According to Hume he believes that self is an illusion or a fiction because self is collection of impressions that we make perceptions which we get from our thoughts. In other words he’s saying we don’t have direct impressions of our selves. In my understanding he says how could we know or how can others know we did something. In the reading he mentions many quotes that bring interest for example he says something about knowing ourselves that it has to be a constant idea and our impressions must be constant as well. But he does realize how we as humans will change our impressions and will be subject to change since we are getting more mature as we grow. I can relate to couple of things where in my past I learned how we can change and when i was a child i would enjoy speaking to my father and spending time with him. But now that I’m a women I don’t even talk to him, and perhaps I could say I don’t want to spend time with him. Or we could simply change by having activities from the past that we enjoyed but now we don’t do those activated because we’re not interested. Hume also mentioned ” If any impression gives rise to the idea of self, that impression must continue invariably the same, through the whole course of our lives; since self is suppose to exist after that manner. But there is no impression contestant invariable(pg 326). Hume is trying to explain to us how having pain , joy or passion don’t exist all at once, he says his impressions don’t last forever, and for nobody else either. For instance, when we have a happy moment in life like a birthday party for your children, you don’t have the joy or the same joy you did before their birthday. Thats because when we are in the present of having joy you’re happy and after the birthday party is over you’re not as excited as you used to be when you were planning it for your children.
Therefore, with Humes arguments I am convinced on how we all change and we all grow up and someday get more mature and won’t enjoy doing the same things as we used to do, or simply be interested in things we used to do back in the day. Another thing that I thought was very interested about this reading was how Hume explained his main point, he said we need perceptions but also senses. He explains in the reading further on how without senses we would “stumble in life”. Humes says we need to hear, smell, touch and feel and without it we wouldn’t be alive. I agree with him but he did mention that when we’re dreaming or sleeping he doesn’t consider us having the knowledge that were asleep and can’t know something without our senses. (word count486 ).
Small world 