BidE 🥶

Question 1

What is thread 1?

Answer 1

Idealism cannot account for hallucinations
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They can be distinguished by what caused them (GOD)

Question 2

What is thread 2?

Answer 2

Berkley’s role of God
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Objects cannot exist within the mind of God
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God is capable of having non-sensory awareness of objects
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This means God and I cannot be aware of the same object

Question 3

What is thread 3?

Answer 3

Idealism leads to solipsism
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Other minds are the best hypothesis
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This is still an inference to an uncheckable conclusion + it doesn’t tell us what these minds are like

Question 4

What is idealism?

Answer 4

• The immediate objects of our perception are ordinary objects that are mind dependant.
• Only minds and their ideas exist
• God exists and is the cause of our ideas and their coherence

Question 5

What is Idealism cannot account for hallucinations

Answer 5

• Berkley says that reality consists of ideas in the mind.
• However, if I were to be hallucinating a flying pig, under normal thinking I would assume it only existed in my mind.
• But Berkley denies any external material reality
• There is no difference between the pig and a real tree, they are both ideas of the mind

Question 6

They can be distinguished by what caused them

Answer 6

• Idealism does make real objects no different from hallucinations.
• But there only needs to be a real difference, we can detect hallucinations
• Veridical perceptions are caused by God who’s ideas are ordered, coherent, and governed by law
• Hallucinations are irregular, private, and not governed by law
• So God controls what is real perception and what isn’t

Question 7

What is Berkley’s idea of the role of God in idealism?

Answer 7

• God causes our sensory ideas, our perceptions aren’t self generated, they require an infinite mind as their cause
• Objects exist within God mind. When no human perceives the classroom God still does, allowing the object to continue to exist
• Continuity is secured, God is eternal and unchanging, so the ideas in God’s mind exist continuously

Question 8

Objects cannot exist within the mind of God

Answer 8

• Berkley says that objects are ideas, that exist in minds, and unperceived objects exist in God’s mind
• He also says that God is perfect and immutable, he cannot suffer, and cannot be affected by sensations.
• However our ideas are sensory ideas, which would include pain, heat, sound, colour etc
• If ideas exist in God’s mind as they do, then he would have sensory experiences, and would experience pain too.