The Phenomenalism of George Berkeley - Research Paper Example

The search for the truth is basically a part of everyone’s nature. Metaphysics and epistemology are indeed much older than the Greeks. However, despite the fact that all had a thirst for the truth, there were differences in the core beliefs. Some like Plato did not believe that the world that we see is everything there is to see, while others like Aristotle believed that whatever we see is all there is to it. Nevertheless, from the 15th through the 17th century, the delineations between these two types of beliefs became clear – the first one is Rationalism, where truth is based on reason and speculation, and the second one is Empiricism, where truth is based on empirical evidence.

One branch of Empiricism is a most practical branch of epistemology known as Phenomenalism and one of its proponents is the Irish philosopher George Berkeley. Berkeley’s phenomenalism is the philosophy of a man with a great common sense and is, in fact, a testament to the claim that everything there is to know is right in front of us, staring at us in the face. The principles of Berkeley’s phenomenalism are a worthy subject of discussion not only among philosophy circles but among anyone who possesses a common sense.

Although it is said that “phenomenalism was officially pronounced dead in 1950” (Yolton, 1961), the fact remains that, whether dead or not, it is still worthy of discussion.Phenomenalism is the philosophical view is the view that physical objects, properties, events (whatever is physical) are reducible to mental objects, properties, events,” which means that “ultimately, only mental objects, properties [and] events exist (“Phenomenalism,” 2005). Phenomenalism is also known as “‘appearanceism,’ [or] any theory which explains a given subject-matter in terms of appearances, without needing to postulate anything else” (“Phenomenalism,” 2010).