Deleuze's Hume Pt. 2

The Mind, Imagination, and Ideas

“The mind is not nature, nor does it have a nature.” (E&S 22)

This a curious thing to say in a book on human nature. We can only assume while not having a nature in itself it must gain one through some process or principles. The purpose of this post is to answer precisely how these principles shape the mind into a system.

It’s necessary to sort out a bit of terminological ambiguity here. Deleuze uses almost interchangeable the terms mind, imagination, and ideas. He clearly says as much “Hume constantly affirms the identity between the mind, the imagination, and the ideas.” (E&S) The reasons for this will become clearer as we proceed.

First, we are presented with the given, this just means any perceptual experience. A book, a dog, a painting, or any perception before us are given as ideas. These simple, atomized ideas form the basis of Hume’s theory of mind. The mind is the collection of these simple ideas. This is why the interchangeability of these words is permissible. The mind is just this collection of ideas, atomized and unconnected. This goes for imagination at this point as well, Deleuze says “The collection of ideas is called ‘imagination,’ insofar as the collection designates not a faculty but rather an assemblage of things…” (E&S 22). So far we have perceptions taken in as simple ideas in the mind/imagination atomized and unconnected “a collection without an album, a play without a stage, a flux of perceptions.” (E&S 23).

How do we get from this assemblage to the subject?

Let’s start from the imagination. As Deleuze points out Hume says that ideas are in the imagination. Deleuze says that the preposition is a metaphorical tool to exclude from the mind/imagination any process that is not the movement of ideas, or as stated earlier a perceptual flux. It is also important to note that the imagination does not do anything with the ideas. It is a location where the doings take place. Of the actual activity of the imagination Deleuze says it is “…being whimsical and delirious, is without constancy and without uniformity.” (E&S 23). Keep in mind that constancy and uniformity are the two qualities that prevent the psychology of the mind.

“The is no constancy or uniformity in the ideas that I have. No more is there constancy or uniformity in the way in which ideas are connected through the imagination: only chance makes up this connection.” (E&S 23).

To get from the delirious connections of the imagination to human nature we need principles of association that will provide constancy and uniformity. These principles are contiguity, resemblance, and causality. The principles affect the ideas and are exterior to them. Causality is also the means through which the subject transcends the given. As Deleuze puts it “Literally, the subject goes beyond what the mind gives it: I believe in what I have neither seen nor touched.” (E&S 24).

Deleuze emphasizes the principle of causality, stating “It confers upon the idea of the object a solidity and an objectivity that this idea would not have had it only been associated through contiguity or resemblance to an actual impression.” (E&S 24). Deleuze cites this passage in the Treatise where Hume is referring to the assumption that the identity of an object has not changed while our perception of it is interrupted:

“But this conclusion beyond the impressions of our senses can be founded only on the connexion of cause and effect; nor can we otherwise have any security, that the object is not changed upon us, however much the new object may resemble that which was formerly present to the senses. Whenever we discover such a perfect resemblance, we consider, whether it be common in that species of objects; whether possibly or probably any cause coued operate in producing the change and resemblance; and according as we determine concerning these causes and effects, we form our judgment concerning the identity of the object.” (Treatise 74)

I’m a bit shaky on the reasoning here but I’m going to take a shot at it. So, Deleuze says that there is an objectivity and solidity of an object given through causality that would not be present via contiguity and resemblance. The objectivity and solidity here refer to the constant identity of the object through time. Regardless of how much the object maintains a resemblance, it offers us no assurance of its continued identity.

Okay, I discovered an old blog post by Corry Shores (who also wrote a great book on Deleuze’s Logic) that explains this excerpt very simply which I’ll paraphrase. When we see an object twice at two different times we are forming two perceptial ideas. There is nothing given in the object(s) that impresses a unified identity on the mind. Though there is nothing given in the objects we passively assume an identity beyond the given. Shores uses the example of a statue. We see the statue at one time and then again several hours later. The statue is the same except the difference in the sun’s position has caused a change in the shadow of the statue. We wonder to ourselves “What caused the difference in the shadow of the statue?” We know that the statue is made of stone and thus not prone to sudden change, we also know that the sun is constantly changing its position relative to the earth. We conclude that the changing shadow is not something inherent in the statue but caused externally by the sun’s position. We then wonder if perhaps someone replaced the statue when we weren’t looking, but this would be quite troublesome, and can safely rule it out. We can then be fairly certain that this statue is identical at both times we encounter it.

So the reasoning that Deleuze and Hume use is a bit clearer now. Given two perceptual ideas of an object at different times, we consider the qualities and changes present to associate causally the two ideas into an identity persisting through time.

I’m going to end this post here because I wanted to keep these to around a thousand words. Originally I was planning on doing one post per chapter of E&S (I’m barely a few pages into chapter one lol) but it’s hard not to spiral out when talking about a fun book.

Deleuze, G., & Boundas, C. V. (2001). Empiricism and subjectivity: An essay on Hume’s theory of human nature. Columbia U.P.

Hume, David. Treatise of Human Nature. Edited by L. A. Selby-Bigge, 2nd ed., Oxford University Press, 1978

Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, Book 1, Part 3, Sect 2 “Of probability; and of the idea of cause and effect” §§168-183. (n.d.). https://piratesandrevolutionaries.blogspot.com/2009/02/hume-treatise-of-human-nature-book-1_2881.html