1 / 11

David Hume

David Hume. Brian Bender. Life. Born as David Home in 1711 Attended University of Edinburgh at 12 Hated everything besides Philosophy and general education Worked at a merchant’s office and spent four years writing A Treatise on Human Nature

herne
Download Presentation

David Hume

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript


  1. David Hume Brian Bender

  2. Life • Born as David Home in 1711 • Attended University of Edinburgh at 12 • Hated everything besides Philosophy and general education • Worked at a merchant’s office and spent four years writing A Treatise on Human Nature • Haters gonna hate, but continued to write other works • The History of England • Charged with heresy, but acquitted • Became famous as a historian

  3. Notable Works • A Treatise of Human Nature (1739-40) – first book that concerned understanding, emotions, and morals • An Enquiry concerning Human Understanding (1748) – A simplification of the first part of the Treatise • An Enquiry Concerning the Principle of Morals (1751) – A simplification of the third part of the Treatise • The History of England (1754-62) – six volume work that spanned from invasion of Julius Caesar to the Revolution of 1688

  4. Ideas • Empiricist • Argued against existence of innate ideas • Humans only have knowledge of things they directly experience • Divided perceptions into impressions and ideas • Mental behavior governed by custom • Ex: our use of induction is only justified by our constant conjunction of cause and effect

  5. The Problem of Induction • Questions whether induction leads to knowledge • Generalizing characteristics of a class of objects based on a number of specific observations • Proposing that things will occur a certain way in the future because of observations in the past • Causal relations are found by induction, not reason • Explained in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding

  6. Bundle Theory • The self is nothing but a bundle of interconnected perceptions. • An object is nothing more than its properties • An object cannot be without properties, nor can it be conceived of. • Objects are a collection of properties, and the self is a bundle of perceptions of these properties.

  7. Reason • Anti-rationalist • Belief rather than reason governed human nature • “Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions.”

  8. Hume’s Fork • Dilemma of Determinism – our actions are either random or determined and we cannot be responsible • Distinction between “is” and “ought” • Distinction between demonstrative and probable reasoning • Statements divided into two categories: • 1. Statements about ideas • 2. Statements about the world • He wanted to prove that certainty does not exist in science.

  9. Miracles • Miracles should only be believed if it is more unbelievable for it to have to occurred. • Arguments against miracles: • People often lie. • People like telling stories of miracles without caring if they’re true. • Most miracles occur in ignorant and barbaric nations and times. • Miracles of certain religions argue against those of others. • However, the laws of nature are only the culmination of past experiences, so they cannot be taken as completely true.

  10. Design argument • Argued that order of universe did not have to originate from design • To deduce that the universe is designed, we would need to have an experience of a range of different universes, which we cannot • If we accept that the universe requires design, then the designer requires a designer • Not X has F to do O. • More like X would not be around without F and O is only a projection of human goals onto nature

  11. Later Life • Met and had a falling out with Rousseau • Became the Under Secretary of State for the Northern Department • Settled back in Edinburgh • Died of either bowel or liver cancer in 1776

More Related