David Hume's Philosophy

Hume is known for his ideas about “perception of the mind” and he divides it into two categories. Hume viewed perception as a mental phenomena. He later divides perceptions into “impressions” and “ideas”. Hume states the impressions are related to more so feelings or the senses and the ideas are more so connected to thinking and thoughts. “There is distinction between two different perceptions made by David Hume. The first is the root of all ideas called and impression.”( David Hume; Impressions and Ideas BY: C. Lindsay) Hume says that you can always tell the difference when it comes to sensations and thoughts, as mentioned before he says that perceptions are more lively and fairly more

Hume’s concern of how we come to know is both intriguing and perplexing as it encourages us to become skeptical of the many things we would consider to be knowledge and thus presents us with a dilemma. If we are to agree with Hume, then experience becomes counterproductive as it cannot verify our knowledge that “the sun will rise tomorrow” for instance. This would mean that science, for example, cannot provide us with truths or knowledge. No matter how convincing, many experiments are widely dependant on past experience and its outcomes’ consistency. Hume asserts that we have an expectancy that past events will resemble future events without really having any kind of valid justification for this. If we are to rely solely on matters of fact, we would be greatly

Hume rejected lockes theory of experiencing cause. He argued that you do not feel the connection between your mind and arm, and thus don't sense the cause of the muscles contracting to raise your arm. Cause, in Hume's mind, is a synthetic experience used to explain the unobservable things in reality. To help explain he used the billiard ball experiement. Ball A is hit and put into motion towards ball B.When ball A collides with ball B the cause of ball B's movement is not experienced, there is no observable connection between the two. This would mean that there is no way to be certain that everytime Ball A collides with ball B that ball B will move, ball A could just as likely bounce off and begin rolling in a random direction. He believd that there is no way of knowing for certain the outcome of an event without being able to perceive the cause.

I do agree that Hume's epistemology is a “wrecking ball” on the grounds that Hume's thoughts develop a radical skepticism, it decreases metaphysics to pretentious nonsense, breaking beliefs of god, mind, and the irrelevant self to smithereens. Furthermore, Hume questions the philosophical validity of the most respected of all scientific concepts, specifically that of causality itself, claiming that our utilization of it cannot be logically justified either in scientific or in commonsense pondering. Many other philosophers, including Hume's, upset conventional pondering and oblige us to reexamine our formerly accepted conceptions about ourselves and the nature of reality. Eventually, Hume concludes that we have no definite knowledge about the

Hume describes empiricism stating, “All our ideas or more feeble perceptions are copies of our impressions or more lively ones,” (DA,166), inferring that what we

Hume begins by noting the difference between impressions and ideas. Impressions come through our senses, emotions, and other mental phenomena, whereas ideas are thoughts, beliefs, or memories that we connect to our impressions. We construct ideas from simple impressions in three ways: resemblance, contiguity, and cause and effect.

Before delving into The Vision of Hume, I had little to no previous understanding of any of his works. Simply reading his complex ideas made my mid hurt just a little. His ideas were certainly ones to contemplate over. The very fact that he makes his readers think deeper into why they are even thinking, or better yet, how they have arrived at the point they are at in their lives. Why do we as humans generally base our lives off of basic beliefs and principles. What keeps our faith strong, and how do we keep believing even though we may have no proof. These are the issues Hume further investigates, and he comes up with some excellent theories.

David Hume, a Scottish philosopher who lived from 1711-1776, was a very persuasive empiricist. David Hume is recognized for his famous book The History of England. In another one of Hume’s books, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Hume describes his skepticism towards knowledge. Hume is correct in saying that knowledge beyond our immediate experience is questionable and can be a topic of skepticism. However, Hume’s skepticism is not worrisome because without one’s questionable beliefs, living would not be nearly as enjoyable.

	What led Hume to deny the existence of a continuous self that in some way retains its identity through time was his thorough denial of the existence of any form of substance. While Locke retained the idea of substance as something, which has color or shape, and other qualities and Berkeley denied the existence of substance underlying qualities but retained the idea of spiritual substances. Hume denied that substance in any form exists or has any coherent meaning. If what is meant, by the self, is some form of substance then no suck substance can be derived from our impressions of sensation.

