The summary-response essay is an essay of roughly 2 pages in length which you will write in response to the text attached. This essay requires you to capture the main argument(s) of the author(s) in q

Bertrand Russell, The Problems of Philosophy Chapter I Appearance and reality I s there any knowledge in the world which is so certain that no reasonable\ man could doubt it? This question, which at first sight might not seem dif\ ficult, is really one of the most difficult that can be asked. When we have reali\ zed the obstacles in the way of a straightforward and confident answer, we shall be well launched on the study of philosophy—for philosophy is merely the atte\ mpt to answer such ultimate questions, not carelessly and dogmatically, as we d\ o in ordinary life and even in the sciences, but critically, after exploring \ all that makes such questions puzzling, and after realizing all the vagueness and confu\ sion that underlie our ordinary ideas. In daily life, we assume as certain many things which, on a closer scrut\ iny, are found to be so full of apparent contradictions that only a great amount \ of thought enables us to know what it is that we really may believe. In the\ search for certainty, it is natural to begin with our present experiences, and in s\ ome sense, no doubt, knowledge is to be derived from them. But any statement as to \ what it is that our immediate experiences make us know is very likely to be wron\ g. It seems to me that I am now sitting in a chair, at a table of a certain shape, on which I see sheets of paper with writing or print. By turning my head I see ou\ t of the window buildings and clouds and the sun. I believe that the sun is about\ ninety- three million miles from the earth; that it is a hot globe many times bi\ gger than the earth; that, owing to the earth’s rotation, it rises every mornin\ g, and will continue to do so for an indefinite time in the future. I believe that\ , if any other normal person comes into my room, he will see the same chairs and tables\ and books and papers as I see, and that the table which I see is the same as\ the table which I feel pressing against my arm. All this seems to be so evident as\ to be hardly worth stating, except in answer to a man who doubts whether I kno\ w anything. Yet all this may be reasonably doubted, and all of it requires much careful discussion before we can be sure that we have stated it in a for\ m that is wholly true. To make our difficulties plain, let us concentrate attention on the tab\ le. To the eye it is oblong, brown and shiny, to the touch it is smooth and cool an\ d hard; when I tap it, it gives out a wooden sound. Any one else who sees and fe\ els and Bertrand Russell, The Problems of Philosophy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997). 64 hears the table will agree with this description, so that it might seem \ as if no difficulty would arise; but as soon as we try to be more precise our t\ roubles begin.

Although I believe that the table is “really” of the same colour a\ ll over, the parts that reflect the light look much brighter than the other parts, and so\ me parts look white because of reflected light. I know that, if I move, the parts th\ at reflect the light will be different, so that the apparent distribution of colours on\ the table will change. It follows that if several people are looking at the table \ at the same moment, no two of them will see exactly the same distribution of colours\ , because no two can see it from exactly the same point of view, and any change in the point of view makes some change in the way the light is reflected.\ For most practical purposes these differences are unimportant, but to th\ e painter they are all-important: the painter has to unlearn the habit of \ thinking that things seem to have the colour which common sense says they “rea\ lly” have, and to learn the habit of seeing things as they appear. Here we have already the beginning of one of the distinctions that cause most trouble in philosop\ hy—the distinction between “appearance” and “reality”, between what\ things seem to be and what they are. The painter wants to know what things seem to be, the\ practical man and the philosopher want to know what they are; but the ph\ ilo- sopher’s wish to know this is stronger than the practical man’s, a\ nd is more troubled by knowledge as to the difficulties of answering the question\ . To return to the table. It is evident from what we have found, that there\ is no colour which preeminently appears to be the colour of the table, or even of any one particular part of the table—it appears to be of different colour\ s from differ- ent points of view, and there is no reason for regarding some of these as more really its colour than others. And we know that even from a given point \ of view the colour will seem different by artificial light, or to a colour-bli\ nd man, or to a man wearing blue spectacles, while in the dark there will be no colour a\ t all, though to touch and hearing the table will be unchanged. This colour is \ not something which is inherent in the table, but something depending upon t\ he table and the spectator and the way the light falls on the table. When, in ord\ inary life, we speak of the colour of the table, we only mean the sort of colour which it will seem to have to a normal spectator from an ordinary point of view under \ usual conditions of light. But the other colours which appear under other cond\ itions have just as good a right to be considered real; and therefore, to avoid\ favourit- ism, we are compelled to deny that, in itself, the table has any one par\ ticular colour. The same thing applies to the texture. With the naked eye one can see the grain, but otherwise the table looks smooth and even. If we looked at it\ through a microscope, we should see roughnesses and hills and valleys, and all sor\ ts of differences that are imperceptible to the naked eye. Which of these is t\ he “real” table? We are naturally tempted to say that what we see through the microscope is more real, but that in turn would be changed by a still more powerful\ micro- scope. If, then, we cannot trust what we see with the naked eye, why sho\ uld we trust what we see through a microscope? Thus, again, the confidence in\ our senses with which we began deserts us. The shape of the table is no better. We are all in the habit of judging as to the “real” shapes of things, and we do this so unreflectingly that w\ e come to think we actually see the real shapes. But, in fact, as we all have to learn if w\ e try to draw, a THE PROBLEMS OF PHILOSOPHY 65 given thing looks different in shape from every different point of view. If our table is “really” rectangular, it will look, from almost all points of view, as if it had two acute angles and two obtuse angles. If opposite sides are parallel, they\ will look as if they converged to a point away from the spectator; if they are of equ\ al length, they will look as if the nearer side were longer. All these things are not commonly noticed in looking at a table, because experience has taught us to const\ ruct the “real” shape from the apparent shape, and the “real” shape i\ s what interests us as practical men. But the “real” shape is not what we see; it is some\ thing inferred from what we see. And what we see is constantly changing in shape as we \ move about the room; so that here again the senses seem not to give us the tr\ uth about the table itself, but only about the appearance of the table.Similar difficulties arise when we consider the sense of touch. It is \ true that the table always gives us a sensation of hardness, and we feel that it resis\ ts pressure.

