History of Philosophy Lecture 16 David Hume

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History of PhilosophyLecture 16David Hume

• By David Kelsey

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David Hume

• David Hume
• 1711-1776
• Born in Edinburgh, Scotland. Attended the
  University of Edinburgh at age 12.
• Wrote his Treatise at College of la Fleche in
  Anjou, France from 1734-39.
• Influential works by Hume
• A Treatise of Human Nature, first published in
  1739
• Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, first
  published in 1748
• Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, first
  published in 1779

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Hume Newton

• Hume aspires to do for human nature what Isaac
  Newton did for nonhuman nature
• A science of human understanding
• to provide principles of explanation both simple
  and comprehensive.
• Isaac Newton
• 1642-1727
• Invented the theory of universal gravitation
• every massive particle in the universe attracts
  every other massive particle with a force that is
  directly proportional to the product of their
  masses and inversely proportional to the square
  of the distance between them
• Newtons three laws
• Every body remains in a state of rest or uniform
  motion unless it is acted upon by an external
  unbalanced force
• F MA
• Action and reaction equal, opposite and
  collinear.
• Thought proper science never frames hypothesis
• A hypothesis is a principle of explanation not
  derived from a close examination of the facts
• Hypothesis not arrived at by by way of careful
  analysis of the sensible facts are arbitrary

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Humes motivation

• Humes motivations for providing a science of
  human understanding
• Wants to debunk popular superstition
• Whatever cannot be demonstrated on the basis of
  experience and reason
• So he aims to show what the human understanding
  both is and is not capable of.
• If he can show that superstition claims to know
  what no one could possibly know
• And a science of human nature is fundamental
• We couldnt know the truths of mathematics,
  natural philosophy or natural religion without
  first knowing the extent of human understanding,
  the nature of the ideas we employ or the
  operations we perform in our reasoning. (Treatise
  of Human Nature, Intro)
• Should illuminate all human intellectual
  endeavors.

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Hume on Descartes

• Hume on Descartes
• Descartes dualism, his doctrine of a separate
  mind substance, frames a hypothesis.
• For to me it seems evident, that the essence of
  the mind being equally unknown to us with that of
  external bodies, it must be equally impossible to
  form any notion of its powers and qualities
  otherwise than from careful and exact
  experiments, and the observation of those
  particular effectsAnd tho we must endeavour to
  render all our principles as universal as
  possibletis still certain that we cannot go
  beyond experience and any hypothesis, that
  pretends to discover the ultimate original
  qualities of human nature, ought at first to be
  rejected as presumptuous and chimerical.
  (Treatise, Intro)
• So in forming any principles of the mind or
  understanding, we cannot go beyond what
  experience gives us

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Perceptions

• So Hume thinks we must form principles of human
  nature from the data.
• The data Hume speaks of are what he calls
  perceptions
• All the contents of our minds when we are awake
  and alert, which for Hume is all our ideas.
• All the ideas of the sciences
• All the arbitrary and superstitious ideas
• Note that Hume holds the representational theory
  of mind that we see in Berkeley and others.
• Hume aims to draw a line between legitimate and
  illegitimate ideas.
• So Hume aims to uncover the origins of our ideas.

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Humes theory of Ideas

• Humes theory of ideas
• Perceptions can be divided into impressions and
  ideas
• Impressions
• Enter the mind with the most force and violence
• Sensations, passions and emotions
• Ideas
• The faint images of impressions in thinking and
  reasoning
• Examples
• If you slap a table with your hand, the sound you
  hear is an impression and your recollection of
  that sound is an idea
• An exception A terrifying dream

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Simple and Complex perceptions

• Hume also distinguishes between simple and
  complex perceptions
• Simple perceptions
• single, solitary ideas.
• Example
• Complex perceptions
• built out of simples.
• Example

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Ideas and Impressions

• Ideas and Impressions
• For Hume it seems all the perceptions of the
  mind are double, and appear both as impressions
  and ideas (Treatise, I, 1, 1)
• But Hume notices that this isnt correct for you
  can have an idea that doesnt correspond to any
  impression.
• Example
• But Hume notes that such cases are only cases of
  complex ideas.
• So for every simple perception, our perceptions
  are always double.
• Every simple idea corresponds to a simple
  impression that resembles it.

