Main Tenet
•The primacy of
ideas
•Dichotomy of
“Mind” and
“Matter”
The primacy of ideas
• IDEAS are the only true reality
• The real is the nature of thoughts
• The object of external perceptions consists of ideas
• Ideas or thoughts make up fundamental reality
• The only thing that is knowable is consciousness
• The only real things are mental entities, not physical things.
The aggregate notion that we can derived
from these is that REALITY IS
ASSOCIATED WITH IDEAS, which the
idealist believe to be constant compared to
matter (material world), which is marked by
change , instability, uncertainty.
Dichotomy of “Mind” and “Matter”
• Idealism is dualistic because of its tendency to
dichotomize or separate “mind” from “matter
• The world as existing dependent of the mind
• Thought is real and matter is just an
appearance.
• IDEAS are perceived as superior, affirming the
understanding that REALITY is associated with
the mind and idea from which matter proceeds
only as an effect or consequence (Zulueta 2010,
167)
• The outside world or the objective reality can
only be known through thought and
consciousness, which determines its
organization and form as well as the human
knowledge
IDEALIST
PHILOSOPHERS
PLATO • The father of idealism
• Real name is Aristocles
• In his book the REPUBLIC he
expressed his views that are
now collectively and
commonly known as idealism.
• Classic belief of ideas can be
deduced from the dualism of
Plato who believed in the
existence of two realms:
PLATO
THE REALM OF
SPIRITUAL/MENTAL
• Views the world as real, eternal,
permanent, orderly, regular, universal,
free from pretense and affection, and
the source of genuine knowledge
THE REALM OF APPEARANCE
/ MATTER
Matter always changing, imperfect, a
source of chaos, confusion, imperfection,
evil, and perceived clearly through the
human senses and Faculties
• Plato expressed his brand of
PLATO idealism in his Allegory of the Cave
in which he argued that reason or
universal truth must illumine or
overcome the shadows of the
sensory world.
• The soul is which is formed prior to
birth and is perfect and one with
the Universal Being , is deformed
or imprisoned by the material
process of birth (Frost 1989, 231)
• Plato expressed his brand of
PLATO idealism in his Allegory of the Cave
in which he argued that reason or
universal truth must illumine or
overcome the shadows of the
sensory world.
PLATO
• It is for this reason that human
persons must regain this lost
perfection through rigorous or
assiduous EDUCATION in order to
recollect or bring back the latent
ideas to consciousness
GEORGE BERKELY
• Irish Philosopher 1650-1753
• Educator, Anglican Bishop
• His life’s work was devoted to
reconciling his Christian Faith with
science, proving that although matter
does not exist, the laws of Physics ,
being God’s laws, govern a universe
made up of ideas.
• As an idealist, he believed that the
fundamental element of the world is
not matter but spirit or mind.
GEORGE BERKELY
• For Berkeley, existence is necessarily linked
to and cannot be separated from
perception. This belief is expressed in his
statement “to be, is to be perceived or to
perceive.” (Flage n.d)
• He declared that the physical or material
world is merely apparent and is actually
just a collection of ideas, which owe their
existence to perceiving mind.
• SUBJECTIVE IDEALISM “the mind and ideas
are the only things that can be definitely
known to exist or have any reality, and that
knowledge of anything outside the mind is
unjustified” (Mastin 2008)
IMMANUEL
• 1724-1804
KANT
• He was born Konisberg, Germany, to a
poor but deeply pietistic family. A
proponent of TRANSCENDENTAL IDEALISM.
• Kant believed that our experience of things
is about how they appear to us, not about
how things are in and of themselves.
• This means that objective realities have two
levels, namely, objective realities “as they
appear” to human person (PHENOMENON),
and the objective realities “as they are in
themselves” (NOUMENON)
IMMANUEL KANT
• He affirmed the existence of an objective world
and his belief that knowledge of the objective
world is only apparent. This is because the aspect
of objective realities “as they are” is beyond the
categories of human reason. This also means that
when the subjective mind is conscious of
something, it is not the thing in itself (das ding an
sich) but the mind is simply conscious of the
experience (phenomenon, the aspect of the thing-
in-itself) or the content of experience.
• It is in this sense that this type of idealism is
called TRANSCENDENTAL , pointing out the
limitations of human knowledge by emphasizing
that things “as they are “ would be beyond
human reason.
Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling
• Attended a protestant seminary in
Tubingen
• proponent of OBJECTIVE IDEALISM,
believes that the world “out there” is in
fact the MIND (nuos) communicating with
our human mind.
• Matter in the materialist sense does not
exist but there is a spirit , which is the
essence of reality. This spirit is in fact the
MIND that communicates with human
minds and it is also the source of all
existence; in fact everything that exist is
one with the MIND.
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL
• Began his studies at a Theological Seminary in
Tubingen
• Know for espousing ABSOLUTE IDEALISM
• His starting point is similar to Kant , who
argued that the mind is incapable of knowing
“things-in-themselves” and assert that what is
real is the mind, also known as the geist.
• Branch of idealism believes that the human
mind or individual consciousness (consciously
or unconsciously) participates in the ABSOLUTE
MIND
• He is known for his logic described as
“DIALECTIC.”
Discussion question:
• What are the main feature of Idealism as a
Philosophical Method?
• What are the positive and negative influences of
Idealism on contemporary world view?
• What is your critical evaluation of Idealism vis-à-
vis your personal belief?