But the sensation we obtain depends upon how hard we press the table and\ also upon what part of the body we press with; thus the various sensations du\ e to various pressures or various parts of the body cannot be supposed to rev\ eal directly any definite property of the table, but at most to be signs of some prop- erty which perhaps causes all the sensations, but is not actually apparent in any of them. And the same applies still more obviously to the sounds which can \ be elicited by rapping the table. Thus it becomes evident that the real table, if there is one, is not the\ same as what we immediately experience by sight or touch or hearing. The real ta\ ble, if there is one, is not immediately known to us at all, but must be an inference from what is immediately known. Hence, two very difficult questions at once\ arise; namely, (1) Is there a real table at all? (2) If so, what sort of ob\ ject can it be? It will help us in considering these questions to have a few simple term\ s of which the meaning is definite and clear. Let us give the name of “sense-data” to the things that are immediately known in sensation: such things as colours, \ sounds, smells, hardnesses, roughnesses, and so on. We shall give the name “sensation” to the experience of being immediately aware of these things. Thus, wheneve\ r we see a colour, we have a sensation of the colour, but the colour itself is a sense- datum, not a sensation. The colour is that of which we are immediately aware, and the awareness itself is the sensation. It is plain that if we are to\ know any- thing about the table, it must be by means of the sense-data—brown co\ lour, oblong shape, smoothness, etc.—which we associate with the table; but\ , for the reasons which have been given, we cannot say that the table is the sense-data, or even that the sense-data are directly properties of the table. Thus a pr\ oblem arises as to the relation of the sense-data to the real table, supposing there \ is such a thing. The real table, if it exists, we will call a “physical object”. Th\ us we have to consider the relation of sense-data to physical objects. The collection \ of all physical objects is called “matter”. Thus our two questions may be\ re-stated as follows: (I) Is there any such thing as matter? (2) If so, what i\ s its nature? The philosopher who first brought prominently forward the reasons for regarding the immediate objects of our senses as not existing independen\ tly of us was Bishop Berkeley (1685–1753). His Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous, in Opposition to Sceptics and Atheists , undertake to prove that there is no such thing as matter at all, and that the world consists of nothin\ g but minds BERTRAND RUSSELL 66 and their ideas. Hylas has hitherto believed in matter, but he is no match for Philonous, who mercilessly drives him into contradictions and paradoxes,\ and makes his own denial of matter seem, in the end, as if it were almost co\ mmon sense. The arguments employed are of very different value: some are impo\ rtant and sound, others are confused or quibbling. But Berkeley retains the me\ rit of having shown that the existence of matter is capable of being denied wit\ hout absurdity, and that if there are any things that exist independently of \ us they cannot be the immediate objects of our sensations.There are two different questions involved when we ask whether matter ex\ ists, and it is important to keep them clear. We commonly mean by “matter” something which is opposed to “mind”, something which we think of as occupyi\ ng space and as radically incapable of any sort of thought or consciousness. It is ch\ iefly in this sense that Berkeley denies matter; that is to say, he does not deny that\ the sense- data which we commonly take as signs of the existence of the table are r\ eally signs of the existence of something independent of us, but he does deny that this something is non-mental, that it is neither mind nor ideas entertained b\ y some mind. He admits that there must be something which continues to exist wh\ en we go out of the room or shut our eyes, and that what we call seeing the ta\ ble does really give us reason for believing in something which persists even whe\ n we are not seeing it. But he thinks that this something cannot be radically dif\ ferent in nature from what we see, and cannot be independent of seeing altogether, though it must be independent of our seeing. He is thus led to regard the “real” table as an idea in the mind of God. Such an idea has the required permanence and independence of ourselves, without being—as matter would otherwise be\ — something quite unknowable, in the sense that we can only infer it, and \ can never be directly and immediately aware of it. Other philosophers since Berkeley have also held that, although the tabl\ e does not depend for its existence upon being seen by me, it does depend upon \ being seen (or otherwise apprehended in sensation) by some mind—not necessarily the mind of God, but more often the whole collective mind of the universe. T\ his they hold, as Berkeley does, chiefly because they think there can be nothin\ g real—or at any rate nothing known to be real—except minds and their thoughts and\ feelings.

