Monday, October 18, 2010
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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Berkeley's argument is that because some perceive the mite's foot as large(for example, a microorganism)and some perceive the mite's foot as large (for example, a person) then the mite's foot is both small and large. However, the mite's foot cannot be both small and large. Therefore, the quality of size must be in the perceiver's mind and not in the mite's foot itself.
ReplyDeleteHe argues that this idea can be extended to all qualities of all things. For example, a person who is on fire would perceive a glass of water to be cold while a person whose hand is numb from snow would pereive it as warm. He argues that all qualities can be shown not to exist within objects through this method.
His argument fails miserably. There is one distinction he fails to make - the distinction between black and white qualities, and those that can have a scale of values. Something can be both hot and cold, or both large and small, because these are not terms saying what an object is - they are terms used to compare multiple objects. Since heat is the transfer of thermal energy, an object can be more cold than another object while more warm than a third object. Since size (as it is used here) is just a measure of how much of a viewer's viewing capacity is used to look at something, that is to say what percentage of their field of view is taken up by an object, size is relative as well. Either size is used in that way, or it is simply a comparative term, in which case the same argument applies.
There are qualities that have only two values as well, and the mite's foot argument does not even apply to these. For example, the quality of being alive. No living thing can be any more alive than any other living thing, and no unliving thing can be any more dead than any other unliving thing. If something is unliving, then (with enough investigation) all perceivers regardless of being living or unliving should be able to tell what it is. Because of this, the mite's foot argument cannot apply to the quality of being alive and life is a primary quality that is inherent within objects.
As for showing that relative qualities are primary, it's all about finding a scale of measurement. Humans have invented the metric system, where any object can be measured for size, mass, volume, color, etcetera. There are meters, grams, liters, and meters again (the wavelength of light) to measure each of these. One objection to this that was raised in class was that if there were no such thing as a meter, this would become invalid. However, even if a meter had not been invented, it could still exist. And even if it didn't exist, we could still say that object A is twice as large as object B rather than just saying "from the perspective of object A, object B is small." This latter way of phrasing things completely ignores the fact that large and small are relative terms.
The mite's foot argument does not apply to relative qualities - and even if it did, absolute qualities would still be exceptions to the rule.
Berkeley’s argument follows: a mite’s foot may seem tiny to some creatures (a human, for example), but massive to other creatures (volvox, for example). He then argues that nothing can have 2 different dimensions at the same time (i.e. the size of the mite’s foot cannot be both big and small). Therefore, size is not inherent in the object, but instead a perception of the mind.
ReplyDeleteThis basic argument also applies to all the primary qualities. Take solidity for example. An object may seem very squishy or very hard, depending on the person. Say a king and a homeless man are asked to sleep on a regular mattress one night. The king, who is used to his Tempur-Pedic, thinks the mattress is extremely hard and uncomfortable and the homeless man, who is used to his cardboard box, thinks the mattress is the softest and squishiest thing he has ever slept one. The mattress cannot be both soft and hard, proving that hardness and solidity are also perceptions of the mind.
The argument is not successful in my opinion. The mite’s foot may look small to the human and large to the microorganism, but as Josh says, these are just comparisons of different perspectives. I agree with the fact that how one may describes the mite’s foot is relative, but I don’t agree that size is not inherent in the object. The mite’s foot is still the same size, and it will always be the same size, say one centimeter long. Berkeley needs to base his argument of size off of measurement and not perspective. The measurement, or the size, or the object is innate and will stay the same. What Berkeley uses to illustrate size are merely descriptions, which are not sufficient.
The same goes for my example with the mattress. The different opinions between the two men are simply descriptions on their perceptions of comfort. If there were a way to measure solidity, density perhaps, then that should be Berkeley’s approach.
The way to resist thinking that these primary qualities, “extension, figure, solidity, gravity, motion,” to name a few, is through measurement (23). Size, as mentioned previously, should be determined by the metric system of measurement, not adjectives like big, small, and tall. Any type of scale for people to measure by erases the problem of thinking about all primary qualities in the mind.
Berkeley's argument is essentially that two different organisms (a microorganism and a human) will think that the same object is a different size. While the microorganism thinks that the foot is large, I think the foot is small. Since an object cannot be both big and small, size must be a quality that is in the mind and not in the object. This can be applied to all qualities, thus all qualities are in the mind, and the object only exists because we can perceive it.
ReplyDeleteI do not think this argument is successful. My biggest objection is that Berkeley assumes both the perception of the microorganism and the human are correct perceptions. Berkeley offers no proof that either organism sees the correct version of reality. Berkeley would argue that we have no reason to think that one organism is more correct than the other, yet he provides such a reason later in the book. Berkeley claims that in situations where we seem to perceive something that isn't real, we can use reason to determine what is actually real. For instance, when an oar is partially underwater, it appears to be bent. However, we can use reason to determine that the oar is not bent and will appear straight once on dry land. Under this logic, since a human is more intelligent than a microorganism, we should accept a human's perceptions over a microorganism.
