Paper Example on Descartes's and Berkeley's Epistemologies

Introduction

Berkeley's and Descartes's epistemologies are based on mediation of perception. Descartes was a rationalist in his mediation while Berkeley was an empiricist who believed that his approach was in line with realist perceptions despite its seemingly non-realistic basis. Descartes believed that human senses were untrustworthy since they relied on reasoning steps that had no predetermined factors of truthfulness or falseness. The senses were thus dependent on an individual. Berkeley based his epistemology on a deity. He believed that all knowledge starts as ideas in the human mind which are put there by God. Berkeley believed that physical objects did not create knowledge but rather led one to unraveling ideas that are already ingrained in the human brain. The two philosophers provide sound arguments with many differences in their philosophies of knowledge and only agree on the psychological basis of idea exploration.

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Descartes epistemology is based on the "method of doubt" (Descartes 32). He regarded knowledge as information whose major attribute was indubitability. Information that no human of sound mind would raise doubts about or challenge the person who brought it forward. The "method of doubt" is thus founded on the elimination of doubt in both the minds of the discoverer of knowledge and the audience. He argued that the human brain is laden with doubt once a new idea is introduced. Through reasoning and evaluation of principles, the doubt may increase or reduce. Reduction in doubt leads to a countercurrent increase in knowledge while the increase in doubt leads to a converse decrease in knowledge (Pearce 12). However, Descartes appreciated the concept of personal conviction and noted that an absolutely certain concept might not appeal as so to all people since humans have different levels of comprehension and uptake of knowledge.

According to Berkeley's epistemology, the fundamental source of knowledge is the ideas generated in the human cognition. Ideas may spark imagination, reflection to events and life experiences or they may invoke the human senses leading to an acquaintance of new concepts (Berkeley 16). his major argument was that ideas are meaningless if humans have no mechanism to detect their existence and construe them as sources of knowledge. Therefore, objects that humans come across harbor many ideas which are in most cases under one collection or name. To differentiate the ideas from one another and use hem as principal sources of knowledge, sensations have to be invoked in the spirit and mind.

Descartes epistemology is to some extent guided by psychology. For a person to regard a concept as indubitable, ingrained psychological aspects have to create a feeling of acceptance and pride for advancing one's intellectual capacity (Descartes 40). This means that there are feelings involved in the discovering of knowledge and the satiable feelings are only achieved upon content that indeed a concept is true according to all variables of logic. The feelings also cause illumination into rational thinking causing a person to judge concepts with his or her mind. The mind then decides if the concepts satisfy its minimum requirements to ground certainty. If the result convinces the mind, then the person is obliged to take a firm stance and stand by without contradiction.

Berkeley's epistemology also has a psychological aspect. He says that opinion greatly shapes perception. For knowledge to be gained, an idealistic opinion has to be developed that will take the person from mere observation of objects to understanding the ideas that the objects harbor (Berkeley 17). For instance, one may perceive a stone as a mere aggregate of soil particles but fail to opinionate it as more than that. A philosopher, on the other hand, will perceive the stone as an idea and seek to construct an existence theory deeper than the mere observation. Therefore, one must have an idealistic opinion to gain knowledge from objects and experiences in life. Opinion manifests contradiction and determines the level of knowledge gained from natural or artificial material objects.

Descartes epistemology bases knowledge on truth. However, truth is a perception judged by its attribute of unshakeability or by virtue of the number of people that agree to it (Descartes 41). The more people that agree to a concept, the truer it is and thus causes advancement of knowledge. However, the epistemology is similar to the Platonian philosophy which sought to justify the truthfulness of a belief or suggested concept. The development of knowledge is as a result of advancing truth of new concepts and theories. The epistemology thus regards knowledge as a construct of a person's internalization of a concept. Internalization leads to conviction once doubts are eliminated, and truthfulness proved. Therefore, Descartes philosophy held that certainty provides everything a skeptic may want (Pearce 11). Truth is thus not a precondition for discovering knowledge because it is its consequence.

Berkeley's advancement of knowledge is founded on the examination of ideas and their relationship to other ideas. Unlike the Descartes approach, ideas cannot be compared to other concepts that are generally regarded as knowledge because they are unique to the mind that perceives them (Berkeley 53). Minds are different from one person to another, and so is the reflection phase achieved upon the perception of an idea (Pearce 19). A person may thus perceive an idea and interpret it different from another person's interpretation. Active minds thus define which ideas lead to knowledge advancement and which ones have nothing more tied to them. Mediately perceived ideas do not necessarily represent the attributes of their objects since the likeness is not accounted for. Berkeley's epistemology involves a contradiction of corporeal substances as their primary qualities differ from one mind to another.

Descartes epistemology bases knowledge on absolute certainty since an absolute truth cannot be attained. The absolute certainty leads one to form a substratum of the idea that accounts for all the factors of the actual object (Pearce 7). Conversely, Berkeley believed that a substratum could not be logically formed since ideas are only compared to one another creating an obscure representation of an object. Descartes regards truth as a coherence factor requisite to advancing knowledge. Once an idea is beyond a reasonable doubt, the certainty is upheld so long as the concept corresponds with reality unequivocally. Introspection is the key to the conception of knowledge in Descartes rational internalization philosophy. Berkeley concludes that ideas of sense led to predictable objects thus advanced knowledge. Ideas of imagination failed to obey the laws of nature and are less lively and coherent (Berkeley 56). Their divine establishment is less steady and causes less excitement. Objects are thus collections of sensible ideas.

Berkeley and Descartes show no agreement on the concept of material substance. Descartes shared the same views with Locke, and their perceptual illusion theories distinguished ideas from materials using human perception (Pearce 13). How humans perceive materials and ideas created the difference. According to Berkeley, materials are a subject of skepticism and do not lead to the advancement of knowledge. He believed that philosophy accounted for only two things that are the perceiver and the concept to be perceived. His unmaterialistic epistemology was based on eliminating the absurd qualities as the third concept in the advancement of knowledge (Berkeley 132). Descartes believed materials lead to the generation of ideas while Berkeley believed that God instilled ideas into peoples' minds. The difference in their approaches was majorly due to their way of lives. Berkeley was a protestant and staunch follower of Christian values while Descartes was a skeptic philosopher whose philosophy is based on atheism.

Conclusion

Descartes and Berkeley present two interesting epistemologies. The two are largely different from one another and only similar in their address of the role of the human mind. Descartes believed that materials created ideas that the mind internalized, eliminated doubt and passed as certain bits of knowledge. Berkeley believed the mighty God puts ideas in people through his power and leads their internalization through the human senses, reflection, and imagination. Senses provide the most logical ideas which when compared to other ideas lead to conviction and development of knowledge. Descartes "method of doubt" treated ideas as knowledge once doubt was eliminated and absolute certainty was achieved. Descartes thus treated truth as a consequence rather than a factor of defining knowledge. His account was in line with Locke's essay from which much was borrowed. Berkeley's religion status greatly influenced his philosophy and gave it a religious nature.

Works Cited

Berkeley, George. Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous. Seven Masterpieces of Philosophy. Routledge, 2016. 117-190.

Descartes, Rene. The principles of philosophy. BookRix, 2018.

Pearce, Kenneth L. What Descartes Doubted, Berkeley Denied, and Kant Endorsed. Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review/Revue canadienne de philosophy (2017): 1-33.