Abstract ideas and the new theory of vision

British Journal for the History of Philosophy

Volumn 10, Issue 1, 2002, Pages 55-69

  Pappas, George S ^a  

^a OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

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Indexed keywords

EID: 60949896980     PISSN: 09608788     EISSN: 14693526     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/09608780110099868     Document Type: Review

References (17)

1. John Locke, Essay Concerning Human Understanding, edited by Peter Nidditch, (Oxford. Clarendon Press, 1975). References made in the body of this paper to the Essay are to this edition.
2. The connection between abstract ideas and other elements of Berkeley's philosophy actually goes much deeper than this, though I cannot discuss all of these connections in this paper. I take up these relationships more fully in 'Abstract Ideas and the esse is percipi thesis,' Hermathena, CXXXIX, (Winter, 1985) pp. 47-62
3. See his 'Berkeley and the Perception of Objects', Journal of the History of Philosophy, Vol. 24, (1986) 99-105.
4. Pitcher's view has been ably criticized by Kenneth Winkler in his Berkeley: An Interpretation, (Oxford, Clarendon Press. 1989) pp. 155-60.
5. For related discussion also critical of Pitcher see my Berkeley's Thought, An Interpretation, op. cit., ch. 6.
6. Pages numbers to Berkeley's texts are made in the paper where possible. The references are to appropriate volumes of The Works of George Berkeley, ed. by A. A. Luce and T. E. Jessop, (Edinburgh, Thomas Nelson, 1948-57).
7. For further discussion of this point, see my 'Abstract Ideas and the esse is percipi thesis', op. cit.
8. This argument has also been discussed in Margaret Atherton, Berkeley's Revolution in Vision. (Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 1991) pp. 177-83
9. See also Genevieve Brykman, Berkeley et le Voile des Mots, (Paris, J. Vrin, 1993) pp. 181-8.
10. Philonous says at one point: 'But it is an universally received maxim, that every thing which exists, is particular'. Three Dialogues, Works II, 192.
11. Here I assume that Berkeley understands the procedure of abstraction to be that of mental separation. The question of whether this is how one of his major opponents. Locke, thinks of abstraction is controversial, though need not be engaged here. For recent discussion of the point, see Michael Ayers, Locke: Epistemology and Ontology, (London. Routledge, 1993) ch. 27
12. and Kenneth Winkler. Berkeley: An Interpretation, op. cit., p. 42.
13. Ayers and Winkler hold that Locke thought of abstraction as selective attention, or partial consideration, rather than mental separation. For the opposite view, see Pappas, Berkeley's Thought, op. cit. . ch. 3
14. and Jonathan Walmsley, 'Locke on Abstraction', British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 7 (March 1999) 123-34.
15. Margaret Atherton suggests such a reading of this passage. She says: 'Berkeley holds the notion that there are common sensibles to be widespread and to be responsible for the prevailing distinction between primary and secondary qualities'. See her Berkeley's Revolution in Vision, op. cit. . pp. 174-5.
16. This reading is suggested by Rolt Sartorius in 'A Neglected Aspect of the Relationship Between Berkeley's Theory of Vision and His Immaterialism'. American Philosophical Quarterly, 6 (1969) 318-23.
17. At one point Berkeley has Philonous say: 'Then as for solidity, either you do not mean any sensible quality by that word, and so it is beside our inquiry: or if you do, it must be either hardness or resistance. ' Works II, p. 191.