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Idealism in philosophy, also known as philosophical idealism or metaphysical idealism, is the set of metaphysical perspectives asserting that, most fundamentally, reality is equivalent to mind, spirit, or consciousness; that reality is entirely a mental construct; or that ideas are the highest type of reality or have the greatest claim to being considered "real".^[1][2] Because there are different types of idealism, it is difficult to define the term uniformly.

Indian philosophy contains some of the first defenses of idealism, such as in Vedanta and in Shaiva Pratyabhijña thought. These systems of thought argue for an all-pervading consciousness as the true nature and ground of reality. Idealism is also found in some streams of Mahayana Buddhism, such as in the Yogācāra school, which argued for a "mind-only" (cittamatra) philosophy on an analysis of subjective experience. In the West, idealism traces its roots back to Plato in ancient Greece, who proposed that absolute, unchanging, timeless ideas constitute the highest form of reality: Platonic idealism. This was revived and transformed in the early modern period by Immanuel Kant's arguments that our knowledge of reality is completely based on mental structures: transcendental idealism.^[2]

Epistemologically, idealism is accompanied by a rejection of the possibility of knowing the existence of any thing independent of mind. Ontologically, idealism asserts that the existence of all things depends upon the mind; thus, ontological idealism rejects the perspectives of physicalism and dualism. In contrast to materialism, idealism asserts the primacy of consciousness as the origin and prerequisite of all phenomena.

Idealism came under heavy attack in the West at the turn of the 20th century. The most influential critics were G. E. Moore and Bertrand Russell, but its critics also included the new realists and Marxists. The attacks by Moore and Russell were so influential that even more than 100 years later "any acknowledgment of idealistic tendencies is viewed in the English-speaking world with reservation." However, many aspects and paradigms of idealism did still have a large influence on subsequent philosophy.

Definitions

Idealism is a term with several related meanings. It comes via Latin idea from the Ancient Greek idea (ἰδέα) from idein (ἰδεῖν), meaning "to see". The term entered the English language by 1743.^[3][4] The term idealism was first used in the abstract metaphysical sense of the "belief that reality is made up only of ideas" by Christian Wolff in 1747.^[5] The term re-entered the English language in this abstract sense by 1796.^[6] A. C. Ewing gives this influential definition:

the view that there can be no physical objects existing apart from some experience...provided that we regard thinking as part of experience and do not imply by "experience" passivity, and provided we include under experience not only human experience but the so-called "Absolute Experience" or the experience of a God such as Berkeley postulates.^[7]

A more recent definition by Willem deVries sees idealism as "roughly, the genus comprises theories that attribute ontological priority to the mental, especially the conceptual or ideational, over the non-mental."^[7] As such, idealism entails a rejection of materialism (or physicalism) as well as the rejection of the mind-independent existence of matter (and as such, also entails a rejection of dualism).^[8]

There are two main definitions of idealism in contemporary philosophy, depending on whether its thesis is epistemic or metaphysical:

• Metaphysical idealism or ontological idealism is the view which holds that all of reality is in some way mental (or spirit, reason, or will) or at least ultimately grounded in a fundamental basis which is mental.^[9] This is a form of metaphysical monism because it holds that there is only one type of thing in the universe. The modern paradigm of a Western metaphysical idealism is Berkeley's immaterialism.^[9] Other such idealists are Hegel, and Bradley.
• Epistemological idealism (or "formal" idealism) is a position in epistemology that holds that all knowledge is based on mental structures, not on "things in themselves". Whether a mind-independent reality is accepted or not, all that we have knowledge of are mental phenomena.^[9] The main source of Western epistemic idealist arguments is the transcendental idealism of Kant.^[9] Other thinkers who have defended epistemic idealist arguments include Ludwig Boltzmann and Brand Blanshard.

Thus, metaphysical idealism holds that reality itself is non-physical, immaterial, or experiential at its core, while epistemological idealist arguments merely affirm that reality can only be known through ideas and mental structures (without necessarily making metaphysical claims about things in themselves).^[10] Because of this, A.C. Ewing argued that instead of thinking about these two categories as forms of idealism proper, we should instead speak of epistemic and metaphysical arguments for idealism.^[11]

These two ways of arguing for idealism are sometimes combined together to defend a specific type of idealism (as done by Berkeley), but they may also be defended as independent theses by different thinkers. For example, while F. H. Bradley and McTaggart focused on metaphysical arguments, Josiah Royce, and Brand Blanshard developed epistemological arguments.^[12]

Furthermore, one might use epistemic arguments, but remain neutral about the metaphysical nature of things in themselves. This metaphysically neutral position, which is not a form of metaphysical idealism proper, may be associated with figures like Rudolf Carnap, Quine, Donald Davidson, and perhaps even Kant himself (though he is difficult to categorize).^[13] The most famous kind of epistemic idealism is associated with Kantianism and transcendental idealism, as well as with the related Neo-Kantian philosophies. Transcendental idealists like Kant affirm epistemic idealistic arguments without committing themselves to whether reality as such, the "thing in itself", is ultimately mental.