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Simple ideas depend on simple impressions

• Simple ideas depend on simple impressions
• Hume argues that every simple idea has some
  simple impression as a causal antecedent.
• To give a child an idea of scarlet or orange, of
  sweet or bitter, I present the objects, or in
  other words, convey to him these impressionsWe
  cannot form to ourselves a just idea of the taste
  of a pine-apple, without having actually tasted
  it. (Treatise, I, 1, 1)
• So the origin of all our ideas are impressions.
• Without an impression, there is no idea.
• A rule with devastating consequences!

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Tracing ideas to impressions

• Tracing ideas to Impressions
• So Humes rule is this if there is no impression
  then there is no idea
• But from this Hume infers that every meaningful
  term is associated with an idea.
• Determining if a term is meaningless
• Trace the idea associated with the term back to
  an impression.
• If you can do so
• If you try and fail
• All ideas, especially abstract ones, are
  naturally faint and obscure The mind has but a
  slender hold of them They are apt to be
  confounded with other resembling ideas and when
  we have often employed any term, though without a
  distinct meaning, we are apt to imagine it has a
  determinate idea, annexed to it. On the
  contrary, all impressions, that is, all
  sensations, either outward or inward, are strong
  and vivid The limits between them are more
  exactly determined Nor is it easy to fall into
  any error or mistake with regard to them. When
  we entertain, therefore, any suspicion, that a
  philosophical term is employed without any
  meaning or ideawe need but enquire, from what
  impression is that supposed idea derived? And if
  it is impossible to assign any, this will serve
  to confirm our suspicion. (Enquiry, 99)

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The Association of Ideas

• The Association of Ideas
• The principles that bind impressions and ideas
  together to produce the complex mental lives of
  humans
• The world of ideas if governed by the gentle
  force of association. Association is a kind of
  attraction
• This gentle force operates without our consent,
  will or even consciousness of it.
• For Hume, the mind just works this way
• He isnt going to try to explain why, for to do
  so would be to frame a hypothesis
• He notes first that we should be able to test for
  such principles by observing our own trains of
  thought
• It is evident that there is a principle of
  connexion between the different thoughts or ideas
  of the mind, and that, in their appearance to the
  memory or imagination, they introduce each other
  with a certain degree of method and
  regularityWere the loosest and freest
  conversation to be transcribed, there would
  immediately be observed something, which
  connected in all its transitions (Enquiry, 101)

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Principles of the Association of Ideas

• Hume thinks there are 3 principles of
  association
• To me, there appear to be only three principles
  of connexion among ideas, namely Resemblance,
  Contiguity in time or place, and Cause or
  Effect. (Enquiry, 101)
• Resemblance
• A picture naturally leads our thoughts to the
  original. (Enquiry, 102)
• Contiguity in time or place
• The mention of one apartment in a building
  naturally introduces an enquiry or discourse
  concerning the others. (Enquiry, 102)
• Cause and effect
• And if we think of a wound, we can scarcely
  forbear reflecting on the pain which follows it.
  (Enquiry, 102)

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Relations of Ideas

• All objects of human enquiry are either relations
  of ideas or matters of fact
• Relations of ideas
• The sciences of geometry, algebra and arithmetic
• Three times five
• Discoverable by the mere operations of thought,
  without dependence on anything existent in the
  universe
• Consider the contrary of a relation of idea
• Consider 2 added to 3 is not 5.
• This is False because of the way the ideas are
  related to each other
• Its denial is contradictory
• We need make no appeals to experience to know it
  is false
• Instead, we can know it is false by the mere
  operation of thought

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Matters of Fact

• Matters of fact
• The contrary of a matter of fact
• is still possible
• never implies a contradiction
• Can be conceived by the mind with the same
  facility and distinctness as the matter of fact
  itself, as if ever so conformable to reality.
  (Enquiry, 108)
• False because of the way the world actually is or
  turns out to be.
• To determine its truth or falsity we must consult
  the external world and experience
• That the sun will not rise tomorrow is no less
  intelligible and implies no more contradiction,
  than that the sun will rise tomorrow

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Matters of Fact and the relation of cause and
effect

• Hume says that relations of ideas can be certain
  but not so for matters of fact.
• With matters of fact, our evidence is never great
  enough to amount to certainty. This is because
• All reasonings concerning matter of fact seem to
  be founded on the relation of Cause and Effect.
  By means of that relation alone we can go beyond
  the evidence of our memory and senses. (Enquiry,
  109)
• The friend in France, the watch and the voice in
  the dark
• So when we reach beyond our perceptions, we do so
  in virtue of the relation of cause and effect
• A present impression is associated with some idea
  such that the impression is taken to be the
  effect of the idea

