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Single Idea 15269

[filed under theme 12. Knowledge Sources / D. Empiricism / 2. Associationism ]

Full Idea

The Humean event, the impression, basic to his epistemology, is, as we have seen, instantaneous in nature, punctiform and elemenentary, and from this characterisation follows its atomicity, its lack of internal connections with anything else.

Clarification

'Puntiform' means pointlike

Gist of Idea

Humean impressions are too instantaneous and simple to have structure or relations

Source

Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.IV)

Book Ref

Harré,R/Madden,E.H.: 'Causal Powers: A Theory of Natural Necessity' [Blackwell 1975], p.110

A Reaction

This simple point about Humean associationism is the key to grasping the whole hideous worldview that has gripped twentieth century philosophy. How many impressions make up an apple? And why do they sum to make something?

The 18 ideas with the same theme [knowledge built by ideas forming links in the mind]:

20306 Once we have experienced two feelings together, one will always give rise to the other [Spinoza]
12527 Some ideas connect together naturally, while others connect by chance or custom [Locke]
12542 Knowledge is just the connection or disagreement of our ideas [Locke]
12555 The constant link between whiteness and things that produce it is the basis of our knowledge [Locke]
2189 All ideas are connected by Resemblance, Contiguity in time or place, and Cause and Effect [Hume]
6489 Associationism results from having to explain intentionality just with sense-data [Robinson,H on Hume]
22005 Associations and causes cannot explain content, which needs norms of judgement [Kant, by Pinkard]
23697 I exist just as an intelligence aware of its faculty for combination [Kant]
14765 Association of ideas is the best philosophical idea of the prescientific age [Peirce]
19253 We talk of 'association by resemblance' but that is wrong: the association constitutes the resemblance [Peirce]
15269 Humean impressions are too instantaneous and simple to have structure or relations [Harré/Madden]
4047 Gestalt psychology proposes inbuilt proximity, similarity, smoothness and closure principles [Goldman]
12617 Associationism can't explain how truth is preserved [Fodor]
2493 According to empiricists abstraction is the fundamental mental process [Fodor]
3978 Associations are held to connect Ideas together in the way the world is connected together [Fodor]
7510 Connectionists say the mind is a general purpose learning device [Pinker]
14955 Rats find some obvious associations easier to learn than less obvious ones [Ladyman/Ross]
11141 Modern empiricism tends to emphasise psychological connections, not semantic relations [Margolis/Laurence]