Essays on the Perception of an External Universe

Introduction

The full title continues “and Other Subjects Connected with the Doctrine of Causation”: Shepherd applies the causal principle defended in her 1824 book to a further sceptical problem. How do we know that bodies exist outside us and continue when no one perceives them? Her answer is an inference: our sensations begin and change independently of our will, so they need causes other than the mind, and these continuing causes are what we call external objects – known in their existence and relations, though not in their inner nature. On this basis she criticises Berkeley’s idealism and Hume’s scepticism about the senses.

Connections

Criticizes

• A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge1710 · George Berkeley

More works by Mary Shepherd

• 1824An Essay upon the Relation of Cause and Effect