We have already looked at Idealism briefly in association with empiricism. As we saw then, the Irish Philosopher, George Berkeley, has most famously advocated the theory. The interesting thing about Berkeley's theory is that it was initially intended as a counter-argument to sceptical arguments about the existence of the soul.

The thing to remember here is that Berkeley himself was not a sceptic, the main purpose of his arguments being to show how easily sceptical arguments could be applied to the existence of physical matter. In this way, Berkeley's scepticism is very similar to Hume's (although Hume's target was the type of certainty that Rationalism claimed for itself). Unfortunately, this point is usually forgotten when discussing the theory.

If we refer back to the three-part theory of perception as proposed by such philosophers as Locke, we can see what Berkeley has done.

Exercise

As we saw in our earlier discussion of Berkeley, he takes the three-part model proposed by Locke and points out that we can never actually experience the object itself. Is this true? Look at the following arguments for the existence of physical matter and identify the counter-arguments - if any - that Berkeley might use to disprove them.

1. We can touch things
2. We can witness other people interacting with things
3. Things behave according to certain laws
4. We can agree with other people about the nature of things