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Two Modes of Idealism
Idealism is the metaphysical (or in extension, ontological and epistemological) belief, or system of beliefs, which asserts that reality is fundamentally a mentally constructed phenomenon. Idealism should not be confused with an instrumentalist's view of the physical world, which would assert that questions about "what reality is" are not wholly the questions that we should be asking, or that not having an answer to this question is of no huge concern so long as our view of the physical world produces a coherent model of prediction and further inquiry. Nor should idealism be seen as opposite instrumentalism either, but as a different sort of inquiry altogether. Idealism is, however, completely opposite to reductivist physicalism (that everything is reducible to physical qualities) and general materialism. Not all idealism is one and the same: Two prominent idealist theories arise from Leibniz and Berkeley, though both have been found highly controversial.
Leibniz Brand Idealism (Monadology) in Brief:
According to Leibniz, if the only genuinely real beings are mind-like simple substances, then bodies, motion, and everything else must result from or be derivative of those simple substances and their perceptual states. In a typical statement of his idealism, Leibniz says, “I don't really eliminate body, but reduce [revoco] it to what it is. For I show that corporeal mass [massa], which is thought to have something over and above simple substances, is not a substance, but a phenomenon resulting from simple substances, which alone have unity and absolute reality.” (G II 275/AG 181) Yet, this position, denying the reality of bodies and asserting that monads are the grounds of all corporeal phenomena, as well as its metaphysical corollaries has shocked many. Bertrand Russell, for example, famously remarked in the Preface to his book on Leibniz that he felt that “the Monadology was a kind of fantastic fairy tale, coherent perhaps, but wholly arbitrary.” And, in perhaps the wittiest and most biting rhetorical question asked of Leibniz, Voltaire gibes, “Can you really believe that a drop of urine is an infinity of monads, and that each of these has ideas, however obscure, of the universe as a whole?” (Oeuvres complètes, Vol. 22, p. 434) Well, if you are Leibniz, you can.
Contrast with...
Berkeley's Immaterial Idealism:
Berkeley’s famous principle is esse is percipi, to be is to be perceived. Berkeley was an idealist. He held that ordinary objects are only collections of ideas, which are mind-dependent. Berkeley was an immaterialist. He held that there are no material substances. There are only finite mental substances and an infinite mental substance, namely, God. On these points there is general agreement. There is less agreement on Berkeley’s argumentative approach to idealism and immaterialism and on the role of some of his specific arguments. His central arguments are often deemed weak.