Tuesday, October 25, 2016
Much Ado About a Mite
Berkeley argues for his idealism from the relativity of perception. He compares the size of a mite's foot as seen by the mite itself, by a human and by some smaller microorganism. What, exactly, is the argument? Is the argument successful? If not, how do we resist the sucking of all so-called primary qualities into the mind?
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Using the mite scenario as his evidence, Berkeley argues that primary qualities such as size and shape are purely subjective. Therefore, since primary qualities are subjective, and since existence refers to something that “has objective reality or being” (According to the Merriam Webster Dictionary), Berkeley successfully proves that these qualities cannot exist outside the mind of the perceiver. First of all, in order to clearly understand how he gets to this conclusion, we need to describe the argument in more detail. Specifically, Berkeley begins the argument with the examination of a mite and his relation to objects around him: “A mite must be supposed to see his own foot, and things equal or even less than it, as bodies of some considerable dimension” (Berkeley 24). From here he goes on to explain that to a mite, a creature such as a human is enormous, and a creature smaller than a mite, the mite is perceived as an enormous figure: “To creatures less than the mite they will seem yet larger” (Berkeley 24). Next, Berkeley states that while humans will perceive a mite as small, an even smaller creature will perceive a mite as enormous: “…Insomuch that what you can hardly discern, will to another extremely minute animal appear as some huge mountain” (Berkeley 24). Finally, he concludes his argument by noting that “one and the same thing cannot be at the same time in itself of different dimensions“ (Berkeley 24-25). This final premise is crucial to understand as he is demonstrating two conflicting perceptions/dimensions (which would be impossible to comprehend), validating idealism.
ReplyDeleteBerkeley is arguing for idealism, or the idea that all qualities of an object are secondary, meaning they are dependent on the perception of a mind. In order to prove this, he uses different perceptions of the size of a mite’s foot. To a human, a mite’s foot seems miniscule. However, to an amoeba or some other extremely small organism, a mite’s foot appears to be ginormous. An object cannot be both miniscule and ginormous at the same time and thus size can’t be inherent in an object. Berkeley extends this principle to all qualities of an object, including color, shape, and so on. A coin could appear as a circle or a straight line depending on the angle you view it from, and people who are color blind might see red where non color blind people see green. Once again, these situations create contradictions; an object can’t have both a circular and straight shape at the same time nor can it be red and green at the same time. Therefore color and shape are not objectively real qualities, and must exist only in the mind of the perceiver. This argument does not succeed in showing that all qualities of an object are primary, however. Take, for example, sound and color. Sound certainly exists only in the mind of the perceiver, but what causes us to perceive sound? Sound waves are responsible for this, and must be inherent qualities of an object that exist outside of our perception. Similarly, people can have different perceptions of color, proving it to be secondary, but the light waves that cause us to perceive color are also inherent qualities of an object. In addition, I don’t think the argument properly addresses standards of measurement. Just because we perceive height or length differently, that doesn’t mean those standard reference points (feet, yards, etc.) don’t exist in the physical world. In other words, a table that’s three feet high might seem somewhat tall to a young child and small to an adult, but both can agree on the fact the table is three feet high. As a final, minor objection, it is hard to conceive that the amount of space an object occupies is only existent in a mind, not in the physical realm.
ReplyDeleteBerkeley, through his argument for idealism, comes to the conclusion that size is an internal quality individuals hold. In simpler terms, the scale of measurement is dependent on the person who is perceiving the object. Take for example the mite and the size of his foot compared to that of another being. The official question asked by these ponderings is, “Can one and the same thing be at the same time in itself of different dimensions” (Berkeley 24)? Can an object hold qualities that different minds can similarly interpret, or are things such as determining scale individualistic endeavors? Berkeley says that objects can only have secondary qualities, such as idealistic views, which start in the mind. He uses the mite to support his conclusion by saying that to a mite, a human’s foot might seem enormous, yet to an elephant (another being) it would be just the opposite. Or the example we used in class, how you could believe that water has two different temperatures, but it is really just that one hand is cold and the other hot. There are very contrasting observations which leads to the conclusion that a being cannot look at an object without its own perception (determining how it registers in comparison to the self). They cannot look at it for what it truly is. Therefore, “No figure or mode of extension, which we can either perceive or imagine, or have any idea of, can be really inherit in matter” (Berkeley 26).
ReplyDeleteBerkeley’s mite example does however raise an issue. If size is a product of the mind, how can you even prove how a mite perceives a foot if you cannot read its mind? You are only taking your own perception to come to a conclusion of a different being. What if there was a possibility that materials do hold primary qualities? Take for example a waterfall. To a dog, the sound means a place to quench its thirst, but to a cat it would create fear causing it to flee. This goes off of Adam’s point about sound and how sound waves can cause more than one being to react. The dog and cat both interpreted the sound that was created from the object. The way they interpreted it and how they chose to react proves that an object can have qualities. A being takes into account these qualities and how it effects themselves personally which is how you get so many different viewpoints and perspectives. Each individual’s mind is the only thing that knows what is best for the individual self. This is why they establish routines that revolve around the action. Take for example snow. To a bear this means hibernation but to a squirrel it has a different significance. Although they react differently, the fact that they both react at the same time to snowfall, during the specific time of the year, proves that there is some quality they are equally perceiving. As a result, Berkeley is correct that there are things that beings individually interpret from objects. At the same time there are also things that cause different creatures to react at the same time due to an object’s presence, signifying that there are inherit qualities objects hold.
