Berkeley's Theory of Immaterialism As man progressed through the various stages of evolution, it is assumed that at a certain point he began to ponder the world around him. Of course, these first attempts fell short of being scholarly, probably consisting of a few grunts and snorts at best. As time passed on, though, these ideas persisted and were eventually tackled by the more intellectual, so-called philosophers. Thus, excavation of "the external world" began. As the authoritarinism of the ancients gave way to the more liberal views of the modernists, two main positions concerning epistemology and the nature of the wo