Hume Personal Identity

Personal identity is a persistent debate which plays a great role in modern philosophy, it centres around the concept of a consistent and continuous concept of self, which we as individuals identify with, it is the question of “what constitutes the persistence of personhood over time?” Hume’s theory of personal identity suggests that the term “self” is coined in a misleading manner, which assumes it to be an independent concept. His theory on personal identity, or namely the lack of it, argues that there is no concept of a self only a culmination of rapid successive perceptions. Hume develops this idea in his book Treatise, where he attempts to answer the question of what a personal identity is through criticism and analysis of the different

Specifically, his account does contradict itself, a fact that he does acknowledge. The contradiction occurs in terms of the origin of his idea that perceptions are distinct entities. Hume seems to be unable to prevent himself from utilising the common belief, which he argues against, namely that there are connections between distinct individual perceptions, connection which are not observable or traceable through his method of introspection. This is further supported by the fact that, even though Hume tries to highlight the idea that we have no perception of abstract concepts such as identity, he still utilises terms such as, mind, soul and self, in the text, in order to describe instance that fall outside of the realm of perceptions. It seems despite Hume’s attempts, concepts of these entities are utilised in creating a semblance of connection amongst perceptions in terms of identity. Although one could defend Hume’s theory by approaching it as an analysis of the mind instead of a refusal of its existence, because Hume’s theory presents us with the concept of “bundled perceptions” which can be understood as the components of the conceptual mind, this would mean that Hume is not refusing to acknowledge the existence of a mind fully, but only the philosophical idea that the mind is mental substance.

The idea of the mind being a mental substance is advocated for by René Descartes who proposed that human nature exists in duality, through mental and physical substances. Descartes argues that by assuming that identity and the mind are of the mental substance, changes to the physical substance would not interfere with their continued and uninterrupted existence, but as has been previously mentioned the text Hume disagrees with this idea and provides arguments which refute