HUME'S PHENOMENOLOGY OF THE IMAGINATION.

This paper examines the role of the imagination in Hume's epistemology. There specific powers of the imagination are identified -- the imagistic, conceptual, and productive -- as well as three corresponding kinds of fictions based on the degree of belief contained in each class of ideas the imagination creates. These are generic fictions, real and mere fictions, and necessary, fictions, respectively. Through these manifestations, it is emphasized, Hume presents the imagination both as the positive force behind human creativity and a subversive presence that transforms experience while at once making it possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]