Berkeley George - Berkeleys metaphysics: structural, interpretive, and critical essays

Berkeley's Metaphysics

Structural, Interpretive, and Critical Essays

Edited by

Robert G. Muehlmann

The Pennsylvania State University Press

University Park, Pennsylvania

Preface

This volume is the outgrowth of a conference on Berkeley's Metaphysics held at the University of Western Ontario in London, Canada, on March 13-14,1992. Aside from the success of the conference in bringing together and facilitating critical dialogue between so many important Berkeley scholars, and aside from the general excellence of the papers read at the conference, there are two additional reasons for assembling yet another collection of essays on Berkeley's philosophy. The first is to bring together contributions by every recipient to date of the Colin and Ailsa Turbayne International Berkeley Essay Prize Competition; before publication of this collection only one of the prize-winning essays, in its original form, had appeared in print. This volume provides a convenient vehicle for publishing togetherfor the first timemost of these essays. The second reason for assembling this collection is the same as that for organizing the original conference: to shed new light on Berkeley's metaphysics, particularly on his idealism but also on his theories of causation and perception. The focus of previous anthologies on Berkeley has been more diffuse than this.

Of the fourteen essays assembled here, eleven were delivered at the conference, including one (Essay 3) of the prize winners. The contents of this volume, however, cannot properly be considered "conference proceedings," even if one ignores the three other recipients of the prize (Essays 5, 6, and 11). Although four of the essays delivered at the conference, as well as the critical commentaries, are reproduced here essentially unaltered, in two instances (Essays 7 and 12) the commentators declined to work up their comments for publication, and in one (Essay 8) the critical commentary has been incorporated into a revised version.

One essay, in its present form (Essay 6), has been published previously, and three (Essays 5, 8, and 12) were extracted from larger works that have seen publication since the time of the conference. I am grateful to the Journal of the History of Philosophy, to Hackett Publishing Company, and to Basil Blackwell, Ltd., for permission to reprint these materials.

Special thanks are due to my colleague Thomas Michael Lennon. A distinguished historian of philosophy and notable commentator on Berkeley, Lennon gave spiritual support to the ideas of both conference and anthology. But it was in his capacity then as Dean of Arts at the University of Western Ontario that he provided the material support that made the conference, and thus this volume, a reality.

Bibliographical Note

Cross-references to this anthology are by parenthesized page numbers: (#) or (#-#). Except for those to Berkeley's writings, all other (external) page references are preceded by p. or pp.

For Berkeley's writings, we have used A. A. Luce and T. E. Jessop, editors, The Works of George Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne, 9 volumes (London: Nelson, 1948-57); hereafter referred to as Works. More specifically, references to Berkeley's writings in this volume include the following abbreviations:

Contributors

Edwin B. Allaire. Ph.D. University of Iowa, 1960. Professor, University of Texas-Austin. Has also taught at Iowa, Michigan, and Swarthmore. Publications: Articles on ontological topics and figures in the modern period.

Margaret Atherton. Ph.D. Brandeis University, 1970. Professor, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Publications: Berkeley's Revolution in Vision (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990); Women Philosophers of the Early Modem Period (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Co., 1994); numerous articles on the history of philosophy, particularly on Locke and Berkeley.

Phillip D. Cummins. Ph.D. University of Iowa, 1962. Professor, University of Iowa. Has published widely in the history of philosophy, particularly on Berkeley, Hume, and Reid.

Lisa Downing. Ph.D. Princeton University, 1992. Assistant Professor, University of Pennsylvania. Publications: papers on Berkeley's philosophy of science and Locke's corpuscularianism. She is currently pursuing research on philosophical debates surrounding early modern dynamics.

Alan Hausman. Ph.D. University of Iowa, 1964. Professor, Southern Methodist University. Has also taught for many years at Ohio State University. Publications: numerous articles on metaphysics, history of philosophy, and contemporary philosophy, particularly on Descartes, Berkeley, Hume, and Goodman.

David Hausman. Ph.D. University of Iowa, 1971. Professor, Southern Methodist University. Publications: with Alan Hausman, Turing Early Modern Philosophy: Machines, Meaning, and the Theory of Ideas (University of Toronto Press, forthcoming); with Alan Hausman, "Descartes' Secular Semantics," Canadian Journal of Philosophy (18:2) (November 1992). Author of articles on history of philosophy, metaphysics, and the philosophy of science.

Robert Imlay. Ph.D. University of Glasgow, 1967. Professor, University of Toronto. Publications: "Descartes, Montaigne, Beyssade et le Critre de Vrit," Studia Leibnitiana 18 (1986); "Frankfurt, van Inwagen, and the Principle of Alternate Possibilities," The Modern Schoolman 66 (1989); "Ckeptizismus und die Ewigen Wahrheiten bei Descartes," Studia Leib nitiana 23 (1991); "Berkeley and Scepticism: a Fatal Dalliance," Hume Studies 18 (1992); and other articles, principally on Descartes and Hume.