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Single Idea 3937
[filed under theme 12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 2. Qualities in Perception / e. Primary/secondary critique
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Full Idea
By 'solidity' either you do not mean any sensible quality, and so it is beside our enquiry; or if you do, it must be hardness or resistance, which are plainly relative to our senses.
Gist of Idea
'Solidity' is either not a sensible quality at all, or it is clearly relative to our senses
Source
George Berkeley (Three Dialogues of Hylas and Philonous [1713], I p.173)
Book Ref
Berkeley,George: 'The Principles of Human Knowledge etc.', ed/tr. Warnock,G.J. [Fontana 1962], p.173
A Reaction
Berkeley fails to recognise that a quality can have primary and secondary aspects (hot/high temperature). He is right that primary qualities are not directly perceived. They are judgements.
The
35 ideas
from 'Three Dialogues of Hylas and Philonous'
5192
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Berkeley did not deny material things; he merely said they must be defined through sensations
[Berkeley, by Ayer]
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5174
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Berkeley needed a phenomenalist account of the self, as well as of material things
[Ayer on Berkeley]
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1103
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'To be is to be perceived' is a simple confusion of experience with its objects
[Russell on Berkeley]
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6403
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For Berkelely, reality is ideas and a community of minds, including God's
[Berkeley, by Grayling]
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5374
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Berkeley probably used 'idea' to mean both the act of apprehension and the thing apprehended
[Russell on Berkeley]
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3930
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There is no such thing as 'material substance'
[Berkeley]
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3931
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Sensible objects are just sets of sensible qualities
[Berkeley]
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3932
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A hot hand and a cold hand will have different experiences in the same tepid water
[Berkeley]
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3933
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Primary qualities (such as shape, solidity, mass) are held to really exist, unlike secondary qualities
[Berkeley]
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3934
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A mite would see its own foot as large, though we would see it as tiny
[Berkeley]
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3935
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The apparent size of an object varies with its distance away, so that can't be a property of the object
[Berkeley]
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3936
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Time is measured by the succession of ideas in our minds
[Berkeley]
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3937
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'Solidity' is either not a sensible quality at all, or it is clearly relative to our senses
[Berkeley]
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3938
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Geometry is originally perceived by senses, and so is not purely intellectual
[Berkeley]
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3939
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I conceive a tree in my mind, but I cannot prove that its existence can be conceived outside a mind
[Berkeley]
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3940
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Distance is not directly perceived by sight
[Berkeley]
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3950
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There must be a God, because all sensible things must be perceived by him
[Berkeley]
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3949
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It has been proved that creation is the workmanship of God, from its beauty and usefulness
[Berkeley]
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3941
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How can that which is unthinking be a cause of thought?
[Berkeley]
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3942
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I do not believe in the existence of anything, if I see no reason to believe it
[Berkeley]
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3943
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If existence is perceived directly, by which sense; if indirectly, how is it inferred from direct perception?
[Berkeley]
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3944
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It is possible that we could perceive everything as we do now, but nothing actually existed.
[Berkeley]
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3945
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There is nothing in nature which needs the concept of matter to explain it
[Berkeley]
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3946
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A thing is shown to be impossible if a contradiction is demonstrated within its definition
[Berkeley]
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3947
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Perceptions are ideas, and ideas exist in the mind, so objects only exist in the mind
[Berkeley]
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3948
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Experience tells me that other minds exist independently from my own
[Berkeley]
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3951
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There must be a God, because I and my ideas are not independent
[Berkeley]
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3952
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I know that nothing inconsistent can exist
[Berkeley]
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3953
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Real things and imaginary or dreamed things differ because the latter are much fainter
[Berkeley]
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3954
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Immorality is not in the action, but in the deviation of the will from moral law
[Berkeley]
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3955
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If sin is not just physical, we don't consider God the origin of sin because he causes physical events
[Berkeley]
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3956
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People are responsible because they have limited power, though this ultimately derives from God
[Berkeley]
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3957
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Immediate objects of perception, which some treat as appearances, I treat as the real things themselves
[Berkeley]
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3958
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Since our ideas vary when the real things are said to be unchanged, they cannot be true copies
[Berkeley]
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3959
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There is no other substance, in a strict sense, than spirit
[Berkeley]
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