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Knowledge of the relation ofcause and effect

• For Hume, we cannot arrive at knowledge of
  relations of cause and effect independently of
  experience.
• Our knowledge of cause and effect relations is
  not a priori
• nor can our reason, unassisted by experience,
  ever draw any inference concerning real existence
  and matter of factcauses and effects are
  discoverable, not by reason, but by experience.
  (Enquiry, 110)
• Knowledge of the relations of cause and effect is
  dependent on our having some prior experience of
  the situation
• Knowledge of relations of cause and effect is a
  posteriori, dependent entirely on experience
• So causal predictions are made based upon past
  experience
• If we have never had experience in dealing with a
  particular relation of cause and effect, we
  cannot make a prediction
• An example

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Causal arguments arent valid

• An example of causation one billiard ball
  strikes another on a billiard table
• 1. I have seen one ball strike another many times
• 2. Each time, the ball that was struck has moved
• Thus, 3. The struck ball will move this time.
• But does 3 follow necessarily from 1 2?
• Isnt it possible that this time something
  different will happen?
• Validity?
• So Hume asks why we seem to always think that 3
  follows from 1 2.
• Dont we assume something like the following The
  future will (in the relevant respect) be like the
  past.
• Validity!
• This premise is known as the principle of the
  uniformity of nature.

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The principle of the uniformity of nature

• The principle of the uniformity of nature
• Says that the future will (in the relevant
  respect) be like the past.
• But how do we know this is true?
• It isnt contradictory to suppose that cause and
  effect relationships might suddenly change
• Whether the principle is true is not a relation
  of ideas. It is a matter of fact
• If we know the future is like the past, we do so
  based upon experience.
• Futures and pasts we have experienced
• So we get this argument in favor of the principle
  of the uniformity of nature
• 1. I have experienced many pairs of events that
  have been constantly conjoined in the past.
• 2. Each time I found that similar pairs of
  events were conjoined in the future.
• Thus, 3. the future will (in these respects) be
  like the past.
• But we find ourselves asking the same question
• Validity?
• Does 3 necessarily follow from 1 2?

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The non-justifiability of the principle of the
uniformity of nature

• So Hume thinks we have no good reason for
  believing in the uniformity of nature.
• It cannot rest on a rational foundation
• Never validity
• But for Hume it doesnt follow that we must give
  up our belief in the uniformity of nature or in
  causal relations...
• We cannot do without them for survivals sake
• Nature will always maintain her rightsand
  prevail in the end over any abstract reasoning
  whatsoever. (Enquiry, 120)
• But if beliefs in relations of cause and effect
  arent rationally based, then what is their
  foundation?

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The foundation of relations ofcause and effect

• Knowledge of cause and effect through experience
• When we experience the constant conjunction of
  events, we form a habit of expecting the second
  when we observe the first, and we believe the
  first causes the second
• So our belief in relations of cause and effect is
  completely irrational
• But we do believe in causation. We cannot help
  it. But we believe in it by a kind of natural
  instinct by custom and habit.
• Human nature
• Custom, then, is the great guide of human life.
  It is that principle alone, which renders our
  experience useful to us, and makes us expect, for
  the future, a similar train of events with those
  which have appeared in the past. Without the
  influence of custom, we should be entirely
  ignorant of every matter of fact (Enquiry, 122)
• So Hume is granting that we have a right to
  believe in something irrational.
• Descartes?

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The strength of causal relations

• Hume says that some causal relations come in
  degrees
• Some events are such that they are always
  conjoined to another.
• And other events are such that it is only just
  often the case that when one occurs so does the
  other.
• So for Hume, the more constant the conjunction
  between one event (A) and another (B), the more
  probable we think it that a new experience of the
  first (A) will be followed by one of the second
  (B).
• So we find ourselves believing those things most
  confidently which are most regular in our
  experience. Nature at work

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Necessary connection

• Causation is more than mere constant conjunction.
  It is necessary connection.
• To say X causes Y is to say X produces Y, if X
  occurs Y must occur and that X has the power to
  bring Y into being
• Hume on the necessary connection in causation
• Hume aims to discover if such a necessary
  connection is metaphysically real. He does so by
  trying to trace the idea back to an impression.
• So his question is can we ever observe this
  necessary connection?

