A Few Tips on Hume

I offer the following tips in the hope they may be of assistance in addressing the discussion questions raised in my previous post:

Hume's epistemology (his theory of knowledge) is based on his definitions of impressions and ideas, which he has given earlier in A Treatise of Human Nature, of which "Of Personal Identity" is one short chapter.

Impressions: "Those perceptions which enter with most force and violence we may name impressions; and under this name I comprehend all our sensations, passions, and emotions, as they make their first appearance in the soul."

Ideas: "By ideas I mean the faint images of these [impressions] in thinking and reasoning; such as, for instance, are all the perceptions excited by the present discourse, excepting only those which arise from the sight and touch, and excepting the immediate pleasure or uneasiness it may occasion."

In "Of Personal Identity," Hume talks about objects. These are the impressions and ideas that constitute our mental activity. The key question to ask in reading the piece is, How are these objects, to employ a more modern term, processed? Does the "process" afford a true sense of personal identity to the individual? Or do the many changes in our perceptions through time, and our difficulty in summarizing past perceptions at any given time, undermine the sense of personal identity? Think of Heraclitus's river: Is it the same or constantly changing?

Hume asks, Can our mind change and still be the same?

Questions for "Of Personal Identity," by David Hume

1. Why, according to Hume, do "some philosophers" think "the strongest sensation, the most violent passion" makes us more aware of the self? (p. 65)
2. If we doubt of the self, then is there "anything of which we can be certain" (p. 65)?
3. Why does Hume define "self" as mind or consciousness? Are there other possible definitions?
4. Is Hume convincing when he says that because "pain and pleasure, grief and joy, passions and sensations" occur at different times, the "idea of self" cannot exist? (p. 66)
5. Is mind just a "bundle or collection of different perceptions"? (p. 66)
6. Can you conceive of the mind as a "kind of theatre" (p. 67)?
7. For analysis: "We have a distinct idea of an object that remains invariable ... " (p. 67) to "... nor find anything invariable and uninterrupted to justify our notion of identity."
8. Is a person comparable to a church that was originally built of brick but has been rebuilt of freestone? Is it a problem to call them the same church?
9. On page 72 Hume writes, "The identity which we ascribe to the mind of man is only a fictitious one, and of a like kind with that which we ascribe to vegetable and animal bodies. It cannot have a different origin, but must proceed from a like operation of the imagination upon like objects." Can we really use the same criteria in identifying a human mind as we would in indentifying a shrub or a crustacean?
10. Read and analyze paragraph starting on page 73 (ending page 74), "But lest this argument should not convince the reader .." to "according to the principles explained above."
11. Read and analyze Hume's discussion of the successive parts our thoughts as to their resemblance and causation on pages 74 and 75, starting "To begin with resemblance" and ending "And in this view our identity with regard to the passions serves to corroborate that with regard to the imagination, by making our distant perceptions influence each other, and by giving us a present concern for our past or future pains or pleasures."
12. Do you agree with Hume (p. 75) that memory is the source of personal identity, because it "acquaints us with the continuance and extent of this succession of perceptions"?
13. Hume asks (p. 75) "Who can tell me, for instance, what were his thoughts and actions on the first of January 1715, the eleventh of March 1719, and the third of August 1733?," and says the many gaps in our memory detract from our sense of personal identity. Do you agree?
14. Is Hume correct in arguing that "all the nice and subtle questions concerning personal identity can never possibly be decided, and are to be regarded rather as grammatical than as philosophical difficulties."
15. Can something that changes still be the same?
16. Is Hume saying (a) there is no self, or that it's (b) simply not something we are capable of knowing (i.e., not a "philosophical difficulty")?

David Hume (1711-1776)

Back in January of 2006, we discussed an excerpt from David Hume's A Treatise of Human Nature entitled "Of Justice and Injustice." This month we return to the Treatise with a piece called "Of Personal Identity."

Interesting that the editors of the Great Books Reading and Discussion Program would pick not one but two selections from the Treatise, since the book generated little excitement when it was first published in 1739. Hume later repackaged his ideas in a work entitled "An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding."

D. G. C. McNabb in the Encyclopedia of Philosophy informs us that Hume was never an academic philosopher, but a "man of letters and to a lesser extent a man of affairs." He holds an important place in the history of philosophy as a radical empiricist and foil to rationalists like Immanuel Kant.

McNabb says Hume's primary motivation was to achieve fame in the literary and not in the philosophy world. If that were the case, why did he publish many of his works (including the Treatise) anonymously?

Questions on "A Simple Heart," by Flaubert

Did Félicité live a life worth living? Did Madame Aubain?

Is "A Simple Heart" a love story?

Why are the men in this story so unimpressive?