Types of metaphysical idealism

Within metaphysical idealism, there are numerous further sub-types, including forms of pluralism, which hold that there are many independent mental substances or minds, such as Leibniz' monadology, and various forms of monism or absolute idealism (e.g. Hegelianism or Advaita Vedanta), which hold that the fundamental mental reality is a single unity or is grounded some kind of singular Absolute. Beyond this, idealists disagree on which aspects of the mental are more metaphysically basic. Platonic idealism affirms that ideal forms are more basic to reality than the things we perceive, while subjective idealists and phenomenalists privilege sensory experiences. Personalism meanwhile, sees persons or selves as fundamental.

A common distinction is between subjective and objective forms of idealism. Subjective idealists like George Berkeley reject the existence of a mind-independent or "external" world (though not the appearance of such phenomena in the mind). However, not all idealists restrict the real to subjective experience. Objective idealists make claims about a trans-empirical world, but simply deny that this world is essentially divorced from or ontologically prior to mind or consciousness as such. Thus, objective idealism asserts that the reality of experiencing includes and transcends the realities of the object experienced and of the mind of the observer.^[14]

Idealism is sometimes categorized as a type of metaphysical anti-realism or skepticism. However, idealists need not reject the existence of an objective reality that we can obtain knowledge of, and can merely affirm that this real natural world is mental.^[15][16] Thus, David Chalmers writes of anti-realist idealisms (which would include Berkeley's) and realist forms of idealism, such as "panpsychist versions of idealism where fundamental microphysical entities are conscious subjects, and on which matter is realized by these conscious subjects and their relations."^[16]

Chalmers further outlines the following taxonomy of idealism:

Micro-idealism is the thesis that concrete reality is wholly grounded in micro-level mentality: that is, in mentality associated with fundamental microscopic entities (such as quarks and photons). Macro-idealism is the thesis that concrete reality is wholly grounded in macro-level mentality: that is, in mentality associated with macroscopic (middle-sized) entities such as humans and perhaps non-human animals. Cosmic idealism is the thesis that concrete reality is wholly grounded in cosmic mentality: that is, in mentality associated with the cosmos as a whole or with a single cosmic entity (such as the universe or a deity).^[16]

Guyer et al. also distinguish between forms of idealism which are grounded in substance theory (often found in the Anglophone idealisms of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries) and forms of idealism which focus on activities or dynamic processes (favored in post-Kantian German philosophy).^[17]

Classical Greek idealism

Pre-Socratic philosophy

There some precursors of idealism in Ancient Greek Philosophy, though scholars disagree on whether any of these thinkers could be properly labeled "idealist" in the modern sense.^[18] One example is Anaxagoras (480 BC) who taught that all things in the universe (apeiron) were set in motion by nous ("mind"). In the Phaedo, Plato quotes him as saying, "it is intelligence that arranges and causes all things".^[18] Similarly, Parmenides famously stated that "thinking and being are the same".^[18] This has led some scholars, such as Hegel and E. D. Phillips, to label Parmenides an idealist.^[19]

Platonism and neoplatonism

Plato's theory of forms or "ideas" (eidos) as described in dialogues like Phaedo, Parmenides and Sophist, describes ideal forms (for example the platonic solids in geometry or abstracts like Goodness and Justice), as perfect beings which "exists-by-itself" (Greek: auto kath’ auto), that is, independently of any particular instance (whether physical or in the individual thought of any person).^[20][21] Anything that exists in the world exists by participating in one of these unique ideas, which are nevertheless interrelated causally with the world of becoming, with nature.^[22] Arne Grøn calls this doctrine "the classic example of a metaphysical idealism as a transcendent idealism".^[23] Nevertheless, Plato holds that matter as perceived by us is real, though transitory, imperfect, and dependent on the eternal ideas for its existence. Because of this, some scholars have seen Plato as a dualist, though others disagree and favor a monist account.^[24][22]