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The impression of a necessary connection

• So Hume asks do we have an impression of the
  necessary connection?
• Take the billiard ball example do you observe
  the force or power that makes the second ball
  move? Hume thinks not!
• We are never able, in a single instance, to
  discover any power or necessary connexion any
  quality which binds the effect to the cause, and
  renders the one an infallible consequence of the
  other. We only find, that the one does actually,
  in fact, follow the otherConsequently, there is
  not, in any single, particular instance of cause
  and effect, anything which can suggest the idea
  of power or necessary connexion. (Enquiry, 136)
• The same holds for mental states
• If you will your hand to move and your hand moves
  there is no impression observable of the
  connection between the willing and the moving of
  the hand. All I observe is one thing followed by
  another.

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The foundation of our idea of necessary
connection

• So we can get no impression of necessary
  connection.
• Upon the whole, there appears not, throughout
  all nature, any one instance of connexion, which
  is conceivable by us. All events seem entirely
  loose and separate. One event follows another
  but we can never observe any tie between them.
  They seem conjoined, but never connected. And as
  we can have no idea of any thing, which never
  appeared to our outward sense or inward
  sentiment, the necessary conclusion seems to be,
  that we have no idea of connexion or power at
  all, and that these words are absolutely without
  meaning (Enquiry, 144)
• Relations of cause and effect are learned from
  experience and experience can only show us
  constant conjunction
• So the idea of a necessary connection is
  meaningless
• But from where then do we get the idea of
  necessary connection?
• After a repetition of similar instances, the
  mind is carried by habit, upon the appearance of
  one event, to expect its usual attendant, and to
  believe that it will exist. This connexion,
  therefore, which we feel in the mind, this
  customary transition of the imagination from one
  object to its usual attendant, is the sentiment
  or impression, from which we form the idea of
  power or necessary connexion. (Enquiry, 145)

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The impression of necessary connection

• The impression
• So the impression of necessary connection is felt
  in the mind.
• It is a kind of mental transition from cause to
  effect.
• It is an expectation felt in the mind, of one
  event given another.
• The expectation is habitual, like breathing.
• So we project a necessary connection on objective
  events based upon our subjective experience, I.e.
  our sentiment or feeling which comes from our
  habit to expect one event following another.

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Causation a fiction

• Hume provides 2 definitions of cause
• Constant conjunction
• An object, followed by another, and where all
  the objects, similar to the first, are followed
  by objects similar to the second. (Enquiry, 146)
• Necessary connection
• An object followed by another, and whose
  appearance always conveys the thought to that
  other. (Enquiry, 146)
• So for Hume, causation as constant conjunction
  and necessary connection is a fiction.
• As far as experience goes, necessary connections
  cannot be found. But we nevertheless apply such
  a connection to our experience.
• But since we appeal to causation to determine all
  matters of fact, it appears we cannot come to
  know any matter of fact.
• What we cannot know and skepticism

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Hume on the soul

• Hume calls the soul the self
• As he did with the notion of causation, he wants
  to consider whether the self is a meaningful term
• So Hume considers whether we can trace the idea
  of self back to some impression
• So the question Hume asks is the term self
  meaningless noise?
• From what impression coud this idea be derived?
  This question tis impossible to answer without
  a manifest contradiction and absurdity and yet
  tis a question, which must necessarily be
  answerd, if we woud have the idea of self pass
  for clear and intelligible. It must be some one
  impression, that gives rise to every real idea.
  But self or person is not any one impression, but
  that to which our several impressions and ideas
  are supposd to have a reference. If any
  impression gives rise to the idea of self, that
  impression must continue invariably the same,
  thro the whole course of our lives since self
  is supposd to exist after that manner. But
  there is no impression constant and variable.
  (Treatise, I, 4, 6)

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Humes argument

• Humes argument that the term self is
  meaningless
• 1. The term self is supposed to represent an
  idea of something that continues unchanged
  throughout a persons life.
• 2. The idea of self is simple, not complex.
• 3. Without an impression, there is no idea.
• 4. So there must be an impression of self. (from
  23)
• This impression must be one that resembles our
  idea of self. Our idea is of substance that
  remains throughout the course of our lives
  unchanging constant and invariable.
• 5. There is no such simple impression of self.
• 6. So the term self is meaningless and we have no
  idea of self. (from 3 5)

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Humes proof that there is no simple impression
of self

