incorporeal, unextended, and it is consequently incorruptible. Nothing can be plainer than that the motions, changes, decays, and dissolutions which we hourly see befall natural bodies (and which is what we mean by the course of nature) cannot possibly affect an active, simple, uncompounded substance; such a being therefore is indissoluble by the force of nature; that is to say, "the soul of man is naturally immortal." 141 The second is that he cannot accept Newtons calculus, since it deals with infinitesimal changes. It calculates motion as if the moving stretch and the time taken to move the stretch could be infinitely divided. But to be is to be perceived and we cannot perceive such infinitely small amounts of distance and time, therefore the calculus must be false. He thus concludes: upon a thorough examination it will not be found that in any instance it is necessary to make use of or conceive infinitesimal parts of finite lines, or even quantities less than the minimum sensible; nay, it will be evident this is never done, it being impossible. (132) 112 This blindness of empiricism to mathematics and hence to the natural science that employs natural science will continue with Hume.

21