PHIL 115 Lecture Notes - Human Nature, Meliorism, Pragmatism
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Pragmatism, chapter 3: applications to metaphysical problems, common sense. We should not take a philosopher s word for it when he says there is an issue with x. There must be more reasoning from the philosopher to convince the reader that there is a problem. There must be a pragmatic issue for it to constitute a problem. Philosophy should always make a tangible, practical difference with how we cope with the world. Hume: there is no experience of the self, only of the body, mental states, emotions, etc. If there is no experience, there is no knowledge. Hume: cannot agree with the cartesian self. James must take hume s position seriously to attack it. I don t know it in the sense that my properties and characteristics were the same in the past. Answer: i know that i am the same person as i was in the past since there is a continuity in my self-consciousness through my memory.