Why is Félicité's first communion less moving to her than Virginie's?

What is Flaubert's religious position? Is his realism to be taken at face value?

Is there a parallelism between the deaths of Victor and Virginie?

Why does Théodore's jilting of Félicité play an such an important role in the rest of her life?

Why is Madame Aubain so mean to Félicité?

Why does Flaubert have Félicité reject the Polish suitor over his theft of a salad (p. 49)?

Why, after Félicité and Madame Aubain exchange a kiss, does Flaubert say of Félicité that "Her native goodness unfolded in her heart"?

What does Loulou symbolize?

Is Loulou important in tying together the story?


For Textual Analysis

Pages 36-38, from "After bending her knee at the door" to "...but did not feel the same thrill."

Pages 46-48, from "For two whole nights Félcité did not leave to "...who had been paralyzed for some time."

Pages 55-56 from "The place contained such an assortment" to ..."stray in the direction of the bird."

Pages 60-62 , whole chapter

Author of the Month: Gustave Flaubert

The great French realist writer Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880) wrote to a female friend about month's selection, "A Simple Heart" (originally titled "L'Histoire d'un Coeur Simple" -- the "Story of a Simple Heart"). He said it "is nothing more or less than the account of an obscure life, that of a poor country girl, devout but not mystical, matter-of-factly devoted, tender with a tenderness redolent of freshly baked bread."*

*Letter to Edma Roger des Genettes, dated June 19, 1876 ; cited in Brown, Frederick, Flaubert: a Biography, New York: Little, Brown, 2006.

Some Questions about "First Principles of Morals," by Kant

Interpretive Questions

Kant asserts (p. 16) that "Now all imperatives command either hypothetically or categorically." What is a "hypothetical imperative"? What is a "categorical imperative"?

Read pages 15-17, beginning "Everything in nature works according to laws ..." to "action is good for some purpose, possible or actual ..."

Read pages 2-5, beginning, "There is, however, something so strange ..." to "may involve many a disappointment to the ends of inclination."

Re-read the last sentence, "For reason recognizes the establishment of a good will as its highest practical destination, and in attaining this purpose is capable only of a satisfaction of its own proper kind, namely, that from the attainment of an end, which end again is determined by reason only, notwithstanding that this may involve many a disappointment to the ends of inclination."

How is reason to cope with such a disappointment?


On page 8, Kant writes, "the second proposition is: That an action done from duty derives its moral worth, not from the purpose which is to be attained by it, but from the maxim by which it is determined, and therefore does not depend on the realization of the object of the action, but merely on the principle of volition by which the action has taken place, without regard to any object of desire." How can "moral worth" come from the source of the action, and not from its outcome?

Read pp. 8 through 11, from "The third proposition ..." to "Hence my maxim, as soon as it should be made a universal law, would necessarily destroy itself."

Re-read the sentence on p. 9, "I am never to act otherwise than so that I could also will that my maxim should become a universal law." Apply this to Kant's position on lying. What is the role of will in turning a maxim into a universal law?

Read pp. 11 through 13, from "If we have hitherto drawn our notion of duty from the common use of our practical reason" ... to "this duty is involved as duty in the idea of a reason determining the will by a priori principles." Why is Kant's notion duty based on a priori principles. (Note: "a priori" means "from before," that is, before experience).

Read pp. 19 through 22, from "There is therefore but one categorical imperative, namely this: Act only on that maxim whereby thou canst at the same time will that it should become a universal law ." to "Thus it has been completely shown by these examples how all duties depend as regards the nature of the obligation (not the object of the action) on the same principle."

Discuss how Kant applies his principles to four imagined individuals, who may be described as (1)depressive, (2) indebted, (3) hedonistic, and (4) self-satisfied. Are you convinced that all four would be unsuccessful in willing his actions into universal laws?

Capstone question: Why, according to Kant, does reason control will by means of a priori principles?

The last sentence of the selection reads, "We have not yet, however, advanced so far as to prove a priori that there actually is such an [categorical] imperative, that there is a practical law which commands absolutely of itself and without any other impulse, and that the following of this law is duty." Will Kant go on to prove this, and how?

Evaluative Question

Is it possible to identify people of "pure and good will." (p.1) Can someone who "is not adorned with a single feature of a pure and good will, enjoying unbroken prosperity ... never give pleasure to an impartial rational spectator." [Emphasis added]. In other words, is it universally unacceptable for good things to happen to bad people?

Author of the Month

W.H. Walsh, in the Encyclopedia of Philosophy, offers the following concise descriptor for Kant: "Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), propounder of the critical philosophy." Here is the statue of Kant in his native Königsberg (currently Russian Kaliningrad), where his daily constitutional was famous for its regularity.