Hume and the belief in personal identity oxford scholarship. The most discussed eighteenthcentury account of personal identity is that of david hume who influenced both sulzer and merian. I have attempted to defend this interpretation in hume s theory of the self revisited dialogue, vol. A treatise of human nature 173940 is a book by scottish philosopher david hume, considered by many to be hume s most important work and one of the most influential works in the history of philosophy. Hume rejects a common philosophical view of the self. Discussion of the views hume put forward on personal identity in the. Hume s theory of the self and its identity it is a widely held view among philosophers that hume s doctrine of personal identity is seriously mistaken, that he makes claims about the existence and nature of personal identity that are clearly false. Terence penelhum, hume on personal identity philpapers. In the appendix to a treatise of human nature, david hume. This paper considers hume s account of personal identity in his treatise of human nature. Humes thoughts about personal identity try to first trace and consecutively explain psychological processes such as beliefs, sentiments, etc. And here tis evident, the same method of reasoning must be. Hume personal identity political science bibliographies. Ideas, their origin, composition, connection, abstraction, etc.
Hume s section of personal identity owes its shape to lockes, and hume evidently wants to capture and explain any of lockes results that he thinks are true. Hume delivers his account of personal identity in treatise 1. Granted that there are various poststructuralist approaches to the question of subjectivity, i. In this paper i will summarize my examination of the first two topic areas only.
Treatise of human nature, book 1 early modern texts. Hume s positive theory of personal identity 151 various causes which produce these passions. In what follows i will argue that humes unpopularity is partly due to the fact that the theory is at odds with how we normally view identity, and partly due to the ambiguity of. He believed as we say nowadays, that his analysis of the concept of personal identity was correct. Personal identity in memento plato philosophy learning. Memory is essential to personal identity, as it is memory which allows us the impression of a continuity of perceptions, and so in turn, the idea of cause and effect.
This idea can be formulated as the following argument. Humes theory as described above seems easy to follow and very appealing, but humes contribution to personal identity is generally not as popular as it deserves. Of personal identity david hume there are some philosophers who imagine we are every moment intimately conscious of what we call our self. Where locke argues from conceptual intuitions about possible cases, hume argues from high theory. From hume to derrida find, read and cite all the research you need on researchgate. An essay concerning human understanding, book ii, chapter 27, of ideas of identity and diversity by john locke i also assign a short primary source reading from john locke, a seventeenth century philosopher who famously defended the memory criterion by arguing that personal identity extends as far back as consciousness. My aim is to offer a brief historical account of the problem touching briefly on bodily identity followed by hume s take on it. Terms in this set 30 many philosophers think they possess a self 299. Personal identity stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. In the introduction hume presents the idea of placing all science and philosophy on a novel. Locke on personal identity stanford encyclopedia of philosophy.
Since he had ceased to believe this by the time that he wrote the appendix, it might be a good thing to mention two relations which have a strong. He concurs with descartes and hume that we never directly apprehend the self this fact is what he calls the systematic elusiveness of the i. Here, ill be discussing the problem of personal identity. This paper considers humes account of personal identity in his treatise of human nature. This bibliography was generated on cite this for me on tuesday, may 2, 2017. The section concerning personal identity to which hume s appendix refersthn 1. Steve and walter used to have a preference for blondes. And here tis evident, the same method of reasoning must be continud. Of personal identity david hume there are some philosophers who imagine we are every moment intimately. It is a widely held view among philosophers that hume s doctrine of personal identity is seriously mistaken, that he makes claims about the existence and nature of personal identity that are clearly false. References to the treatise are in each case given as follows. The concept of the self in david hume and the buddha. This chapter begins with a close analysis of the relevant sections in book i of the treatise of human nature and hume s famous second thoughts on identity in the appendix to book iii. Sophiaomni 1 of personal identity david hume there are some philosophers who imagine we are every moment intimately conscious of what we call our self.
A question of humes theory of personal identity the. There are no persons that continue to exist over time. Locke and hume on personal identity locke and hume both discuss the idea of personal identity in connection with certain general claims about the very idea of identity in a more general sense and i am going to begin, prior to discussing personal identity in particular, with a comparison of their specific treatments of the general idea of identity. Hume s account of personal identity does not satisfy philosophers dreams about perfect identity. A summary of a treatise of human nature in s david hume 17111776. The perception of self is a subjective interpretation of reality and is necessarily colored by the subjects own preconceived notions. David hume, a treatise of human nature by david hume. Of personal identity may be conveniently divided into three main subsections. A question of humes theory of personal identity the oxford. Regarding the issue of personal identity, 1 humes skeptical claim is that we have no experience of a simple, individual impression that we can call the selfwhere the self is the totality of a persons conscious life. Humes account is also explained by reference to earlier theories such as those.
To understand what personal identity consists in, we must understand what the word person designates. Turning now to humes theory of personal identity, we begin by noting that it is an outgrowth of his overall epistemology. Treatise generally proceeds on the assumption that it was his object to justify ascriptions of. The strongest sensation, the most violent passion, say they, instead of. One of the problems with this discussion, that penelhum also remarks upon hume on personal identity, pp. This relation i here consider as applyd in its strictest sense to constant and unchangeable objects. While hume examined the concept of personal identity in a rigorous manner within the boundaries of his assumptions, buddha adhered to studied silence on such questions, and neither asserted the existence of an identical self nor concluded that it was a pure nothing. Hume in the treatise was proud of his view of belief. At the opening of the treatise, ideas and impressions are distinguished by their degrees of vivacity.
