Origins of the bundle theory

Psychological connectedness and continuity is not the result of any core pearl of self that carries the continuity. Rather, this is sometimes called a ‘bundle theory’. The eighteenth-century philosopher David Hume was the first to use ‘bundle’ in this context, just once. His contemporary Thomas Reid picked up on it, attributing to Hume the view that ‘what we call the mind, is only a bundle of thoughts, passions, and emotions, without any subject’.5 Like many descriptions which start out as mockery, the term has stuck.

Saved 23 April 2015

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