Abstract
In this chapter, I defend the Idealist interpretation of the belief about “bodies” Hume ascribes to us (both vulgar and philosophers), according to which we can only think about perceptions, and not, as the Materialist Hume claims, about material bodies. First, I adduce some explicit statements Hume makes that show he endorses the Idealist construal of object terms. Second, I argue that the cognitive/semantic considerations Hume adduces when characterising the belief in “bodies” suggest (after some interpretative work) that we can only think of perceptions. Third, I show that some of the argumentative moves he makes, for instance in his discussion of Nominalism, much better comport with the Idealist interpretation.
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Notes
- 1.
As Flage notes (2007, p. 153), what (if anything) causes our perceptions is a contingent matter. So this cannot be a way of defining – via relative ideas – the term ‘material object’ or object-terms (‘tree’, ‘bed’, etc.). But elsewhere (1990, p. 44), Flage himself seems to approve of the definition, and ascribes it to Hume. Perhaps the former is his considered (present) view.
- 2.
This is Peter Kail’s suggestion (private communication).
- 3.
According to Pappas (1989, p. 347), Hume “does not explicitly link [the CP] and abstract ideas”. Rather, the denial of abstract ideas functions “to fend off a quick and easy refutation of [the CP]” (1989, p. 348). This claim is doubly mistaken. Hume does link the two explicitly: he invokes the CP to argue against abstract ideas. And when he comes to deny abstract ideas, he has already (T 1.1.1; SBN 1-7) established the CP and contended with a counter-example (the missing shade of blue). And he doesn’t say that abstract ideas might constitute a counter-example to the CP. So his view of the order of support is the reverse from the one Pappas suggests. Anticipating this objection, Pappas claims not to be concerned with Hume’s intentions (1989, p. 350). Perhaps he thinks Hume’s system would be better supported if the order of justification were reversed, since the denial of abstract ideas can be supported without invoking the CP: Hume cites two additional arguments that do not rely on the CP. But then, this is irrelevant to my concern, which is interpretative.
- 4.
Stanistreet (2002, pp. 156–7) thinks that the philosophers’ view, according to Hume, is incoherent (and cannot, therefore, be endorsed by him). But the contradiction Hume thinks he discerns is between the deliverances of the imagination (our perceptions exist independently and continuously) and reason (perceptions are dependent). So it is the vulgar view that Hume thinks to be incoherent. The philosophical view is more faithful to reason: it retains the independence by ascribing it to something other than our perceptions. This is doing something that is more than sufficient for meeting the objection.
- 5.
Bennett thinks the explanation is unsuccessful, because the argument that shows the belief to be consistent is too abstruse to be comprehended by the vulgar.
- 6.
Whereas we cannot, according to Hume, have an inconsistent thought (or belief), it is possible, he thinks, to have logically incompatible beliefs. But when the contradiction is fairly apparent, such a state is unstable, because painful. “[A]ny contradiction…gives a sensible uneasiness…there being here an opposition betwixt the notion of the identity of resembling perceptions, and the interruption of their appearance, the mind…will naturally seek relief from the uneasiness” (T 1.4.2.37; SBN 205-6). Elsewhere (EHU 12.20; SBN 157), he wonders “How any clear, distinct idea can contain circumstances, contradictory to itself, or to any other clear, distinct idea, is absolutely incomprehensible; and is, perhaps, as absurd as any proposition, which can be formed”. But the two passages are compatible, because in the latter, Hume claims that clear and distinct ideas cannot contradict one another. So if two beliefs contradict one another, at least one is not clear and distinct.
- 7.
This is a different suggestion from Strawson’s (1989, pp. 44–5) as to how Kripke can be enlisted on Hume’s behalf. Strawson argues that Kripke’s notion of a rigid designator enables Hume to secure reference for the term ‘external body’.
- 8.
See (Naaman-Zauderer, 2010, ch. 1) for a detailed discussion of the various proposals.
- 9.
There is an important difference between the ways in which these two commentators depart from the (traditional) phenomenological understanding of Humean belief so as to allow for non-imagistic beliefs. Everson thinks that impressions needn’t be images. So, of course, ideas needn’t be either. They “copy” impressions by having – to some extent – their causal powers. Loeb, by contrast, construes the role of the CP so that it is compatible with non-imagistic ideas. Ideas without corresponding impressions do not have “positive” (impression-based) content, but they have enough content (“quasi-content”) to allow them to be believed, albeit without justification.
- 10.
I needn’t, for instance, decide whether belief, for Hume, is a disposition to action, reasoning and for the occurrence of image (Loeb, 2002), or to having an image and being disposed to act and to reason. I think the former is more reasonable as an account of belief, but less plausible as an interpretation of Hume. In defending a “double-aspect” account interpretation of Hume, Kamooneh (2003) doesn’t distinguish between the two versions.
- 11.
Marušić (2010) argues that the inclusion of a phenomenal component in belief makes for a more explanatory theory than a purely dispositional one.
- 12.
Hume is inconsistent in his use of the terms ‘vivacity’ and ‘liveliness’. In the following passage, he uses the term ‘vivacity’ to denote both aspects of belief, and ‘liveliness’ to denote the phenomenal one: “[B]elief…is nothing but the vivacity of those perceptions…’Tis merely the force and liveliness of the perception which constitutes [belief]” (T 1.3.5.5; SBN 86, my italics). In another passage, he uses the term ‘vivacity’ erratically, sometimes denoting whatever it is that makes for belief; at others – its phenomenal component: “Having…shewn that [belief] consists in a lively idea…let us now proceed to examine…what bestows the vivacity on the idea…[an] impression communicates to [ideas] a share of its force and vivacity…the mind applies itself to the conception of the related idea with all the force and vivacity it acquir’d” (T 1.3.8.1-2; SBN 98-9, my italics).
- 13.
I am grateful to Avital Hazony for bringing this to my attention.
- 14.
Here we have a conflict between the functional and the phenomenal criteria: a belief may be fainter than an idea of the imagination. A similar conflict occurs when an emotion, which is an impression, “may decay into so soft an emotion, as to become, in a manner, imperceptible” (T 2.1.1.3; SBN 276). “A passion…in a tragedy…feels less firm and solid: And has no other than the…effect of exciting the spirits…The force of our mental actions in this case, no more than in any other, is not to be measur’d by the apparent agitation of the mind. A poetical description may have a more sensible effect on the fancy, than an historical narration [that we believe]” (T App; SBN 631). Hume also allows for a discrepancy falling short of a conflict between the two criteria for distinguishing between ideas and impressions. Impressions have to do with feeling; ideas with thinking. And, Hume notes, we can have thoughts that are (almost) as lively (phenomenally) as sensations: “our ideas may approach to our impressions…notwithstanding this near resemblance in a few instances” (T 1.1.1.2: SBN 2, my italics). These are cases in which the functional and phenomenal tests give the same verdict, but the former is much more clear-cut.
- 15.
In introducing the argument, Hume suggests that the difficulty it exposes is not the one pertaining to substance in general. “This question”, he says with respect to the mind, “is burthen’d with some additional [difficulties]…which are peculiar to the subject” (T 1.4.5.3; SBN 232). But the argument he then adduces seems equally pertinent against substance in general: “how can an impression resemble a substance, since…it is not a substance, and has none of the peculiar qualities or characteristics of a substance?”.
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Weintraub, R. (2024). Arguments for the Idealist Interpretation. In: Humean Bodies and their Consequences. Jerusalem Studies in Philosophy and History of Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-50799-1_3
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