Also, Berkeley lists motion as a quality, yet we cannot perceive both the location and motion of an electron at the same time. This means that an electron must have qualities that are solely in the object. Even if that wasn't true, the fact that we cannot properly perceive an electron means that electrons would not exist, yet we know that other objects react to the existence of electrons. This disproves Berkeley's argument.
Berkeley's argument is basically a way of saying how size may be relative from one individual to another. This is through his comparisons of the person with a mite and even more miniscule creature. The argument begins with his saying that when the mite looks at the person's foot, it will believe that it is huge, while the human will think the mite tiny. The even smaller organism will believe the foot of the mite to be giant, like how the mite saw the human foot. It is at this point in the argument that the question comes about, how can an object be both large and small. From here, Berkely says that an object cannot possess clashing qualities, such as big and small at the same time. So the conclusion is than made, if an object cannot be big and small, than the perception of size is relative to the perceiver and therefore size is in the mind. While I do agree about how size relativity is more of a mental quality than physical, in a scientific sense it is not. More specifically when one talks about measurements of length, the quantity for the measurement stays the same despite the differing sizes of people or other creatures. When one thinks about the absolutism of measurements this becomes obvious because, say a person and a mite are standing at the same spot side by side and accross from them are another person and mite side by side facing them. Now, even thought the mites are much smaller than the people, the length is still the same. For these more scientific reasons, Berkely's attributing size as a mental quality is not completely true.
ReplyDeleteBerkeley argues that to a mite, his foot is large. To a human, however, the foot is very small. If size were a primary quality in the foot, the foot would have to be both big and small at the same time. Since this is impossible, large and small, and therefore size, must not be primary qualities. Rather than being in the object, then, size must be in the mind. This same argument can be applied to all supposedly primary qualities, proving that all qualities are in an object and that all qualities are in the mind.
ReplyDeleteThe argument is not successful. It completely ignores the fact that large and small are dependent completely to the observer and is completely relative. An object does not have to be two sizes just because one person calls an object small and another calls it large. If the mite’s foot were to be measured at a length of one millimeter, both the mite and the person would agree that the length of the foot is one millimeter, despite the fact that to the mite a millimeter is quite long and to the person it is negligible. Furthermore, Berkeley says that because large and small are not in the object, size must not be in the object without proving it. I would agree that large and small specifically are not in the object but in the perception, because large and small are always taken relative to something else, but size is an absolute scale that is cannot be compromised – an object cannot be both one meter and two meters long at the same time, for example.
The “sucking” of the primary qualities into the mind can be avoided by observing that in some cases, even though two observers perceive different things relative to themselves, relative to an absolute scale, they are the same. The same applies to Berkeley’s example of hot and cold. Even though the two hands feeling the water perceive different sensations, if they put a thermometer into the water, they would agree that the water they were feeling is a certain number of degrees Celsius or Fahrenheit. Therefore, while hot and cold, and fast and slow, may not be in the object, temperature and speed may be.
Berkeley begins his argument with the image of a mite's foot. To something bigger than the mite it's foot looks small and to something smaller than the mite it's foot looks larger. With that being said one comes to the conclusion that the mite's foot must be small and large but Berkeley goes on to argue that nothing can be small and large at the same time. If something cannot be small and large at the same time then size must be in the mind of the perciever.
ReplyDeleteHis argument without a doubt fails. In order to make his argument successful Berkeley would have needed to give a clear defintion as to what big and small were. Size is classified by more than just big and small. Size includes measurements and weights and demension and things like that. Berkeley just uses big and small which as I said before is the main reason for his argument failing. With that being said Berkeley failed to realize that everyone has different opinions on the size of something. If I see something and think that its big and someone else sees that same thing and thinks that its small then that thing is in fact big and small because we see the same thing but think of its size differently.
All anyone would have to do in order to avoid the sucking of the primary qualities into the mind is to see that we all observe the world in different ways. Sometimes people don't view things in terms of size, they may view them in terms of color or shape or something of that matter. To some one things might be pretty and to another that same thing may be ugly but that doesn't mean that you can classify that thing in the category of pretty or ugly because two people are going to precieve them in two different ways. Once differences in perceptions are realized then arguments like this will probably make a lot more sense.
Berkley's argument is that size is not in the object, it is in the mind of the perceiver. In the argument he uses a human, a mite, and some organism that is smaller than the mite. Berkley argues that to a human being, the mite s small and tothe mite, the hman is quite large. He also says that to the mite, the smaller organism is tiny but to that smaller organism the mite is very large. It is at this point in the argument where we ponder, can one thing be large and small at the same time? Berkley comes up with the conclusion that it is impossible for one object to heve two differnet sizes therefor he says that size can not be in the object but in the mind of the perceiver. I agree with Berkley's argument because the size of an object will never change, so if you have two objects, one small and one big, they will always be the same size relative to each other. I will always be bigger than a mite, and the mite will always be bigger than the smaller organism and our size will not change. I believe that the argument that Berkley presents about size being in the mind of the perceiver rather than in the object is true
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