* Available (i) for printing, (ii) for viewing on screen, (iii) for printing as a booklet. (For the last to work you must print 2-sided, flipping on the long side.)
Berkeley’s Principles is a relatively short book, and we will be reading a substantial part of it. If you are curious about the parts not on the handout, you can find the full text to it (and also to a couple of other related works by Berkeley) on the course Moodle site.
Berkeley’s main focus in the body of the Principles is the idea of matter. This is what Locke would call an “abstract idea” (it corresponds roughly to Locke’s “idea of a substance in general,” his “something I know not what”). In the introduction to his work Berkeley addresses the question of abstract ideas generally. He launches into this discussion in §6 of the introduction, so the first five sections are the real introduction to the work.
Locke is mentioned often in the introduction, so you might want to have your copy of Locke available as you read it (though Berkeley will actually quote several passages). It isn’t clear whether Berkeley has Locke’s views on abstract ideas right. But, part of the reason for that is that Berkeley raises issues on which Locke did not make his view clear.
There is both a critical and a constructive side to Berkeley’s discussion of abstraction, and you should watch for both.
• On the one hand, he denies the existence of abstract ideas, given what he understands such ideas would have to be like. Consider his arguments and ask yourself whether there is any way to construe what an abstract idea is that would avoid these problems.
• On the other hand, he provides his own account of the meaning of the general terms that Locke took to be labels for abstract ideas. Ask yourself, also, whether you think his view of this is correct.