How the Human Mind Functions is No Mean Task

How the Human Mind Functions is No Mean Task One of the outstanding philosophers of the 18th century, David Hume, made a spirited attempt at making a distinction between ideas and impressions in his treatise. Hume was known to hold that there are no innate ideas. In this regard, he contended that ideas are copies of impressions (Hume 10). Hume elaborated on his holding by defining impressions as the more lively perceptions people experience after seeing, hearing, and feeling, among other experiences. On the other hand, he described ideas as the fainter perceptions people get after reflecting upon their impressions. Hume is, by many accounts, correct by contending that impressions are more forceful than ideas. By arguing that people can only form ideas from impressions, Hume seems to imply that the latter precedes the former in terms of force and liveliness. To give heft to his argument, he uses the example of the sensation one gets from being exposed to excessive heat. He contends, which is true, that it is more acute than the sensation the same person feels upon thinking about the heat later on (Hume 7). Therefore, impressions, which comprise memory and imagination, tend to copy what the senses perceive. However, they cannot conjure up a perception that has the same force and liveliness as the one they seek to mimic. For instance, think of a person eating a delicious piece of pizza. That person vividly enjoys the delicacy at that very moment. However, the case will be different when he thinks about the tasty pizza hours later. He will only have faint memories of how it tasted. People may fault this reasoning by arguing that our thoughts (ideas) are absolutely free. In addition, they may argue that thoughts are beyond the control of human power and authority. To some exte...