Answer to Bishop Berkeley
The wind blew and blew and blew,
the snow fell and fell and fell.
In their dens and lairs the foxes,
rabbits and other little creatures slept
curled against their mates and kits,
their burrows warmed by breath alone.
The deer bunched against one another
in the shelter of vines and shrubs.
Huddled in the trees, deep into the low
piled brush and old leaves, wild turkeys
and smaller birds, feathers fluffed,
heads tucked under wings, slept, waiting.
The little animals were shaken awake
when the earth shuddered. They snuffled,
and moaned, and moved and groaned;
the birds felt the branches bounce,
clenched their feet and jostled closer,
warmer together. All returned to sleep.
A great tree had fallen, crushing smaller
trees, snapping limbs, spewing snow, balling
a great clot of earth and roots. The giant’s fall
was felt as much as heard by all woodland life.
Creatures large and small did not dream disaster.
They dozed as safe as they knew how to be.
Those who survived awaited the quiet after-storm,
sunshine. They renewed endless search for sustenance.
(Berkeley seems to have been the first to ask the question: If a tree falls in forest and no one is there does it make
a sound? To the philosopher only humans are sensate beings.)
George Berkeley -- William Skelton
George Berkeley served as the Anglican bishop of Cloyne, a town in Muister, Ireland, from 1734 to 1752 but he had already established himself as a philosopher with 2 early books, "A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge," written in 1710 when he was 25, and "Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous" in 1713. His notion, called "immaterialism," denied the existence of material substance except as ideas: "Esse est percipi" (To be means to be perceived). Though they are not made of physical matter, what we consider to be "things" continue to exist even when no human perceives them directly because they are still perceived by God's infinite mind. (Since Limerick is in Munster, it is apropos to quote the following exposition of the principle:
ReplyDeleteThere was a young man who said "God
Must think it exceedingly odd,
If He finds that the tree,
Continues to be
When there's no one about in the quad."
"Dear Sir, your astonishment's odd;
I'm always about in the quad.
And that's why the tree
Continues to be,
Since observed by yours faithfully,
- God."
According to James Boswell, Berkeley's contemporary Samuel Johnson was skeptical of Berkeley's skepticism: "After we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of Bishop Berkeley's ingenious sophistry to prove the nonexistence of matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it is impossible to refute it. I never shall forget the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it -- 'I refute it thus.'"