Throughout his three dialogues between Hylas and Philonous, Berkeley attempts to strip everything in the natural world of their inherent properties, arguing that everything one perceives is just in the mind. One of the strongest arguments he makes in favour of this is the Mite’s Foot Argument, in which he tries to disprove size as an inherent property of an object. He argues that since different perspectives lead to different observations as to how large or small an object is, no object has an inherent size, as there are too many contradicting perceptions. For example, while I see a tennis ball as a relatively small object, a mite would view it as relatively large. If I am looking at the mite’s foot, I would regard it as incredibly miniscule (or, in technical terms, teeny-tiny), while the mite would regard it as somewhat small. Therefore, the size of both of these objects, as Berkeley argues, is not an inherent quality. But what Berkeley fails to account for is the idea of a universal measurement system, in which definite sizes are given to objects. No matter who is looking at the tennis ball, it has a radius of 5 centimeters, an obviously inherent quality. But still, one might object and say that while 5 cm to a human is still ‘small,’ to a mite it is ‘large.’ We can solve this problem if we can convince the mite to look at things from our point of view, thereby returning to the ball its quality of size. While the mite may call the ball ‘humongous’ at first, if we show to the mite an elephant, it may feel less convinced, and believe the ball to just be ‘big.’ If we then show the mite it a skyscraper, it will be overwhelmed, and will then hopefully be convinced that, relatively, the ball is actually pretty ‘small.’ Thus, by comparing objects relatively by size, from all perspectives any one object can be viewed as having an intrinsic size by lining it up with other larger and smaller objects, disproving Berkeley’s claim that size is all in the mind.
ReplyDeleteIdealism, from what I understand, is that any thought or knowledge is dependent upon perceptions of the individual. Berkeley believes deeply in this theory, and he uses the idea of the mite to help prove his argument. The idea is that a mite can look at a human's foot and think of it as gigantic while a human would view his foot as a small part of his body. Then something smaller than a mite would view a mite as gigantic while a human would view it as tiny. Through this argument, Berkeley wanted to prove that size is relative in the person's mind and is not inherent to an object. I can see why people would believe this theory because at first you would think that this does seem to make some sense. After some thought though, there are many ways to disprove Berkeley's theory that size is not inherent. If we look at objects through measurement or perspective it would show that size is indeed inherent to an object. For example, I am 6 feet 4 inches but it wouldn't change if an adult looked at me or if a child did. Though the perspective is different, my height or size doesn't transform in the eye of the beholder but is just the perspective or relativity of the subject's view. I think possibly through photography, we can also prove size is inherent. if we take a picture next to an object and switch out the object, between each picture, next to it with a person, a dog, and a baby we would see that size does not change but instead the comparison of size changes. This would show that size is not in the eye of the beholder but inherent to the object. This is why I believe that even though Berkeley's argument is an interesting one that gives a different perspective it is not true.
ReplyDeleteBerkeley's argument is one of perception. He uses the mite's foot scenario to demonstrate how perceived qualities are subjective. All objects exist only as we perceive them. To a mite, a mites foot is relatively large. But to a human, a mite's foot is tiny. So, is a mites foot large, or small? Berkeley argues that because of this difference in perception, the object is neither large or small. Berkeley believes that the object has no inherent qualities. He believes the object has only secondary qualities. He claims that no objects have primary qualities.
ReplyDeleteHowever, Berkeley's reasoning is flawed. Small and large aren't primary qualities, they are secondary. These adjectives are not definitive measurements. They are statements of comparison, and exist only subjectively. Small and large are completely subjective terms that do not exist without other objects to compare them to. The metric system exists because small and large are not pragmatic forms of measurement. Any object has the primary quality of mass, which can be measured with the metric system. The mites foot does have inherent qualities. The foot has a definitive size. It can be measured in millimeters using the metric system. Although perspective can be distorting, humans created math in order to transcend perception bias. This disproves Berkeley's claim that objects lack inherent qualities.
