Substance and Mental Identity in Hume's Treatise

Abstract

Hume's discussion of personal identity is generally regarded as an interesting failure. A good deal of the attention that it has received has been precisely because of this : it has been an obvious specimen for those wanting to practise the art of philosophical trouble-shooting. The diagnosis has varied widely: it is a failure that has its roots in Hume's atomism, or it turns out to be an inevitable product of this sort of scepticism; it is the outcome of an attempt to solve a false problem, or it is the absurd consequence of Hume's egocentric perspective. And, just as there is disagreement as to the respect in which Hume was mistaken, there is likewise no agreement about the depth of the trouble, with nearly anything from a number of obvious, but disastrous mistakes 1 to a Nemesis of confusion 2 being found in this brief exploration of personal identity. Hume, who was the initiator in this condemnation of his account, seems to have chosen with some foresight his characterization of it as a labyrinth . In light of all this, it might be thought that any attempt to defend the conclusions at which Hume arrives in this section of the Treatise would be