more from this thinker
|
more from this text
Single Idea 21295
[filed under theme 16. Persons / E. Rejecting the Self / 4. Denial of the Self
]
Full Idea
When I enter most intimately into myself I always stumble on some particular perception or other, of heat or cold, love or hatred, pain or pleasure. I never can catch myself at any time without a perception, and never observe any thing but the perception.
Gist of Idea
When I introspect I can only observe my perceptions, and never a self which has them
Source
David Hume (Treatise of Human Nature [1739], I.IV.6)
Book Ref
Hume,David: 'A Treatise of Human Nature', ed/tr. Selby-Bigge/Nidditch [OUP 1978], p.252
A Reaction
It isn't like looking for your car in the car park. The prior question should be: assuming you do have a persisting self, what would you expect introspection to reveal about it?
The
24 ideas
with the same theme
[denial that there is any such thing as a 'Self']:
|
5517
|
Individuals don't exist, but are conventional names for sets of elements
[Buddha]
|
|
7277
|
The perfect man has no self
[Zhuangzi (Chuang Tzu)]
|
|
7286
|
To see with true clarity, your self must be irrelevant
[Zhuangzi (Chuang Tzu)]
|
|
7906
|
When the Buddha reached the highest level of insight, he could detect no self in the world
[Ashvaghosha]
|
|
21294
|
A continuous lifelong self must be justified by a single sustained impression, which we don't have
[Hume]
|
|
21295
|
When I introspect I can only observe my perceptions, and never a self which has them
[Hume]
|
|
21298
|
We pretend our perceptions are continuous, and imagine a self to fill the gaps
[Hume]
|
|
21304
|
Identity in the mind is a fiction, like that fiction that plants and animals stay the same
[Hume]
|
|
21308
|
We have no impression of the self, and we therefore have no idea of it
[Hume]
|
|
21310
|
Does an oyster with one perception have a self? Would lots of perceptions change that?
[Hume]
|
|
4175
|
It is as perverse to resent our individuality being replaced by others, as to resent the body renewing itself
[Schopenhauer]
|
|
24099
|
We contain many minds, which fight for the 'I' of the mind
[Nietzsche]
|
|
7148
|
The 'I' is a conceptual synthesis, not the governor of our being
[Nietzsche]
|
|
7138
|
The 'I' is a fiction used to make the world of becoming 'knowable'
[Nietzsche]
|
|
4527
|
Perhaps we are not single subjects, but a multiplicity of 'cells', interacting to create thought
[Nietzsche]
|
|
6475
|
In perception, the self is just a logical fiction demanded by grammar
[Russell]
|
|
20114
|
Everyone is other, and no one is himself
[Heidegger]
|
|
23498
|
The modern idea of the subjective soul is composite, and impossible
[Wittgenstein]
|
|
7115
|
Maybe it is the act of reflection that brings 'me' into existence
[Sartre]
|
|
7121
|
The Ego only appears to reflection, so it is cut off from the World
[Sartre]
|
|
7370
|
The brain is controlled by shifting coalitions, guided by good purposeful habits
[Dennett]
|
|
7655
|
The work done by the 'homunculus in the theatre' must be spread amongst non-conscious agencies
[Dennett]
|
|
5518
|
It doesn't matter whether I exist with half my components replaced (any more than an audio system)
[Parfit]
|
|
5349
|
For Buddhists a fixed self is a morally dangerous illusion
[Flanagan]
|