Being the skeptic that he is, Hume believes in the epistemological position that true knowledge is unattainable. Why? Everything we learn to believe about the world through experience is based on matters of fact. “The contrary of every matter of fact is still possible because it can never imply a contradiction, and is conceived by the mind with the same facility and distinctness as if ever so conformable to reality” (Hume, p.191). Given that matters of facts “are founded on the relation of cause and effect” (Hume, p.193) we can simply say that experience is the base of everything we know and not a priori reasoning. However, Hume argues that we rely on past experience to predict the future which not a reliable process. This being said, Hume believes that knowledge derives from senses and we can only be sure of what we have experienced and even then, this is merely a representation of your own reality; it is as close as we get to the truth.

Hume considered a career in law but found his real calling in philosophy and general learning and as a result, he never graduated.At the age of 18, Hume made a philosophical discovery that opened ‘a new scene of thought’ for him. Such was the thought over him that he gave up everything, to pursue it. Though no one actually knows what the new scene of thought was, many have interpreted their own variations.Inspired by the new thought, Hume spent more than 10 years reading and writing on the subject. He reached a stage wherein he was on the verge of mental breakdown. Just as when he decided to come out of his shell and have an active social, Hume was then afflicted with a ravenous appetite and palpitations of the heart. It took him some time to become sturdy and robust. Hume then decided to go to Bristol wherein he apprenticed as an assistant to a rich merchant his apprenticeship did not last long as he soon retired to La Fleche in Anjou, France. After about four years in France, Hume came up with his first work, ‘A Treatise of Human Nature’, subtitled ‘Being an Attempt to Introduce the Experimental Method of Reasoning into Moral Subjects’ in

Hume’s Enquiry is written as an evolving body of philosophical work that revises itself when needed, as it goes along. The format must be understood to fully appreciate the content. That being said, it is necessary to work through the concepts that led to Hume’s discussion of causation. The most suitable place to start is Hume’s Copy Principle. The Copy Principle is Hume’s empirical claim that all our ideas are mere copies of impressions drawn from the senses. Whereas the impressions are vivid and lively, the ideas pale in comparison. Hume uses an account of pain to illustrate this principle. “Everyone will readily allow, that there is a considerable difference between the perceptions of the mind, when a man feels the pain of excessive heat, or the pleasure of moderate warmth, and when afterwards recalls to his memory this sensation, or anticipates it by his imagination.” (Hume 1772, 12) One might think of the difference between a photocopy and an original to visualize the comparison between an idea and the impression that caused it. The photocopy will never have such sharp contrast or clarity that the

I do, however, tend to lean towards the theory of David Hume in that our sense is what drives our passions and desires and in turn creates our identity. When contemplating what life would be like without our sense’s I find it difficult to imagine that I would have any desire to strive for more. If I am ok with the minimum to sustain life then why push through the rigors of life that are required to achieve more. Why struggle when I’m not concerned about need or want or desire which are all passions that encourage us to do better. Granted, as Descartes argues, our senses can absolutely be deceiving, I believe it is up to our mind to process what our senses are showing us and decide whether those are deceptive or not. That is another part of how the senses allow us to experience life and mold the identity that is one’s self. Yes, Hume does not appear to believe in the idea of the self and this is where I begin to struggle with his theory as I do believe that it takes the mind and the experiences we have through our senses to form our identity. I do however disagree with Hume in the idea that our mind is just a passive receiver of the information received from our senses. If this were true then we would not search out those experiences that our mind perceived as good or great or those images that our mind perceived as beautiful. It would also not force us away from those experiences that cause pain or sadness. If the mind was nothing more than a passive tool then why would we search out beauty or refrain from sticking our hand in a flame. With that said I believe that both Hume and Descartes are correct in certain aspects of their theories but absolutely feel that our senses are an integral part of what shapes our identity and create the “self” that we

Hume opens his book III of A Treatise of Human Nature with the premise that moral distinctions are not derived from reason. According to Hume we must turn our reflection into ‘our own breast’. Hume had his own reasons to reject the rationalist interpretation of morality. Hume puts forward six arguments to reject the rationalist view.

According to Hume, deliberate actions are the direct products of passion. He believes that no other mental state on its own could have intentional action except by creating a passion. In the book of Treatise he explains the difference between impressions of sensation and impressions of reflection. He claims that motivating passions are formed by specific causes in the mind.