The thought of Plato was widely influential, and later Late Platonist (or Neoplatonist) thinkers developed Platonism in new directions. Plotinus, the most influential of the later Platonists, wrote "Being and Intellect are therefore one nature" (Enneads V.9.8).^[25] According to scholars like Nathaniel Alfred Boll and Ludwig Noiré, with Plotinus, a true idealism which holds that only soul or mind exists appears for the first time in Western philosophy.^{[26][27][28][29]} Similarly, for Maria Luisa Gatti, Plotinus' philosophy is a "'contemplationist metaphysics', in which contemplation, as creative, constitutes the reason for the being of everything".^[25] For Neoplatonist thinkers, the first cause or prinicple is the Idea of the Good, i.e. The One, from which everything is derived a hierarchical procession (proodos) (Enn. VI.7.15).^[30]

Judeo-Christian idealism

Some Christian theologians have held idealist views,^[31] often based on neoplatonism. Christian neoplatonism included figures like Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, and influenced numerous Christian thinkers, including the Cappadocian Fathers and Augustine.^[32] Despite the influence of Aristotelian scholasticism from the 12th century onward, there is certainly a sense in which some medieval scholastic philosophers retained influences from the Platonic idealism that came via Augustine.^[33] For example, the work of John Scottus Eriugena (c. 800 – c. 877) has been interpreted as an idealistic philosophy by Dermot Moran who writes that for Scottus "all spatiotemporal reality is understood as immaterial, mind dependent, and lacking in independent existence".^[34] Scottus thus wrote: "the intellection of all things...is the being of all things".^[35]

Idealism was also defended in medieval Jewish philosophy. According to Samuel Lebens, early Hassidic rabbis like Yitzchak Luria (1534–72) defended a form of Kabbalistic idealism in which the world was God's dream or a fictional tale told by God.^[36]

Later Western theistic idealism such as that of Hermann Lotze offers a theory of the "world ground" in which all things find their unity: it has been widely accepted by Protestant theologians.^[37]

Several modern religious movements such as, for example, the organizations within the New Thought Movement and the Unity Church, may be said to have a particularly idealist orientation. The theology of Christian Science includes a form of idealism: it teaches that all that truly exists is God and God's ideas; that the world as it appears to the senses is a distortion of the underlying spiritual reality, a distortion that may be corrected (both conceptually and in terms of human experience) through a reorientation (spiritualization) of thought.^[38]

Idealism in Eastern philosophy

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There are currents of idealism throughout Indian philosophy, ancient and modern. Some forms of Hindu idealism (like Advaita) defend a type of monism or non-dualism, in which a single consciousness (brahman) is all that exists. However, other traditions defend a theistic pluralism (e.g. Shaiva Siddhanta), in which there are many selves (atman) and one God.^[39]

Buddhist idealism on the other hand is non-theistic and does not accept the existence of eternal selves (due to their adherence to the theory of not-self).

Hindu philosophy

A type of idealistic monism can be seen in the Upanishads, which often describe the ultimate reality of brahman as "being, consciousness, bliss" (Saccidānanda).^[40] The Chāndogya Upaniṣad teaches that everything is an emanation of the immortal brahman, which is the essence and source of all things, and is identical with the self (atman).^[41][42] The Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad also describes brahman as awaress and bliss, and states that "this great being (mahad bhūtam) without an end, boundless (apāra), nothing but vijñāna ."^[43]

Idealist notions can be found in different schools of Hindu philosophy, including the various schools of Vedanta. Other schools like the Samkhya and Nyaya-Vaisheshika opposed idealism in favor of dualism and realism. Different schools of Vedanta have different interpretations of brahman-atman, their foundational theory. Advaita Vedanta posits an absolute idealistic monism in which reality is one single absolute existence. Thus, brahman (the ultimate ground of all) is absolutely identical with all atmans (individual selves). Other forms of Vedanta like the Vishishtadvaita of Ramanuja and the Bhedabheda of Bhāskara are not as radical in their non-dualism, accepting that there is a certain difference between individual souls and Brahman.

