A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge

A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge (commonly called Treatise when referring to Berkeleys works) is a 1710 work in English by Anglo-Irish Empiricist philosopher George Berkeley. This book largely seeks to refute the claims made by Berkeleys contemporary John Locke about the nature of human perception. Whilst like all the Empiricist philosophers both Locke and Berkeley agreed that we are having experiences regardless of whether material objects exist Berkeley sought to prove that the outside world (the world which causes the ideas one has within ones mind) is also composed solely of ideas. Berkeley did this by suggesting that Ideas can only resemble Ideas - the mental ideas that we possess can only resemble other ideas (not material objects) and thus the external world consists not of physical form but rather of ideas. This world is (or at least was) given logic and regularity by some other force which Berkeley concludes is God.