Of Personal Identity

David Hume believes that the idea of self is false. He states “every person is just their own collection of perceptions acquired throughout their lives and constantly in a state of flux.“ His argument is that our identity is not our collection of perceptions but rather the bond felt between the collection of perceptions. He exemplifies this by saying “The mind is a kind of theater”(pg 1). I believe that Hume is trying to say our minds are illusions, just like the movies we watch at a movie theater. The movie is not to be judged in accordance to a scene to scene manner but is rather judged as all the scenes combined, just as one assesses or judges ones own personal identity. I also believe Hume is trying to say that we do not know what is going to happen next in our lives. The next scene of a film is always unknown. You can make assumptions based on previous scenes but your prediction will never be exact just as in life as you can’t predict the next day, next hour, or even the next minute. Another quote that illustrates the argument is ”If any impression gives rise to the idea of self, that impression must continue invariably the same, thro’ the whole course of our lives; since self  self is suppose to exist after that manner.But there is no impression constant invariable. Pain and pleasure, grief and joy, passions and sensations succeed each other, and never all exist at the same time”. According to Humes impressions do not last forever and we cannot depend on our impressions to assess self identity. This assertion comes from the ever-changing nature of our lives. For example, someone may meet you at a dark point in life thus creating a negative impression. These same two people meet later in life and now you are a college graduate. This creates a different impression of a person. Impressions may not change as drastically as that, but this example demonstrates the fallibility of using impressions because impressions are lost in the moment and that moment will never be the same just as no impression will ever be the same. Later in the excerpt, Hume states “I never catch myself at any time without a perception, and never can observe anything but the perception.” Everything that is viewed is viewed from a lens of past perspective or from eyes looking forward. Our perception of self is nothing more than a perception and we can never see the true self.

I do not find the argument convincing. I can only view gravity through perception just as I can with the self. This does not mean that the identity of self does not exist. This argument is my thought process as to why the idea that the self is an illusion is not convincing. Some elements of the argument are convincing such as not assessing the self based on impressions as impressions are constantly changing. I also find it convincing that our self is the collection of perceptions we have acquired over our lives. These two premises alone were not enough to convince me that the self does not actually exist.

(531 words).