Advaita

The most influential Advaita philosopher was Ādi Śaṅkara (788–820). In his philosophy, brahman is the single non-dual foundation (adhiṣṭhana) for all existence. This reality is independent, self-established, irreducible, immutable, and free of space, time, and causation.^[44] In comparison to this reality, the world of plurality and appearances is illusory (maya), an unreal cognitive error (mithya). This includes all individual souls or selves, which are actually unreal and numerically identical to the one brahman.^[44]

Śaṅkara did not believe it was possible to prove the view that reality is "one only, without a second" (Chandogya 6.2.1) through independent philosophical reasoning. Instead, he accepts non-duality based on the authority of the Upaniṣads. As such, most of his extant works are scriptural commentaries.^[44]

Nevertheless, he did provide various new arguments to defend his theories. A major metaphysical distinction for Śaṅkara is between what changes and may thus be negated (the unreal) and what does not (which is what is truly real).^[44] He compares the real to clay (the substantial cause, analogous to brahman) and the unreal to a pot which depends on the clay for its being (analogous to all impermanent things in the universe).^[44] By relying on dependence relations and on the reality of persistence, Śaṅkara concludes that metaphysical foundations are more real than their impermanent effects, and that effects are fully reducible and indeed identical to their metaphysical foundation.^[44] Through this argument from dependence, Śaṅkara concludes that since all things in the universe undergoes change, they must depend on some really existent cause for their being, and this is the one primordial undifferentiated existence (Chandogya Bhāṣya, 6.2.1–2).^[44] This one reality is the single cause that is in every object, and every thing is not different from this brahman since all things borrow their existence from it. Śaṅkara also provides a cosmogony in which the world arises from an unmanifest state which is like deep dreamless sleep into a state in which īśvara (God) dreams the world into existence. As such, the world is not separate from God's mind.^[44]

Śaṅkara's philosophy, along with that of his contemporary Maṇḍana Miśra (c. 8th century CE), is at the foundation of Advaita school. The opponents of this school however, labeled him a māyāvādin (illusionist) for negating the reality of the world.^[44] They also criticized what they saw as a problematic explanation for how the world arises from māyā as an error. For them, if māyā is in brahman, then brahman has ignorance, but if it is not in brahman, then this collapses into a dualism of brahman and māyā.^[45]

Other idealist schools

Perhaps the most influential critic of Advaita was Rāmānuja (c. 1017 – c. 1137), the main philosopher of the competing Viśiṣṭādvaita (qualified non-dual) school. His philosophy affirms the reality of the world and individual selves as well as affirming an underlying unity of all things with God.^[45] One of Rāmānuja's critiques of advaita is epistemological. If, as Advaita argues, all cognition other than pure undifferentiated consciousness is based in error, then it follows we would have no knowledge of the very fact that all individual cognition is error (Śrī Bhāṣya, I.i.1).^[45]

Furthermore, Rāmānuja also argues contra Advaita that individual selves are real and not illusory. This is because the very idea that an individual can be ignorant presupposes the very existence of that individual.^[45] Furthermore, since all Vedāntins agree that Brahman's nature is knowledge, consciousness and being, to say that brahman is ignorant is absurd, and so it must be individual souls which are ignorant.^[45] Thus, there must be individual selves with a metaphysically prior existence who then fall into ignorance (Śrī Bhāṣya, I.i.1.).^[45] Selves might be individual, but as the Vedas state, they still share a sense of unity with brahman. For Rāmānuja, this is because selves are distinct modes or qualities in the cosmic body of Brahman (and are thus different and yet united with brahman).^[45][46] Brahman meanwhile is like the soul in the body of the world. Furthermore, brahman is a theistic creator God for Rāmānuja, which really exists as the union of two deities: Vishnu, and Lakṣmī.^[45]

The philosophy of the Tantric tradition of Trika Shaivism is a non-dual theistic idealism.^[47][48] The key thinkers of this philosophical tradition, known as the Pratyabhijñā (Recognition) school, are the Kashmirian philosophers Utpaladeva (c. 900–950 CE) and Abhinavagupta (975–1025 CE).^[49] This tradition affirms a non-dual monism which sees God (Shiva) as a single cosmic consciousness.^[50] All selves (atman) are one with God, but they have forgotten this, and must recognize their true nature in order to reach liberation.^[51]

Unlike in Advaita Vedanta however, the one cosmic consciousness is active and dynamic, consisting of spontaneous vibration (spanda) since it has the quality of absolute freedom (svātāntrya).^[52] Through the power (Śakti) of dynamic vibrations, the absolute (Shiva-Śakti, consciousness and its power) creates the world, and so, the world is a real manifestation of absolute consciousness.^[53] Thus, in this system, the world and individual selves (which are dynamic, not an unchanging witness) are not an unreal illusion, but are seen as real and active expressions of God's creative freedom.^[54]

Idealism has remained influential in modern Hindu philosophy, especially in Neo-Vedanta modernism. Prominent modern defenders include Ram Mohan Roy (1772–1833), Vivekananda (1863–1902),^[55] Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (An Idealist View of Life, 1932) and Aurobindo (1872–1950).

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