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The simple duality: Humean passions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Hsueh Qu
Hsueh Qu*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, New York University, 5 Washington Place, New York City, NY, 10003, USA
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Abstract

Hume views the passions as having both intentionality and qualitative character, which, in light of his Separability Principle, seemingly contradicts their simplicity. I reject the dominant solution to this puzzle of claiming that intentionality is an extrinsic property of the passions, arguing that a number of Hume's claims regarding the intentionality of the passions (pride and humility in particular) provide reasons for thinking an intrinsic account of the intentionality of the passions to be required. Instead, I propose to resolve this tension by appealing to Hume's treatment of the ‘distinctions of reason’, as explained by Garrett (Cognition and Commitment in Hume's Philosophy, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997).

Keywords

Humepassionsintentionalityphenomenologysimplicity
Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 42 , Issue S1: Hume in Alberta: Selected Papers from the 2012 Hume Conference in Calgary , February 2012 , pp. 98 - 116
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 2012

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Footnotes

*

Current address: Department of Philosophy, National University of Singapore, 3 Arts Link, Block AS3, #05-22, Singapore. Email: phiqhm@nus.edu.sg

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