• Humes proof that there is no simple impression
  of self
• For my part, when I enter most intimately into
  what I call myself, I always stumble on some
  particular perception or other, of heat or cold,
  light or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure.
  I never can catch myself at any time without a
  perception, and never can observe any thing but
  the perception. When my perceptions are removd
  for any time, as by a sound sleep so long am I
  insensible of myself, and may truly be said not
  to exist. And were all my perceptions removd by
  death, and coud I neither think, nor feel, nor
  see, nor love, nor hate after the dissolution of
  my body, I shoud be entirely annihilated, nor do
  I conceive what is farther requisite to make me a
  perfect non-entity. (Treatise, I, 4, 6)
• So Hume simply looks in himself.
• He finds no impression of a simple, unchanging,
  single substance underlying all our particular
  impressions.
• What Hume thinks we do find in ourselves
• Nothing but fleeting perceptions ideas,
  sensations, feelings and emotions.

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Evaluating the Argument

• Evaluating the argument
• What about premise 1?
• What is our idea of self?
• Maybe Hume is going about this all backwards
• What about premise 2?
• Is the idea of self simple?
• Maybe premise 3 is false?
• Maybe we can push on his theory of ideas?
• And of course we could challenge premise 5.
• If we look inside ourselves, do we have an
  impression of a simple substance?

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What the mind is

• So when Hume looks for an impression of self that
  remains constant and unchanging he finds only
  fleeting perceptions.
• So for Hume the self is
• nothing but a bundle or collection of different
  perceptions, which succeed each other with an
  inconceivable rapidity, and are in a perceptual
  flux and movementthe mind is a kind of theatre,
  where several perceptions successively make their
  appearance pass, re-pass, glide away, and mingle
  in an infinite variety of postures and
  situations. There is properly no simplicity in
  it at any one time, nor identity in different
  whatever natural propensity we may have to
  imagine that simplicity and identity. The
  comparison of the theatre must not mislead us.
  They are the successive perceptions only, that
  constitute the mind nor have we the most distant
  notion of the place, where these scenes are
  represented, or of the materials, of which it is
  composd. (Treatise,I, 4, 6)

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Hume on the mind

• Hume on the self
• So the idea of self, like the idea of cause, is a
  fiction or human construct.
• As a self, we are nothing but a bundle of
  perceptions.
• The mind is no single substance.
• The mind is like a theatre.
• In the theatre an amazingly complex play
  performs.
• The players are the perceptions.
• The theatre is just the performance of the play
• So Descartes was wrong after all!
• Thought doesnt entail a thinker!

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Hume on Freedom

• Hume on freedom
• For Hume, freedom is a power of acting or not
  acting, according to the determinations of the
  will that is, if we choose to remain at rest, we
  may if we choose to move, we also may. Now this
  hypothetical liberty is universally allowed to
  belong to everyone, who is not a prisoner and in
  chains. (Enquiry, 159)
• A person lacks freedom when he is in chains.
  When he cannot do what he wants to do. He is
  unfree because his actions are constrained,
  against his will.
• The unfree man who desires, wills and tries to
  walk away
• If the unfree mans chains are removed, he is
  free to do what he wants
• So some person P is free with respect to some
  action A, when if P chooses to perform A, then
  he performs A.

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Freedom and Determinism

• Freedom and Determinism
• So, for Hume, freedom is a kind of hypothetical
  power to do something if one chooses to do it.
• But one might worry that if a Newtonian world, a
  world determined by mechanical laws, persists
  there is no room for freedom of the will.
• Determinism is the view that human actions
  constitute no exception to the universal rule of
  causal law.
• And Hume admits that Human actions are caused in
  the same sense as events in the material world.
  We can observe no necessary connection in either
  material or mental causation. Causation is just
  regularity or constant conjunction.
• men still entertain a strong propensity to
  believe, that they penetrate farther into the
  powers of nature, and perceive something like a
  necessary connexion between the cause and the
  effect. When again they turn their reflections
  towards the operations of their own minds, and
  feel no such connexion of the motive and the
  action they are thence apt to suppose, that
  there is a difference between the effects, which
  result from material force, and those which arise
  from thoguht and intelligence. (Enquiry, 156,
  157)

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Humes compatibilism

• Humes compatibilism
• So for Hume causes are just constant
  conjunctions, regularities.
• But freedom is just a kind of regularity.
• It is the hypothetical power to do something if
  we choose to do it.
• The regularity of the actions we choose
  following upon our choosing them
• So if the world is wholly determined by causal
  laws and yet freedom is just a causal law, we can
  have both determinism and freedom of the will.
• This is the view known as Compatibilism
• Humes Compatibilism and Naturalism man is just
  another natural fact, like everything else in the
  natural world, operating under natural causal
  laws

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Questions about Humes account of freedom

• Questions about Humes account of freedom
• Questions unanswered
• What does this power of turning intention to
  action amount to?
• So isnt Humes explanation of freedom a kind of
  surface or superficial explanation only?
• Only the extension of freedom is given, not the
  intension.
• But of course Hume will say that he cannot give
  an account or explanation of the power of willing
  actions to be.
• To do so would be to frame a hypothesis!
• But we still want to ask what is freedom of the
  will?

