David Hume Of Personal Identity?

Question

I need MAJOR HELP!!!

Can anyone explain to me David Hume's argument in Of Personal Identity??

Answer 1

Ok, Hume is often a toughy, but I will give you a little peek into his views on Personal Identity....

He (somewhat) argues that Personal Identity, as we commonly use the term, as it relates to "ordinary people", does not exist.  At least not in the way that we think it does.  

The key term here is "bundle of perceptions".  He defines the identity of a person as nothing more than the totality of that persons perceptions, this bundle makes up the "identity" of that person.  However, these perceptions are always in flux!  There is no moment during conscious life where our perceptions remain constant through time.

This differs from any regular non-conscious object.  He talks about the identity of objects being definable because they (for practical purposes) stay the same through time, so that if a person were to examine them today, tomorrow, or next week, they would still be the same object.  The ways in which objects remain the same constitutes their identity.  

But since the Identity of a Personality is the constituents of its Perceptual Bundle, and those constituents are always in flux...Personal Identity does not exist, in the same way, as other ordinary objects, and in a sense, could be said not to exist at all.  

Hume quote about this:

"Thus the principle of individuation is

nothing but the invariableness and

uninterruptedness of any object, thro' a

suppos'd variation of time, by which the

mind can trace it in the different

periods of its existence, without any

hreak of the view, and without being

oblig'd to form the idea of multiplicity

or number."

Hope that helps at least a little!