The treatise is a classic statement of philosophical empiricism, skepticism, and naturalism. Identity may be esteemd a second species of relation. Psychological continuity theories pct are most popular parfit, noonan, etc. For, he thought, when we encounter several different things existing in succession and differing gradually, one from the next. Nov 02, 2015 hume s theory of personal identity is developed in response to lockes account of personal identity. Hume s labyrinth concerning the idea of personal identity. Pdf hume on personal identity nicko miranda academia. University of hawaii press is collaborating with jstor to. In what follows i will argue that hume s unpopularity is partly due to the fact that the theory is at odds with how we normally view identity, and partly due to the ambiguity of. It is a widely held view among philosophers that humes doctrine of personal identity is seriously mistaken, that he makes claims about the existence and nature of personal identity that are clearly false.
To understand hume s account of personal identity one must, as hume says, take the. Hume was the first western philosopher to unmask the confu sions attending our idea of personal identity and subsequently to reject the idea as a fiction. David humes view on personal identity ask a philosopher. David hume, true to his extreme skepticism, rejects the notion of identity over time. David hume, the buddhists, and others deny there is any such core. Humes theory of the self and its identity dialogue.
Hume and leibniz on personal identity oxford scholarship. Defending humes theory of personal identity and discarding. David hume on personal identity a treatise concerning human nature 1739. Yet it is striking that hume does not emphasize lockes distinction between persons and human beings. Learn exactly what happened in this chapter, scene, or section of david hume 17111776 and what it means. Personal identity and the skeptical system of philosophy. Lockes most thorough discussion of the persistence or diachronic identity of persons can be found in book 2, chapter 27 of the essay of identity and diversity, though locke anticipates this discussion as early as book 1, chapter 4, section 5, and locke refers to persons in other texts, including the second treatise of government. For example, if one severs the brains hemispheres one seems to create different persons. Pdf based on previous thinkers such as john locke, the scottish philosopher david hume developed his own theory of personal identity, one that is.
In the previous section, he has rejected the ancient philosophys posit of a mental substance, or soul, in which the perceptions of the mind are said to inhere, and has argued that, in fact, each perception fits the definition of substance as something which may exist by itself. We now proceed to explain the nature of personal identity, which has become so great a question in philosophy, especially of late years in england, where all the abstruser sciences are studyd with a peculiar ardour and application. What is the mind, self, or person to which identity and simplicity are attributed. Hume s account is also explained by reference to earlier theories such as those. Flash cards for arguments and evaluations relating to david hume s of personal identity reading for vce philosophy unit 3, 2014. Summary of the problem of personal identity reason and. The strongest statement of this view is to be found in terence penelhums hume on personal. This act of the mind has never yet been explaind by. This textbased pdf or ebook was created from the html version of this book and is part of the portable library of liberty. Locke but once memory has done its work, then our personal identity can be extended even to times forgotten. Humes views on personal identity are not difficult to summarize. The objects of the mind vary along a single dimension of force and vivacity.
Robison brain transplants are now medically feasible, but the whole head would probably have to be grafted at the same time, said david hume, md, chief of the. Since locke ends up relating personal identity to consciousness and to memory, it is possible to say that, if understanding is not repeatedly presented with the idea of self identity, it would lose this idea. These differ in the degrees of force and liveliness with which they. The treatment of personal identity in hume s treatise displays a shift that is both interesting as an object lesson in the weakness of a particular sort of empirical project, and important for what it teaches about investigating moral life. Hume, belief and personal identity justin broackes semantic scholar. Split brains modern science accords well with the bundle theory, but not the soul theory. Perfect for acing essays, tests, and quizzes, as well as for writing lesson plans. David hume believed that while people may have notions of some unchanging personal characteristics embedded within themselves, people have actually mistaken their perceptions of themselves as the genuine article.
Hume on personal identity oxford academic journals. The origin of our ideas all the perceptions of the human mind fall into two distinct kinds, which i shall call impressions and ideas. These are the sources and citations used to research hume personal identity. Rethinking humes second thoughts about personal identity may. For my part, when i enter most intimately into what i call myself, i always. The strongest statement of this view is to be found in terence penelhums hume on personal identity. Summary david hume of personal identity flashcards. The questions i wish to explore inthis paper pertain to the status of personal identity in the context of poststructuralist decenterings of subjectivity. Hume s thoughts about personal identity try to first trace and consecutively explain psychological processes such as beliefs, sentiments, etc. It is just this sort of approach to the problem of personal identity that is found in the writings of the most important noself theorist, david hume. Hume s theory as described above seems easy to follow and very appealing, but hume s contribution to personal identity is generally not as popular as it deserves. Introduction the problems of personal identity the persistence question the population question the personal ontology question the question of what matters in identity the persistence question. Rightly or wrongly, i take the view, with hume, that ones own identity. David hume of personal identity flashcards quizlet.
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