We might state the argument by which they support their view in some such\ way as this: “Whatever can be thought of is an idea in the mind of the pe\ rson thinking of it; therefore nothing can be thought of except ideas in minds; theref\ ore anything else is inconceivable, and what is inconceivable cannot exist.”\ Such an argument, in my opinion, is fallacious; and of course those who advance it do not put it so shortly or so crudely. But whether valid or \ not, the argument has been very widely advanced in one form or another; and very \ many philosophers, perhaps a majority, have held that there is nothing real e\ xcept minds and their ideas. Such philosophers are called “idealists”. W\ hen they come to explaining matter, they either say, like Berkeley, that matter is really nothing but a collection of ideas, or they say, like Leibniz (1646–1716), t\ hat what appears as matter is really a collection of more or less rudimentary minds. But these philosophers, though they deny matter as opposed to mind, neve\ rthe- less, in another sense, admit matter. It will be remembered that we asked two questions; namely, (1) Is there a real table at all? (2) If so, what\ sort of object can it be? Now both Berkeley and Leibniz admit that there is a real table, b\ ut Berkeley THE PROBLEMS OF PHILOSOPHY 67 says it is certain ideas in the mind of God, and Leibniz says it is a co\ lony of souls.

Thus both of them answer our first question in the affirmative, and \ only diverge from the views of ordinary mortals in their answer to our second questio\ n. In fact, almost all philosophers seem to be agreed that there is a real tab\ le: they almost all agree that, however much our sense-data—colour, shape, smoothness, etc.—may depend upon us, yet their occurrence is a sign of something \ existing independently of us, something differing, perhaps, completely from our s\ ense- data, and yet to be regarded as causing those sense-data whenever we are\ in a suitable relation to the real table.Now obviously this point in which the philosophers are agreed—the vie\ w that there is a real table, whatever its nature may be—is vitally important, and i\ t will be worth while to consider what reasons there are for accepting this vie\ w before we go on to the further question as to the nature of the real table. Our\ next chapter, therefore, will be concerned with the reasons for supposing that there\ is a real table at all. Before we go farther it will be well to consider for a moment what it is\ that we have discovered so far. It has appeared that, if we take any common object of the sort that is supposed to be known by the senses, what the senses immediately tell us is not the truth about the object as it is apart from us, but only th\ e truth about certain sense-data which, so far as we can see, depend upon the relation\ s between us and the object. Thus what we directly see and feel is merely “appe\ arance”, which we believe to be a sign of some “reality” behind. But if the\ reality is not what appears, have we any means of knowing whether there is any reality \ at all?

And if so, have we any means of finding out what it is like? Such questions are bewildering, and it is difficult to know that even \ the stran- gest hypotheses may not be true. Thus our familiar table, which has rous\ ed but the slightest thoughts in us hitherto, has become a problem full of surp\ rising possibilities. The one thing we know about it is that it is not what it \ seems.

Beyond this modest result, so far, we have the most complete liberty of con- jecture. Leibniz tells us it is a community of souls; Berkeley tells us \ it is an idea in the mind of God; sober science, scarcely less wonderful, tells us it is \ a vast collection of electric charges in violent motion. Among these surprising possibilities, doubt suggests that perhaps there \ is no table at all. Philosophy, if it cannot answer so many questions as we could wish, has at least the power of asking questions which increase the interest of the world, and show the strangeness and wonder lying just below the surface \ even in the commonest things of daily life.

Chapter II The existence of matter I n this chapter we have to ask ourselves whether, in any sense at all, there is such a thing as matter. Is there a table which has a certain intrinsic nature, and con- tinues to exist when I am not looking, or is the table merely a product \ of my imagination, a dream-table in a very prolonged dream? This question is o\ f the greatest importance. For if we cannot be sure of the independent existen\ ce of objects, we cannot be sure of the independent existence of other people’\ s bodies, and therefore still less of other people’s minds, since we have no gr\ ounds for believing in their minds except such as are derived from observing their\ bodies. BERTRAND RUSSELL 68