Berkeley argued tables exist only when perceived, and a university took his name
An Irish bishop claimed that chairs, tables and the whole physical world are collections of ideas that exist only while someone perceives them. Few accepted it, yet George Berkeley became one of the most cited philosophers of 18th-century Europe, and a California city and university still bear his name.
Berkeley was born on 12 March 1685 at Dysart Castle near Thomastown in County Kilkenny, eldest of six brothers in a branch of an old noble family from Gloucestershire. Educated at Kilkenny College and Trinity College Dublin, he became a scholar in 1702, took his degrees and stayed on as librarian, Greek lecturer and preacher. His ordination in 1710 went ahead without the Archbishop of Dublin being consulted, which led to a court case.
His first widely noticed work, An Essay Towards a New Theory of Vision of 1709, examined distance, size and the relation between sight and touch, arguing that what we really see is light and colour rather than material objects. It caused controversy then, but its conclusions are now standard optics. It prepared the ground for his Principles of Human Knowledge in 1710, which set out immaterialism: material substance does not exist, and objects are ideas that depend on being perceived. When that book was poorly received, he recast it in 1713 as Three Dialogues Between Hylas and Philonous, pitting Philonous, the lover of mind, against Hylas, matter, who stands for opponents such as John Locke.
He ranged widely beyond that thesis. In De Motu of 1721 he attacked Newton's absolute space, time and motion, anticipating arguments by Ernst Mach and Albert Einstein. The Analyst of 1734 criticised the foundations of calculus and influenced mathematics, and Alciphron defended Christianity against free-thinkers. His critique of abstraction underpinned his immaterialism.
Schopenhauer called him the father of idealism, and he influenced both Kant and Hume. Interest rose sharply after the Second World War, since he had tackled perception, primary and secondary qualities and language, questions central to 20th-century philosophy. American enthusiasm in the early 19th century gave his name to the University of California, Berkeley, and Berkeley College at Yale. Bishop of Cloyne in the Church of Ireland, he died in Oxford in 1753.
Source: George Berkeley
