Why does Berkeley consider himself the defender of common sense? Do you agree with this self-assessment?

Because Berkeleys ideas are so unconventional, it is surprising that he claims that his ontology is actually a validation of common sense. The common sense trance that Berkeley believes himself to be defending consists of the following interrelated ontological and epistemological claims: (1) We buns trust our senses. (2) The things we see and feel are palpable. (3) The qualities we perceive as inhabiting really do exist. (4) All skeptical uncertainty about the real existence of things is, therefore, precluded. Berkeley contrasts this common sense determine with the view of philosophers, in particular the views of Descartes and Locke. The philosophical view Berkeley opposes distinguishes between subjective ideas, which exist altogether as the content of our consciousness, and real material things, which exist objectively in the external dry land and do not depend on their being appreciated by any mind in order to exist. On this view it is only the ideas and not the real things, of which the ideas are representations, to which we harbor immediate access (counter to common sense claim two). Therefore, this view raises the worry of how we can know anything about the external sphere (counter to common sense claim four). The philosophical view also draws a distinction between primary qualities (such as size, motion, and shape) and lowly qualities (such as color, sound, taste, and smell).



Primary qualities, it is said by the philosophers, really exist within the objects of perception, but secondary qualities are nothing more than ideas (counter to common sense claims one and three).

According to Berkeleys ontology, there are only two types of things existing in the world: ideas and the spirits which cod them. He identifies sensible objects such as flowers, chairs, and hands, with those ideas we call sensations. In other words, he eliminates the philosophers distinction between...

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