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- Hume developed his political thought most explicitly in political essays of the 1740s and 1750s, and in his multivolume History of England (1754–1762).
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Hume sees all governments as the result of a struggle between authority and liberty, with the best of them achieving a balance between the two by implementing systems of “general laws.” Hume’s cautious approach to social change may fairly be called conservative.
- Life
- Origin and Association of Ideas
- Epistemological Issues
- A. Space
- B. Time
- C. Necessary Connection Between Causes and Effects
- D. External Objects
- E. Personal Identity
- F. Free Will
- Skepticism
David Hume was born in 1711 to a moderately wealthy family from Berwickshire Scotland, near Edinburgh. His background was politically Whiggish and religiously Calvinistic. As a child he faithfully attended the local Church of Scotland, pastored by his uncle. Hume was educated by his widowed mother until he left for the University of Edinburgh at th...
Drawing heavily on John Locke’s empiricism, the opening sections of both the Treatise and Enquiry discuss the origins of mental perceptionsas laid out in the following categorical scheme: Perceptions A. Ideas 1. From memory 2. From imagination a. From fancy b. From understanding (1) Involving relations of ideas (2) Involving matters of fact B. Impr...
Much of Hume’s epistemology is driven by a consideration of philosophically important issues, such as space and time, cause-effect, external objects, personal identity, and free will. In his analysis of these issues in the Treatise, he repeatedly does three things. First, he skeptically argues that we are unable to gain complete knowledge of some i...
On the topic of space, Hume argues that our proper notions of space are confined to our visual and tactile experiences of the three-dimensional world, and we err if we think of space more abstractly and independently of those visual and tactile experiences. In essence, our proper notion of space is like what Locke calls a “secondary quality” of an ...
Hume’s treatment of our idea of time is like his treatment of the idea of space, in that our proper idea of time is like a secondary quality, grounded in our mental operations, not a primary quality grounded in some external phenomenon beyond our experience. (1) He first maintains that we have no idea of infinitely divisible time (Treatise, 1.2.4.1...
According to Hume, the notion of cause-effectis a complex idea that is made up of three more foundational ideas: priority in time, proximity in space, and necessary connection. Concerning priority in time, if I say that event A causes event B, one thing I mean is that A occurs prior to B. If B were to occur before A, then it would be absurd to say ...
Hume’s view on external objects is that the mind is programmed to form some concept of the external world, although this concept or idea is really just a fabrication. (1) Hume’s skeptical claim here is that we have no valid conception of the existence of external things (Treatise, 1.2.6.9). (2) Nevertheless, he argues that we have an unavoidable “v...
Regarding the issue of personal identity, (1) Hume’s skeptical claim is that we have no experience of a simple, individual impression that we can call the self—where the “self” is the totality of a person’s conscious life. He writes, “For my part, when I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I always stumble on some particular perception o...
On the issue of free will and determinism—or “liberty” and “necessity” in Hume’s terminology—Hume defends necessity. (1) He first argues that “all actions of the will have particular causes” (Treatise, 2.3.2.8), and so there is no such thing as an uncaused willful action. (2) He then defends the notion of a will that consistently responds to prior ...
In all of the above discussions on epistemological topics, Hume performs a balancing act between making skeptical attacks (step 1) and offering positive theories based on natural beliefs (step 2). In the conclusion to Book 1, though, he appears to elevate his skepticism to a higher level and exposes the inherent contradictions in even his best phil...
Hume’s essay “Of the Original Contract” provides a good sense of his overall political stance. His main target is the theory of the social contract, supported by the English Whigs, which holds that governmental authority rests on consent of the governed.
Oct 25, 2017 · A rich and suggestive summary of Hume’s political theory that pays attention to historical context and to Hume’s relations with earlier figures in the history of political thought. Provides a helpful synopsis of major trends in interpretation.
Feb 26, 2001 · Although in his critical phase Hume freely borrows many of Hutcheson’s arguments to criticize moral rationalism, his rejection of a God-given moral sense puts him on a radically different path from Hutcheson in his constructive phase.
after all, very few provocative and well-written studies of Hume’s political thought. Yet this work fills the gap admirably. Hardin attempts to show the systematic coherence behind Hume’s scattered reflections on politics and to weave his political ideas into the more developed fabric of his theory of morals.
