SAMUEL JOHNSON, PHILOSOPHER.

SAMUEL JOHNSON, PHILOSOPHER. With my obtuse approach to philosophical issues, I have always treasured Samuel Johnson’s refutation of Berkeley’s argument that the objects of the world are just inventions of the mind. (Johnson kicked a stone, saying “I refute it thus.”) Until I read the Gawande article I linked to yesterday, I had not realized the argument that Johnson was refuting. Berkeley had argued that we have no direct perception of objects; we have only sensations from which we infer the existence of objects. (And therefore, perhaps there are no objects at all).