The Scottish Philosophy [86]
joined, and reckons them the same, and mistakes the succession of images for an identity of objects. {144}
The result reached by him is," All our distinct perceptions are distinct existences," and ,the mind never perceives any real connection among distinct existences." "What we call mind is nothing but a heap or collection of different impressions united together by certain relations, and supposed, though falsely, to be endowed with a perfect simplicity and identity." He gives the same account of what we call matter. He shows that having nothing but impressions, we can never, on the mere ground of a conjunction which we have never witnessed, argue from our perceptions to the existence of external continued objects; and he proves (very conclusively, I think, on his assumption), that we could never have any reason to infer that the supposed objects resemble our sensations.[40] He now draws his sceptical conclusion: " There is a direct and total opposition betwixt our reason and our senses, or, more properly speaking, betwixt those conclusions which we form from cause and effect, and those that persuade us of the continued and independent existence of body. When we reason from cause and effect, we conclude that neither color, sound, taste, nor smell have a continued and independent existence. When we exclude these sensible qualities, there remains nothing in the universe which has such an existence."
The question is: How is such a scepticism to be met? Reid opposed it by showing that the sensation leads us intuitively to believe in the existence of the external thing, and that the states of self, known by consciousness, imply a thinking substance. {145} The more correct statement seems to me to be, that we know at once the external objects; that intuitively we know our own frame and objects affecting it; that we are conscious, not of states arguing a self, but of self in a certain state; and that, on comparing a former self recalled by memory and a present self known by consciousness, we declare them to be the same. Kant certainly did not meet the scepticism of Hume in a wise or in an effective manner, when he supposed that the unity was given to the scattered phenomena by forms in the mind.
It is clear that all the usual psychological arguments for the immateriality and immortality of the soul are cut up and destroyed by this theory. We cannot speak of the soul as either material or spiritual, for we know nothing either of matter or spirit except as momentary impressions. The identity which we ascribe to the mind of man is only a fictitious one." Identity is nothing really belonging to these different perceptions, but is merely a quality which we attribute to them because of the union of their ideas in the imagination, when we reflect upon them.
His theory of causation undermines the argument for the divine existence. He carefully abstains from dwelling on this in his great philosophic work, but he expounds it at great length, and with all his intellectual power, in his " Dialogues on Natural Religion." We know nothing of cause, except that it has been observed to be the antecedent of its effect; when we have noticed an occurrence usually preceded by another occurrence, we may on discovering the one look for the other. But when we have never seen the events together, we have really nothing to guide us in arguing from the one to the other. We can argue that a watch implies a watchmaker, for we have observed them together; but never having had any experience of the making of a world, we cannot argue that the existence of a world implies the existence of a world maker. There is no effective way of answering this objection, but by maintaining that an effect necessarily implies a cause. It was on this ground that he was met by Reid, who argues that traces of design in God's works argue an intelligent cause. Kant deprived himself of the right to argue in this way, by making the mind itself impose the relation of causation on events, {146} so that we cannot argue that there is a corresponding law
The result reached by him is," All our distinct perceptions are distinct existences," and ,the mind never perceives any real connection among distinct existences." "What we call mind is nothing but a heap or collection of different impressions united together by certain relations, and supposed, though falsely, to be endowed with a perfect simplicity and identity." He gives the same account of what we call matter. He shows that having nothing but impressions, we can never, on the mere ground of a conjunction which we have never witnessed, argue from our perceptions to the existence of external continued objects; and he proves (very conclusively, I think, on his assumption), that we could never have any reason to infer that the supposed objects resemble our sensations.[40] He now draws his sceptical conclusion: " There is a direct and total opposition betwixt our reason and our senses, or, more properly speaking, betwixt those conclusions which we form from cause and effect, and those that persuade us of the continued and independent existence of body. When we reason from cause and effect, we conclude that neither color, sound, taste, nor smell have a continued and independent existence. When we exclude these sensible qualities, there remains nothing in the universe which has such an existence."
The question is: How is such a scepticism to be met? Reid opposed it by showing that the sensation leads us intuitively to believe in the existence of the external thing, and that the states of self, known by consciousness, imply a thinking substance. {145} The more correct statement seems to me to be, that we know at once the external objects; that intuitively we know our own frame and objects affecting it; that we are conscious, not of states arguing a self, but of self in a certain state; and that, on comparing a former self recalled by memory and a present self known by consciousness, we declare them to be the same. Kant certainly did not meet the scepticism of Hume in a wise or in an effective manner, when he supposed that the unity was given to the scattered phenomena by forms in the mind.
It is clear that all the usual psychological arguments for the immateriality and immortality of the soul are cut up and destroyed by this theory. We cannot speak of the soul as either material or spiritual, for we know nothing either of matter or spirit except as momentary impressions. The identity which we ascribe to the mind of man is only a fictitious one." Identity is nothing really belonging to these different perceptions, but is merely a quality which we attribute to them because of the union of their ideas in the imagination, when we reflect upon them.
His theory of causation undermines the argument for the divine existence. He carefully abstains from dwelling on this in his great philosophic work, but he expounds it at great length, and with all his intellectual power, in his " Dialogues on Natural Religion." We know nothing of cause, except that it has been observed to be the antecedent of its effect; when we have noticed an occurrence usually preceded by another occurrence, we may on discovering the one look for the other. But when we have never seen the events together, we have really nothing to guide us in arguing from the one to the other. We can argue that a watch implies a watchmaker, for we have observed them together; but never having had any experience of the making of a world, we cannot argue that the existence of a world implies the existence of a world maker. There is no effective way of answering this objection, but by maintaining that an effect necessarily implies a cause. It was on this ground that he was met by Reid, who argues that traces of design in God's works argue an intelligent cause. Kant deprived himself of the right to argue in this way, by making the mind itself impose the relation of causation on events, {146} so that we cannot argue that there is a corresponding law