Descartes, Locke and Hume

Abstract

Yeandle focuses on Carter’s engagement with René Descartes, John Locke and David Hume in this chapter. Discussing ideas of how knowledge is formed and how identities and countries are constructed, the chapter examines Carter’s rejection of innatist arguments and thus her damning reading of Descartes, and situates Carter in line with the empiricists, Locke and Hume. Her deconstruction of Descartes’s philosophy is discussed in relation to The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman (1972), while Carter’s engagement with Locke’s work on knowledge and identity spans her career and is central to texts ranging from Shadow Dance (1966) to The Passion of New Eve (1977) and Nights at the Circus (1984). Carter’s sympathetic reaction towards Hume’s theories of the self and of causation in Several Perceptions (1968) and Love (1971) is also examined.