The
intellectual achievements of George Berkeley, David Hume, Immanuel
Kant, and Georg Hegel are widely celebrated, but it’s hard to see
why. These four similar thinkers are generally considered some of the
greatest philosophers ever; and yet their theories are
so
false and evil. Berkeley, Hume, Kant, and Hegel have damaged mankind
immensely thru their remarkable irrationality, lack of common sense,
and denial of obvious truths. The individual and society have
suffered enormously.
George
Berkeley is
probably best known for his idea-ism or “Idealism”, the doctrine
that only minds and their ideas are real. Berkeley’s assertion that
material objects do not exist independently of perception defies the
common-sense view that the physical world is real and existent, regardless of whether or not anyone is looking at it. This “out of
sight, out of mind, out of existence” claim is a fundamentally
irrational and senseless view which denies the seemingly obvious
truth that physical things and material objects continue to exist
even when not observed, whether by “god” or man. Berkeley’s
bizarre claim undermines confidence in reason and the human mind. His
attack on sensory experience and near-universal belief generates a
form of Skepticism so extreme that both intellectuals and average men
lose confidence in their ability to gain knowledge about basic
reality. The damage this nonsense does to fundamental understanding,
rational self-confidence, and the human spirit is incalculable.
David
Hume, in turn, takes
Skepticism to new heights with his radical questioning of causality.
He claims our basic beliefs in cause and effect, the continual self, and even
the external world are not grounded in reason and actual reality, but
in mere habit and custom. One thing may happen after another, due to
a seemingly direct and clear impact, yet Hume claims no conclusion
can be drawn from this, no matter how carefully it’s observed,
recorded, analyzed, and tested. Ultimately, Hume disbelieves in objective reality and truth; and even himself as a certain being. By denying a reasonable and
scientific basis for these foundational concepts, Hume’s philosophy
promotes fundamental irrationality and senselessness. His notion of
causality casts serious and painful doubt that events in the world
are connected in predictable and comprehensible ways. This dreadful
Idealism and Skepticism leads to an intellectual paralysis and
uncertainty in which the observation and study of the universe is
seen as essentially hopeless, and any real search for truth,
knowledge, and understanding is futile.
Immanuel
Kant compounds Hume’s errors by positing
a complex and baffling system of “transcendental” Idealism. This
is even more irrational and nonsensical than the ideas of Berkeley
and Hume. Kant argues that human observations and experiences are
fatally shaped by the limited nature and inborn categories of their
minds, such as space, time, and causality. While Kant claims his
beliefs preserve the possibility of knowledge, in fact he argues
humans can only know appearance and not reality. They can only know
things as they seem but not “things-in-themselves”. This defies
common experience and good sense. The idea that our understanding of
the world is fatally and hopelessly mediated by the innate structures
and inescapable flaws of the mind contradicts all of human history
and virtually every individual’s experience of the universe and
life. Kant’s separation of phenomena and “noumena” is without
evidence or justification. Everyday perception and experience rejects
his literally irrational and senseless ideas. Kant adds to his
destructiveness and nonsensicality by claiming people shouldn’t be
morally good in order to be great or happy, as everyone supposes.
Rather they should be “good” without hope of reward, and thru a
mindless and arbitrary adherence to self-sacrifice based on duty
alone.
Georg
Hegel “learns” from the three previous thinkers, and is arguably
the worst of them all. He
complicates and damages the philosophical landscape with perhaps the
most convoluted and extreme Idealism and Skepticism of all. He looks
at the universe and then claims subjects and objects are the same, or
else form a single inseparable unit. No real evidence is offered for
this claim, and like Berkeley, Hume, and Kant before him, it’s hard
to see how such “knowledge” and “truth” is relevant to
philosophy or benefits mankind in any manner whatever. Certainly
Hegel’s notion of the “absolute” is a highly abstract and
elusive concept that seems to lack practical relevance, purpose, and
benefit for men.
* * *
People
seek to understand their universe and themselves, accomplish great
things with their short lifespans, and experience pleasure and
happiness at the highest levels possible. And people turn to
philosophers for help in this. But it’s hard to see how the
irrational, senseless, incomprehensible, tortured, schizophrenic,
irrelevant, worthless, dispiriting, depressing claims of Berkeley,
Hume, Kant, and Hegel achieve any of this.
In
the end, the philosophies of George Berkeley, David Hume, Immanuel
Kant, and Georg Hegel – such as they are – aren’t just
pointless and useless, but positively damaging to mankind’s job and
hope of obtaining knowledge about material and moral reality. They
shake confidence in the universe and reality, reason and mind,
knowledge and truth, and life and self. These “philosophies”
confuse, perplex, disorientate, and alienate. Actual truth, genuine
knowledge, common sense, and practical information and education
perish under their freakish and malign influence.
It’s
clear that the influence of these pseudo-philosophers extends well
beyond obscure think-tanks and academia. Their ideas have shaped
countless aspects of culture, politics, and society. The damage they
do to Western Civilization, sound thinking, truth, moral goodness,
and real life is immense. Metaphysical bafflement, epistemological
agnosticism, cultural relativism, and fundamental amoralism are the
result. People become apathetic about their sacred existence as they
lose intellectual hold of their formerly competent minds and good
sense. Such philosophical victims ignore, and end up repudiating, the
differences between truth and falsity, good and evil, civilization
and savagery, joy and agony. Postmodernism, Wokism, ignorance,
depravity, and misery are the result.
In
summation, the philosophies of Berkeley, Hume, Kant, and Hegel
promote irrationality, are oblivious to practical reality, lack
common sense, and deny obvious truths. Their worthlessly complex,
esoteric, and abstract ideas alienate people from reality and
intellectual truth while creating anxiety, confusion, disorientation,
and despair in the real world. By denying the clarity of existence,
the trustworthiness of sensory experience, the rational basis for
fundamental concepts, the possibility of direct knowledge of the
world, and the reality and objectivity of truth, these “philosophers”
undermine, suborn, and defeat the natural and necessary human
acquisition of knowledge and understanding of reality, leading to
intellectual, cultural, and moral ambiguity, relativism, devastation,
and oblivion.