Duration and Persistence: Substance in the Analogies
Duration and Persistence: Substance in the Analogies
This chapter discusses what we normally think of as two temporally separated perceptions of a single object. As Hume observed, such perceptual experiences are numerically distinct occurrences ‘in the mind’ separated from each other by an incredibly diverse stream of innumerable items of the same sort (impressions). What Hume wants is an account of the way in which the idea of a relation of identity can be derived from original impressions, but his Separability Principle evidently implies that no such account can be forthcoming. Since an impression of a relation must be a relation of impressions, no single impression could give rise to the idea of one single item's self-identity. The notion that Hume in fact invokes in response to these puzzles about identity is that of duration of time. Given Hume's principles, a mere change in the time, without change or alteration, is not so easy to imagine. Like Kant, Hume is clear that time itself cannot be perceived.
Keywords: perception, perceptual experience, separability, analogies, judgments, impression
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