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Hume on God

• Hume on God
• Hume is taken by many to be an atheist for Hume
  shows that we have no good reason to believe in
  God.
• Hume sets out to show that several key arguments
  for Gods existence are unsound.
• First, he disproves the ontological argument
• Remember the ontological argument assumes
• You cannot think of God without thinking God
  exists
• For Hume, it may be that thinking of God entails
  thinking that he exists but this concerns only
  relations of ideas not matters of fact.
• So pointing out that the thought of God includes
  in it the thought of existence doesnt entail the
  truth of the matter of fact that God exists.
• A relation among ideas, even one that is
  necessary, gets no traction and can have no
  causal power on how things are in the world.

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Hume on Descartes first proof for Gods existence

• Descartes first argument for Gods existence
• 1. I have an idea of God
• 2. This idea must have a cause
• 3. The cause must be equal in formal reality to
  the subjective reality of the idea
• 4. I myself could not possibly be the cause
• 5. So God must be the cause of my idea
• Hume wants to deny premise 3.
• But Hume thinks that our idea of God as perfect
  entity comes from reflecting on our own
  imperfections
• The idea of God, as meaning infinitely
  intelligent, wise, and good Being, arises from
  reflecting on the operations of our own mind, and
  augmenting, without limit, those qualities of
  goodness and wisdom. (Enquiry, 97-98)

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The idea of God in ourselves

• So for Hume, the origin of our idea of God is in
  impressions of our imperfect selves.
• We reflect on ourselves and find impressions of
  imperfect intelligence and goodness.
• From our impressions we can gain the idea of more
  and less.
• But then we can add our idea of more with our
  ideas of intelligence or goodness.
• In this way we get the idea of a being more
  intelligent and good than we are.
• We can then reiterate this inference until we get
  perfection
• Thus, the idea of perfect entity can come from an
  object with less than perfect formal reality, for
  the ideas of perfection can be formed from the
  ideas of imperfection!
• What would Descartes say in response?

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The argument from design

• The argument from design
• Look around the world Contemplate the whole and
  every part of it You will find it to be nothing
  but one great machine, subdivided into an
  infinite number of lesser machines, which again
  admit of subdivisions to a degree beyond what
  human senses and faculties can trace and
  explain.The curious adapting of means to ends,
  throughout all nature, resembles exactly, though
  it much exceeds, the productions of human
  contrivance of human design, thought, wisdom,
  and intelligence. Since therefore the effects
  resemble each other, we are led to infer, by all
  the rules of analogy, that the causes also
  resemble, and that the Author of Nature is
  somewhat similar to the mind of man, though
  possessed of much larger faculties, proportioned
  to the grandeur of the work which he has
  executed. By this argument a posteriori, and by
  this argument alone, do we prove at once the
  existence of a Deity and his similarity to human
  mind and intelligence. (Dialogues, II, 45)

42
The argument from designformalized

• The argument from design
• 1. A machine is the effect of intelligence
• For every clock
• 2. The world is like a machine
• It is an ordered whole. Newtonian mechanics
  tells us so.
• So the world is like a clock
• 3. Thus, the world is the effect of some
  intelligence
• An argument a posteriori
• it is an argument that depends upon experience
  and matters of fact
• An argument by analogy
• Since worlds are like machines and machines have
  designers so too does the world have a designer.
• A causal argument
• The first premise and conclusion

43
Humes response to the argument from design

• Hume raises many questions about the argument
  from design
• 1. A posteriori arguments are never valid and can
  never entail their conclusions. Thus, the most
  the argument from design can give us is
  probability
• 2. Causal arguments follow this principle the
  cause must be proportioned to the effect.
• If the cause be known only by the effect, we
  never ought to ascribe to it any qualities,
  beyond what are precisely requisite to produce
  the effect. (Enquiry, 190)
• But if you look around the world it certainly
  isnt perfectly good, intelligent or wise. It
  seems to have none of the qualities we attribute
  to God and so cannot prove the existence of a
  perfect God

