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Brian asked:

I have been reading Berkeley's Principles of Human Knowledge.

He seems to say:

*Only God can create ideas

*Man can copy and re-create ideas but cannot create from nothing

*There are two types of mind, created and uncreated (God) and two type of ideas: ideas of sense,
and ideas of the imagination which only come from God

*God has no ideas of sense

So where does Man get his ideas of sense from?

I am sure that I have mis-understood the text but in what respect?

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Firstly, your points. Man does not copy ideas. Sense experience is a given, and by means of the will
ideas of sense can be used in imaginings, so there is a distinction between ideas of sense and those
of imagination, the latter being weaker. But the main distinction between ideas is between the simple
sense experience, such as visual qualia, and ideas as "things". Berkeley uses the word "ideas" for
"things" because a thing is not matter but a construct of simple sense experience ideas belonging to
different senses. A tree only becomes a thing, or complex idea, when we have visual as well as
tactual experience of it.

God is not "created and uncreated". He is infinite, or eternal and "uncreated", as you can see in the
The Principlesno. 92. Man is finite and created.

As to your question, man gets his ideas from God even though God himself has no
sense-experience. God's way of perceiving is described as "understanding" and in contrast to this our
own perceptions are incomplete and appear as sense experience. God imprints or excites these
experiences in us by means of his will. We know that God is the cause of ideas because we know
that the will is a causal force as we ourselves can "excite ideas to the mind at pleasure". However,
when we receive a passive idea, and are not using our wills to imagine something, so another will
must be responsible — God. God is the causal force and law of nature, responsible for all ideas and
change. It is difficult to rebut this argument when we don't have an idea of cause as other than laws of
nature.

A C Grayling has written an excellent book on Berkeley which you might find helpful.

Rachel Browne