So I just read Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius, from the garden of

No they're not looking for the place, one found it mentioned in an encyclopedia but not in its regular edition, but that's just the hook of the story

>>9268940
You can read it as a thought experiment attacking the coherence of Berkeleyan idealism, or an endorsement of its explanatory attractiveness.

File: Jorge Luis Borges 00.jpg (510KB, 940x1383px) Image search: [Google]

510KB, 940x1383px

>>9268940
Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius is Borges's is a thought experiment. He uses the setting of a man reading encyclopedic entries on Tlön, Uqbar as a means to explore metaphysical and philosophical hypotheticals.

Are you reading Labyrinths? Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius is the first short story in the collection. If you keep reading, you'll see that each story is exploring a theme of a kind of labyrinthine complexity. In Tlön, Uqbar it is metaphysical and cultural complexity - in The Garden of Forking Paths it is time, in the Lottery of Babylon it is chance, and so on.

I'm unfamiliar with Berkeley's philosophy, but this anon >>9269086 may be correct.

>>9269261
>I'm unfamiliar with Berkeley's philosophy, but this anon >>9269086 (You) may be correct.
Berkeley thought that everything was, ontologically speaking, mental. He used the terminology of 'ideas', hence we get the theory of idealism. Borges puts Berkeley in the secret society of people who 'create' the world of Tlon, and Borges characterises Tlon as what the world would be like if we all assumed Berkeley was correct, and not, as we all pre-reflectively do, assume naive-realism is correct.

A key point where Tlon departs from Berkeley's philosophy is that they have no principle that makes reality continuous between observers (the thing that makes the tree falling in the wood actually make a sound even if no-ones around to hear it). For Berkeley, God was omnipresent and thus always perceiving everything for us, but in Tlon they don't have a parallel principle so all the wacky shit with coins disappearing and reappearing and the hronir stuff happens.

>>9269306
Truly interesting. Is there a specific work of Berkeley's you would recommend?

>>9269780
Principles of Human Knowledge is the main presentation of his theory. He conveniently also presented it more approachably as a Socratic-style dialogue in Three Dialogues (Berkeley's interloctur is actually much more rigorous and challenging to the theory than any of Plato's!).

Oxford World Classics has a single, slim paperback containing both, as well as an invaluable introduction and notes by Howard Robinson, a contemporary idealist who also edited a notable anthology of essays on Berkeley.

>>9269261
>Are you reading Labyrinths?
I am reading the complete works, the garden of forking paths.

It turns out the real world was already The Demons.

>>9269086
This.
In any case, OP should start with an easier one.

>>9269839
Awesome! Thank you.

>>9270511
Which one should I start with?

I love threads like this. They remind me how dumb you guys are and how little people understand even the most basic literature

>>9270738
Something like:
The Circular Ruins -> The Garden of Forking Paths -> The Lottery in Babylon -> The Library of Babel -> The Approach to Al-Mu'tasim -> An Examination of the Work of Herbert Quain -> Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote -> Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius
That way you start with an easy story that has been plagiarized to death and move up from there. By the time you get to pierre menard / tlon uqbat orbis tertius you should get how borges works.

>>9270858
Thank you so much anon.