"I Refute It Thus"
After we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of Bishop Berkeley's ingenious sophistry to prove the non-existence of matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it is impossible to refute it. I never shall forget the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it, 'I refute it thus.'
Notes:
An amusing anecdote about disproving solipsism and the idea that nothing really exists.
Folksonomies: solipsism
Taxonomies:
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/religion and spirituality (0.279395)
/science/social science/philosophy (0.187751)
Keywords:
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Entities:
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Concepts:
Reality (0.979629): dbpedia | freebase
Ontology (0.964485): dbpedia | freebase | opencyc
Materialism (0.950012): dbpedia | freebase
Physics (0.882343): dbpedia | freebase | opencyc
Universe (0.844986): dbpedia | freebase
Gottfried Leibniz (0.826823): dbpedia | opencyc | yago
Metaphysics (0.812182): dbpedia | freebase | opencyc
Early Islamic philosophy (0.811824): dbpedia | freebase
Boswell's Life of Johnson