44
Humes third response to the design argument

• Taking the analogy seriously The analogy is
  between machines and their designers and the
  universe and its designer.
• Many people often cooperate to make a machine ?
  Many Gods
• Wicked people can create technological marvels ?
  a wicked God
• Machines are made by mortals ? a Mortal God
• The best machines are a result of a long history
  of gradual improvements.
• But then Many worlds might have been botched and
  bungled, throughout an eternity, ere this system
  was struck out much labor lost many fruitless
  trials made and a slow but continued improvement
  carried on during infinite ages in the art of
  world-making. (Dialogues, 36)
• What Hume shows us here is that any of these is
  possible.
• And we have no way of knowing which are the
  similarities between worlds and machines and
  which are not.

45
Humes final response to thedesign argument

• Humes final response
• There is one respect in which the universe is
  entirely unlike machines
• The universe is entirely singular
• We can infer the cause of a machine because we
  have in the past experienced the constant
  conjunction of machines and designers.
• But if we apply this reasoning to the universe,
  we would need past experience of the making of
  worlds, such that worlds are constantly conjoined
  to designers. And yet

46
Skeptical doubts

• Causal arguments and skeptical doubts
• We cannot infer, by causal argument, the
  existence of God.
• Likewise, we cannot infer, by causal argument,
  the existence of a material world beyond our
  perceptions.
• If we can have no impression of the conjunction
  of an external object and the impression it
  causes, we cant infer the existence of the
  external object from any impressions of them we
  might have.
• And yet we cant ever observe the constant
  conjunction of an external object and the
  impression it causes
• So then what we seem to have here is skepticism
• We have no reason to believe in God or an
  external world

47
Humes morality

• Humes morality
• Hume says first that the ultimate ends of human
  action can never, in any case, be accounted for
  by reason, but recommend themselves entirely to
  the sentiments and affections of mankind, without
  any dependence on the intellectual faculties.
  (An Enquiry concerning the Principles of Morals,
  163)
• In the absence of a desire or passion, reason
  alone cannot produce action.
• Ask a man why he uses exercise he will answer
  because he desires to keep his health
  (Principles, 162)
• Passion or desire motivate to action and reason
  is inert. Reason is the slave of the passions.
• Likewise for moral judgments, if they are to have
  have effect on action, they must be motivated by
  passions.

48
Morality isnt a matter of fact

• Morality isnt a matter of fact
• Take any action allowd to be vicious Wilful
  murder, for instance. Examine it in all lights,
  and see if you can find the matter of fact, or
  real existence, which you call vice. In
  whichever way you take it, you find only certain
  passions, motives, volitions and thoughtsThe
  vice entirely escapes you, as long as you
  consider the object. You can never find it, till
  you turn your reflexion into your own breast, and
  find a sentiment of disapprobation, which arises
  in you, towards this action. Here is a matter of
  fact but tis the object of feeling, not of
  reason. It lies in yourself, not in the object.
  So that when you pronounce any action or
  character to be vicious, you mean nothing, but
  that from the constitution of your nature you
  have a feeling or sentiment of blame from the
  contemplation of it. Vice and virtue, therefore,
  may be compard to sounds, colours, heat and
  cold, which according to modern philosophy, are
  not qualities in objects, but perceptions in the
  mind. (Treatise, II, 3, 1)
• So virtue and vice arent primary qualities they
  are secondary qualities.
• We project onto the facts an idea of virtue or
  vice which has an origin in a feeling in the
  mind.
• Note this is like our idea of the necessary
  connection in causation which has its origin in a
  feeling of expectation ..
• This feeling is one of approval or disapproval
  which are expressed in terms like good or bad,
  right or wrong.

49
Facts and values

• Facts and values
• The is ought problem says this an ought (or
  value) cannot be derived from an is (or fact).
• For Hume there are no value facts at all.
• Value has its origin in valuing, I.e. perceiving.
• So values are projections onto the facts and
  facts have no value in and of themselves.
• So the foundations of morality are found in
  sentiment, in feelings of approval and
  disapproval, not in reason.

