Midterm Report: David Hume and Skeptical Empiricism

            David Hume was a Scottish philosopher who lived from 1711 to 1776. Considered one of the greatest thinkers of his time, Hume focused his studies mostly on explaining the nature of humanity and our place in the universe. Skeptical Empiricism is one philosophy put together by Hume that has been studied and reworked since the eighteenth- century. As an Empiricist, Hume believed that all causes and effects are discoverable by experience only, not by reason. In analyzing and researching Hume’s argument regarding humanity’s knowledge of the world, it is evident that- according to Hume- reality is simply a collection of impressions and ideas. 

            Throughout his life as a philosopher, Hume had no issue questioning the true nature of God, or the Divine Architect. During the eighteenth- century, it was very difficult to openly go against religious beliefs. Due to this, Hume was never able to access a position at any university, even though he is considered to be one of the greatest thinkers of his time period. (Warburton 101) Regarding the argument of God’s existence, which demonstrated that everything in our universe was created by the Divine Architect, Hume disagreed. Hume believed that the Design Argument was based on bad logic. He also believed it was unreasonable to believe in miracles because of how easily humanity can be misled by eyewitnesses and testimonies. To stray away from accepting logic as truth, Hume instead focused mostly on what kind of valid evidence can be given in support of any set of beliefs. 

            In regards to God, Hume argued that just because the natural world looks to be designed, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it was. As humans, when we see the effects of different causes, we attempt to seek out the most likely explanation. (Warburton 102) In Christianity, miracles are often accounted for through eyewitness testimonies. Hume responds to this belief by arguing that for something to truly be considered a miracle, it needed to defy a law of nature and be proven true. This was Hume’s Argument from Miracles, a philosophy that did not gain recognition or much support until years after his death in 1776. (Warburton 102) Hume believed that there was always going to be a reasonable explanation for any event and that nothing could be proven as an act of God. Though Hume never declared himself to be an atheist, when asked if he feared death by James Boswell, a Christian, Hume responded that he had “absolutely no hope that he would survive death.” (Warburton 104) Regarding death, Hume was also quoted saying he was “no more worried about the time after his death than he was about the time he had not existed before his birth.” (Warburton 104) 

            Many of Hume’s philosophies were influenced by English philosopher John Locke. Like Locke, Hume believed that our knowledge of the universe and humanity comes solely from observation and experience. By using reason, Hume wanted to explain the nature of humanity and our place in the universe by considering how we can gain knowledge and to what limits we can learn. (Warburton 100) This led to a focus in Hume’s work on empirically verifiable statements. In order for a statement to be empirically verifiable, there has to be an observation or test that will tell us whether it is true or false. (Warburton 192) Empirically verifiable statements are all found to be factual and help us understand the way that the world is. At one point in his career, Hume even suggested that we should burn philosophy books that could not pass as empirically verifiable statements, because- according to Hume- they contained nothing but “sophistry and illusion.” (Warburton 192) A philosopher named A.J. Ayer based many of his philosophies on Hume’s work regarding the nature of the universe and humanity, even reworking many of Hume’s ideas in order for them to remain relevant in the twentieth- century. 

            All of this information leads us to a better understanding of Hume’s Skeptical Empiricism. Through the discovery of many of Hume’s philosophical findings, he came to the conclusion that any knowledge of the nature of reality is impossible. (Loyno line 4) So, in respect to this, Hume divided the contents of the human mind into two categories. The first category is impressions. Impressions are the immediate sensations we feel when we are having them. The second category is ideas. Ideas are considered the memory’s copy of these impressions. This division of the mind was influenced by both Descartes and Berkeley, but does not model either one synonymously. 

            In his philosophy of Skeptical Empiricism, Hume argues that any knowledge of the world that goes beyond our sensations and memories must require an inference from what we know from our impressions and ideas in order to find the alleged cause of those impressions in the external world. To simplify this is a quote from Berkeley, stating that “we cannot ever infer from our impressions to anything at all which causes them, if indeed there even is such a cause.” (Loyno paragraph 28) So, if we cannot make any valid reasoning from our impressions and ideas, what can we truly know? Well, Hume allows two possibilities. The first is analytic knowledge on the judgments in relation to ideas, which is uninformative on the topic of reality. The second possibility is knowledge that is restricted to our impressions and ideas. (Loyno paragraph 29) To put it plainly, Hume argues through Skeptical Empiricism that all reality is are the impressions and ideas we hold in our minds. 

Resources: 

Warburton, Nigel. A Little History of Philosophy. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011. Print.

 “Hume’s Argument from Empiricism to Skepticism.” http://people.loyno.edu/~folse/HumeCause.html