Berkeleian

American  

[burk-lee-uhn, burk-lee-, bahrk-lee-uhn, bahrk-lee-] / ˈbɜrk li ən, bɜrkˈli-, ˈbɑrk li ən, bɑrkˈli- /

adjective

1. pertaining or relating to George Berkeley or his philosophy.

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noun

1. an advocate of the philosophy of George Berkeley, especially its denial of the existence of a material world.

Berkeleian British  

/ bɑːˈklɪən /

adjective

1. denoting or relating to the philosophy of George Berkeley

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noun

1. a follower of his teachings

Other Word Forms

• Berkeleianism noun

Etymology

Origin of Berkeleian

1855–60; George Berkeley + -an

Example Sentences

Of or relating to Bishop Berkeley or his system of idealism; as, Berkeleian philosophy.

From Project Gutenberg

A broad smiling letter from John Heath commissions me this morning to engage Mrs. Perry’s lodgings for Dunbar, whereat I rejoice: also informs me that he himself keeps a Parroquet, and that Douglas has become a great Berkeleian, and would leave his body, like Jeremy Bentham’s, to be dissected, if he thought he had one.

From Project Gutenberg

To the causes thus inferred the name of qualities is given, to distinguish them from the sensations whereof they are causes; and the Berkeleian transgression consists in overlooking the distinction between things so diametrically opposite.

From Project Gutenberg

Often, as I saunter along Piccadilly or Bond Street, I please myself with the Berkeleian notion that Matter has no existence; that this so solid-seeming World is all idea, all appearance—that I am carried soft through space inside an immense Thought-bubble, a floating, diaphanous, opal-tinted Dream.

From Project Gutenberg

There was never any more doubt that Leibniz was a Leibnitian than that Berkeley was a Berkeleian.

From Project Gutenberg