The principles of association of ideas: David Hume

David Hume was born on May 7, 1711 in the Scottish city of Edinburgh. He was a philosopher, essayist and historian who became known for the radicalism of his empiricism and the skepticism present in his thinking. The importance of his thought is due to his attempt to apply in the moral sciences the methodology exposed by Newton in the astronomical and physical spheres. Hume, with his thesis that all of man’s knowledge originates and derives from the senses, challenges Cartesian rationalism – which considers knowledge to be closely linked to reason – as well as the Western metaphysical tradition as a whole.

In this text, we aim to address the innovation made by the philosopher regarding the use of the principles of association, that is, we will scrutinize the principles of association of Humean ideas and their intimate connection with language. However, before exposing these principles, a brief introduction to Humean concepts and theory is necessary so that there is a better understanding of our objects. Such objects are found in his two works Treatise of Human Nature (1740) and Inquiry into Human Understanding (1748). However, we will analyze our objects according to the expositions made in this second work, which is divided into twelve sections and is a reconstruction of the First Part of the Treatise.

Hume criticizes the entire metaphysical discourse about the phenomena that occur in the world and, more than that, proposes that there is an inadequacy between language and the object to which it refers. As can be seen, Hume’s philosophy aims to dissolve the Platonic-Cartesian and Christian philosophical paradigm of the split between sensible and suprasensible. There is, therefore, distrust of language and reason, and, as a consequence, the skepticism present in his philosophy becomes evident.

To solve this problem, the philosopher presents his first proposition about human knowledge: all human ideas derive from impressions – a class of perceptions. Impressions originate, in turn, from sensations – internal experience – or from feelings – external experience. From impressions arise ideas and thoughts, that is, ideas and thoughts are pale copies of impressions, which are kept in imagination or memory. The contents of the mind are understood by the philosopher as impressions and ideas, the former being more vivid than the latter.

In order to better understand what Hume conceives by perception, we must bear in mind how perceptions are divided into: 1) impressions – which are vivid perceptions, external and internal sensations; 2) ideas or thoughts – which are less vivid perceptions because they are copies of impressions. However, external sensations are those arising from the five senses and may be accompanied by feeling; internal sensations, on the other hand, refer to feelings. Thoughts, in turn, are copies of impressions and when accompanied by feelings, they can conceive new impressions. Therefore, this is the origin of human knowledge, according to the Scottish philosopher, and it is through this perspective that the difference, inherited from Plato and also found in Descartes, about the opposition between the sensible and intelligible world is revoked.

By determining that knowledge comes from impressions, the limits of this and of language are exposed: everything that can be expressed and known about the world – about matters of fact – is limited to what is based on experience, limited to the that is supplied to our senses and sensations. Thus, any discourse, whether physical or metaphysical, is conceived as a combination of basic thoughts based on impressions about the object at certain times. This combination of terms that refer to perceptible objects results in complex sentence structures, based on simple ideas – which come from the sensible world. Nevertheless, the reality of the world, according to Hume, is composed of impressions and copies of impressions.

Feeling something and then bringing that feeling to memory or imagination are different things, and it is in this way that perceptions linked to sensations can be copied or imitated. However, the vividness and force of these sensations cannot be copied by memory or imagination, nor by any speech or thought. As all ideas come from the external senses, or come from the representation of a thought in the mind of something previously felt by it, man cannot think of anything that he has not seen outside himself or felt in his own mind. Only the strongest perceptions or impressions are innate.

The author states that thought seems to have no limits, and because of this, speculation begins and talks about what cannot be said (such as metaphysical entities, angels, spirits, etc.). However, thought is detained within “very narrow limits, and that all this creative power of the mind consists merely in the ability to compose, transpose, increase or decrease the materials that the senses and experience provide us” (HUME, 1999, p. 13). By combining simple ideas based on sensations, a composite idea is obtained that describes, apparently, an autonomous entity, which is, however, only a combination of words – clothing of thought – for the formation of a complex period, which it does not come from experience.