50
A scientific investigation of morality

• So if we conduct a scientific investigation of
  morality it will consist in an investigation of
  the things we approve and disapprove of and why.
• Hume examines
• we tend to approve of the things which are
  agreeable or useful, either to ourselves or to
  others.
• Agreeable things elicit our immediate approval
  while useful things promote the occurrence of an
  agreeable thing.
• Hume also says one of the passions had by humans
  is sympathy or what he calls fellow feeling.
• This is why we can have concern for others or for
  the greater good.

51
Does Humes view imply Relativism

• A possible implication and reply to Humes
  account of morality
• Since a feeling or sentiment of approval or
  disapproval seems relative to the individual
  doesnt it follow that Humes account of morality
  implies Moral Relativism?
• Humes reply
• Sympathy is an original passion in human nature.
• It works toward a commanality in the moral sense
  of us all.

52
Hume the skeptic

• Hume the skeptic
• Causation is mere constant conjunction
• There is no good reason to believe in God, the
  self, the objectivity of morals or an external
  world.
• Humes skepticism isnt Descartes though.
  Descartes skepticism, which Hume calls antecedent
  skepticism
• recommends an universal doubt, not only of all
  our former opinions and principles, but also of
  our very faculties of whose veracity, say they,
  we must assure ourselves, by a chain of
  reasoning, deduced from some original principle,
  which cannot possibly be fallacious or deceitful.
  But neither is there any such original
  principle, which has a prerogative above others,
  that are self-evident and convincing Or if there
  were, could we advance a step beyond it, but by
  the use of those very faculties, of which we are
  supposed to be already diffident. (Enquiry, 199)
• So if you could doubt everything, there would be
  no way back to rational belief
• For to get back you would have to use the very
  reasoning faculties you doubt

53
Humes mitigated skepticism

• Humes mitigated skepticism
• The greater part of mankind are naturally apt to
  be affirmative and dogmatical in their
  opinionsBut could such dogmatical reasoners
  become sensible of the strange infirmities of
  human understanding, even in its most perfect
  state, and when most accurate and cautious in its
  determinations such a reflection would naturally
  inspire them with more modesty and reserve, and
  diminish their fond opinion of themselves, and
  their prejudice against antagonistsIn general
  there is a degree of doubt, and caution, and
  modesty, which, in all kinds of scrutiny and
  decision, ought for ever to accompany a just
  reasoner. (Enquiry, 207-8)
• An attempt to keep in mind the strange
  infirmities of human understanding
• Makes for modesty and caution
• It will teach us the limitations of our human
  capacities
• It will encourage us to devote our understanding
  to the problems of common life

54
The perils of skeptical doubt

• Hume
• ready to reject all belief and reasoning, and
  to look upon no opinion even as more probably
  or likely than another. Where am I, or what?
  From what causes do I derive my existenceI am
  counfounded with all these questions, and begin
  to fancy myself in the most deplorable condition
  imaginable, invirond with the deepest darkness,
  and utterly deprivd of the use of every member
  and faculty. (Treatise, I, 4, 7)
• So the skeptical conclusions of his philosophy
  have lead Hume into depression and utter
  paralysis.
• It is a kind of philosophical melancholy and
  delirium, a shivering terror at our lack of
  certainty

55
Escaping the perils of skeptical doubt

• Escaping the perils of skeptical doubt
• Most fortunately it happens, that since reason
  is incapable of dispelling these clouds, nature
  herself suffices to that purpose, and cures me of
  this philosophical melancholy and delirium,
  either by relaxing this bent of mind, or by some
  avocation, and lively impression of my senses,
  which obliterate all these chimeras. I dine, I
  play a game of back-gammon, I converse, and am
  merry with my friends and when after three or
  four hours amusement, I woud return to these
  speculations, they appear so cold, and straind,
  and ridiculous, that I cannot find in my heart to
  enter into them any farther. (Treatise, I, 4, 7)
• We cant escape the depression through reason
• Nature is always too strong for principle.
• Custom and habit ensure that we dont sit
  shivering in terror at our lack of certainty.
• Maybe it takes one lively impression of the
  senses
• Activities of every day life

56
Final thoughts on Hume

• If philosophy has lead us into such drastic
  doubts about our nature, where can it take us
• The value of the science of human nature has
  provided us with the limits and scope of our
  understanding.
• It frees us from the dogmatism and superstition
  that plagues man
• Problems for Humes view
• Challenging his theory of ideas
• Could we challenge his rule that for every idea
  there is a corresponding impression?
• Challenging Empiricism
• Rationalism instead?
• Challenging the Newtonian model
• Why a Newtonian model for human nature?