Berkeley uses the example of the size of a mite's foot in order to make the claim that all qualities rely on perception. He starts by saying that to a micro-organism a mites foot is actually extremely large. While to a human, the mite's foot is extremely large. It is impossible for the mite's foot to be both large and small at the same time so Berkeley claims that size isn't something that can be determined overarchingly, but instead relies on the perception of an individual. This is a very interesting argument which is very similar to the previous arguments Berkeley made for secondary qualities such as color, scent, and taste, but size is a primary quality. This is the argument where Berkeley attempts to extend this logic to all things, and this is where I think he falls short. Primary qualities rely on the physical object while secondary qualities rely on your perception of the object. When you perceive something in relation to different things it appears in different ways. Of course, your perception will be different but that object is a physical entity, even when it is not in relation to something else. This could be thought of in terms of proportions in geometry: if you have three triangles one may be 25% larger than the middle triangle that has an area of 25 cm^2 and the other might be 25% smaller, but at the end of the day the middle triangle is still 25 cm^2. Your perceptions of the larger and smaller triangles in relation to the middle triangle does not change the physical size of the middle triangle.
ReplyDeleteBerkeley’s argument uses perception to create impossibilities within reality. He starts by saying that a mite would see its own foot to be a certain size. A human would see the mite’s foot as being extremely small, since a human is so much larger. An amoeba on the other hand would see that the mite’s foot would be incredibly large since an amoeba is much smaller compared to a mite. At this point, we have 3 different perceptions about the size of the mite’s foot, an impossibility since the foot has to be 1 size, not 3. Thus, all of these characteristics are in the mind of the observer and thus idealism exists and is the method which we view the world. The argument makes sense and definitely seems quite reasonable. My first question is about perspective and even scale. It seems that Berkeley does not have a baseline which he bases these measurements. If we were to use a mite as the scale, then measurements would follow to be the same if the other two people were to use it. I would give an example like this. Is 1 kilometer equal to 1,000,000 millimeters? Yes, it is, so if these are the extremes, let us say that 1 kilometer is for the human, and 1,000,000 millimeters is the measurement of the amoeba, then they are the same. The issue is that the amoeba would not call it 1,000,000 millimeters, it would call it 1,000,000 kilometers on its scale. So the issue that Berkeley comes across is that different objects each call the same measurement by something else depending on how they view it in their own world’s scale. This means that objects are not given properties based on the mind, but that they could have their own intrinsic properties, but we don’t give everything a universal scale to use in measuring these properties, thus the discrepancies.
ReplyDeleteAfter Berkeley is able use his arguments for fire to prove that secondary qualities are mind dependent, he must also prove that primary qualities are also mind dependent to show that everything we perceive depends on the mind. His argument shows that size, which is normally thought of as a primary quality that is innate in an object, is in fact relative and cannot be independent of thought. From a person’s perspective, a mite’s foot is incredibly small and barely visible. However, when taken from the reference frame of a mite, a mite’s foot would be equivalent size to one of our hands. In the reference frame of something even smaller than a mite, the foot would be incredibly big. In materialism, mind independent objects are stable things that cannot be more than one concrete thing. Since you can change the reference frame of an object to change its size, objects size as well as all other primary qualities cannot be mind- independent. With this argument as well as the pain argument shows that everything we perceive is mind-dependent. This argument is very successful because the only way that a mind-independent object can still exist from this argument is if we can successfully make an inference to prove an object based on experiences.
ReplyDeleteBerkeley’s analogy of the mite’s foot is a way of explaining part of the idealism argument. The analogy itself is that when we as humans look at a mite’s foot, we perceive it to be “teeny-weeny” (to use the philosophical terminology), but when the mite looks at it, it is the same size as the way we perceive our own foot, and when a microorganism sees the mite’s foot, it sees it as ginormous and huge and scary because the mite could step on it and kill it instantly. Anyone knows however that one object cannot be, in itself, teeny-weeny, normal sized, and ginormous all at the same time. It’s just not possible. Therefore there has to be a way to get around that. Berkeley’s loophole is to say that size is not a primary quality, or an inherent quality, but instead is a secondary, perceived quality, only real in the eyes of the perceiver. This is one of the pieces of the idealist argument, but idealism goes past that. The idealist argues that not only is size in the mind of the perceiver, but all other senses as well. For example, how can you know if color truly exists, if it is possible that when looking at the same blue sweater, the person next to you perceives the sweater to be your version of red, but calls it blue because they have always done so? If that is possible, then sight cannot exist. If you perceive ordure to smell horrible, yet pigs are willing to roll around in it and live all day in it and enjoy it, ordure cannot at the same time be both pleasant and filthy, so smell must be in the mind of the perceiver. This argument is extremely successful, because it is able to give an explanation to one of the things that is almost unexplainable about the world we live in. The argument is able to defeat skepticism because it eliminates any possibility of illusion. Skepticism can only exist if you can be deceived, which means that there must be a distinction between things that you perceive and the reality of those things. In the idealist argument, this distinction is taken away by eliminating all primary inherent qualities of objects so that there is no way for deception to occur and so everything you perceive must be the reality of the thing. This argument takes care of one of the examples we did in class quite nicely. Imagine you have a quarter , and 3 people are looking at it from different angles, such that one of the people sees a face of the coin, one sees the coin at an angle such that it looks oblong, and the other sees the edge of the coin. Which of the 3 is correct about what they see? If idealism is applied, all three if them are correct and there is no need for deception or correction.
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