After this brief exposition on the theory of human knowledge according to Hume, we focus on the question about the association of ideas. Ideas and thoughts are involuntarily associated with each other through connection principles, constituting different chains of thought, which are exchanged by people in a sonorous way through phrases, words, dialogues, texts, science, etc. And they are intended to express meanings. Thoughts have laws through which they connect to the intellect, that is, there are families of ideas that form various forms of speech – from trivial conversations to more serious reasoning. The principles of connections also apply to dreams: imagination has the ability to make present what is absent, while memory is the ability to store images and words. Both do not work without rules, without a logical connection between thoughts and images – which are tasks of memory and imagination. By admitting such laws, a metaphysical remnant is evident in Hume, since there seems to be a belief, on the part of the philosopher, in an internal order according to which associations occur.

Thus, as Hume exposes in Section III of the Inquiry, there is evidence of the existence of a principle of connection between the diverse thoughts or ideas of the human spirit. When these present themselves to memory or imagination, “they introduce each other with a certain method and regularity” (HUME, 1999, p. 14). Even in the case of daydreams, the imagination does not wander without a connection between the various ideas that follow one another.

Among the most different languages, even those in which we cannot suppose the slightest connection or communication, we find that the words that express the most complex ideas almost correspond to each other, which is a sure proof that the simple ideas, understood in the ideas complex, they were linked by some universal principle that had equal influence on all men (HUME, 1999, p. 14).

Even if the connection of different ideas is notorious, it cannot be perceived by observation. Hume points out that no philosopher bothered to list or classify the principles of association of ideas, that is, principles of: similarity, contiguity in time and space, cause and effect. As an example of this connection, a painting takes the man’s thoughts to the original due to the similarity between both. However, there is the difficulty of proving the completeness of this enumeration, and for this reason, the philosopher aims to resume several examples and scrutinize the principle that reciprocally links thoughts. One should therefore stop when the principle is general, as far as possible.

The consequences, the effects arising from this connection on the imagination and on the passions are now considered by the philosopher: “Since man is a rational being and is continually looking for happiness, which he hopes to achieve for the satisfaction of some passion or affection, rarely acts, thinks or speaks without purpose or intention” (HUME, 1999, p. 14). Man always aims at some object, even if inadequate means are used to reach the expected end. Thus, man does not think or reflect when he does not aim at some satisfaction.

In genius compositions, it is imperative that the author has a plan or object. Furthermore, in narrative compositions, the events or acts reported by the writer must be united by some link, they must be united to each other in the imagination to the point of forming a kind of unit that is capable of placing them in only one plane, in only one plane. a point of view. The principle of connection between different events forms the theme of a story or a poem. This principle may differ according to the author’s plans. In the case of Ovid, the principle used was that of similarity, as the fabulous transformation brought about by the power of the gods is present in his work. Thus, “Nothing but this condition is needed for an event to converge to its original plan or intention” (HUME, 1999, p. 15).

In the case of a historian or an analyst who aims to write the history – lasting a century – of Europe, he is guided by the principle of contiguity in space and time. Events that occurred in a certain portion of space and in a certain period of time are placed in the historian’s plans, even if there are different characteristics and no connection between them. Despite the differences, one can note, according to the philosopher, “a kind of unity among all diversity” (HUME, 1999, p. 15).

The most common type of relationship that occurs between different events in a narrative composition is that of cause and effect. By following the series of actions in their natural order, the historian returns to principles and sources, and is able to describe the far-off consequences this event may have. His task is to choose the theme – a certain portion of the chain of events that make up the history of mankind – and to elucidate in his narrative the links in the historical chain of this theme. For the empiricist philosopher, the greater the continuity of the chain of events, the more perfect the work.

The historian bears in mind that knowledge of causation is most satisfactory, “since this relation or connection is stronger than all others, but also most instructive, for it is by this knowledge alone that we are able to control events and govern the world. future” (HUME, 1999, p. 15). The unity of action is evidenced by the philosopher, which was also discussed by critics who succeeded Aristotle, but nothing was obtained. In both tragic and epic works, a certain unity is advocated – since thoughts cannot wander without…