edoc

The Irish Context of Berkeley's 'Resemblance Thesis'

Fasko, Manuel and West, Peter. (2020) The Irish Context of Berkeley's 'Resemblance Thesis'. Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement, 88. pp. 7-31.

[img] PDF - Published Version
Restricted to Repository staff only until 5 November 2025.

217Kb

Official URL: https://edoc.unibas.ch/79380/

Downloads: Statistics Overview

Abstract

In this paper, we focus on Berkeley's reasons for accepting the 'resemblance thesis' which entails that for one thing to represent another those two things must resemble one another. The resemblance thesis is a crucial premise in Berkeley's argument from the 'likeness principle' in §8 of the Principles . Yet, like the 'likeness principle', the resemblance thesis remains unargued for and is never explicitly defended. This has led several commentators to provide explanations as to why Berkeley accepts the resemblance thesis and why he also takes his opponents to do so too. We provide a contextual answer to this question, focusing on epistemological discussions concerning resemblance and representation in Early Modern Irish Philosophy. We argue that the resemblance thesis is implicit in early responses to William Molyneux's famous example of the 'man born blind made to see' and trace the 'Molyneux man' thought experiment as it is employed by Irish thinkers such as William King and Berkeley himself. Ultimately, we conclude that Berkeley's acceptance of the resemblance thesis can be explained by the Irish intellectual climate in which he was writing.
Faculties and Departments:04 Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences > Departement Künste, Medien, Philosophie > Fachbereich Philosophie > Theoretische Philosophie (Wild)
UniBasel Contributors:Fasko, Manuel
Item Type:Article, refereed
Article Subtype:Research Article
Publisher:Cambridge University Press
ISSN:1358-2461
e-ISSN:1755-3555
Note:Publication type according to Uni Basel Research Database: Journal article
Language:English
Identification Number:
edoc DOI:
Last Modified:08 Jun 2021 08:28
Deposited On:15 Jan 2021 20:45

Repository Staff Only: item control page