"This stunning work is without question a major contribution to Cartesian studies, to the field of early modern philosophy, and to general epistemology--original, provocative, and philosophically interesting.

"This stunning work is without question a major contribution to Cartesian studies, to the field of early modern philosophy, and to general epistemology- ...

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:217 HUME'S IDEAS ABOUT NECESSARY CONNECTION 1. Introduction Hume asks, "What is our idea of necessity, when we say that two objects are necessarily connected together"? He later says that he has answered this question, but it is difficult to see what his answer is, or even to see precisely what the question was. Currently there are two main ways of understanding Hume's views about our idea of necessary (...) connection. These interpretations divide on the question whether Hume allows that we can speak meaningfully of an objective and necessary connection between two events. The one interpretation, which I will call epistemological, says that Hume does allow meaning to that phrase. On this view, justification is the only topic of Hume's negative message about necessary connection. We can mean what we say when we talk about necessary connection, but we cannot justify what we (meaningfully) say. That, according to this interpretation, is the negative outcome toward which Hume aims his investigation of the origin of our idea of necessary connection. He isn't denying we have that very idea; he is denying that its origin allows us to justify applying it to anything. The other interpretation, which I will call psychological, says that Hume does not allow meaning to the phrase, "an objective and necessary connection between two events." According to this interpretation, once we see the origin of our idea of necessary connection, we realize that we cannot mean by "necessary connection" what we thought we meant. Those words allow us to speak only of a certain 218 feeling in our minds, not of an objective feature of the world. Of course, the psychological interpretation partly resembles the epistemological one: it, too, denies that we can justify saying objective necessary connections exist. But on the psychological interpretation this follows a fortiori from the central negative claim, a claim which itself concerns meaning, not justification. In what follows, I will present these two interpretations more carefully and critically, and then I will advance my own. I think Hume was trying to express a view very different in kind from either of the two I've just mentioned. I think we can get a good idea of the kind of view Hume had by looking at Newton's treatment of gravitational force. Roughly, Newton thought that while there certainly are gravitational forces in objects, we can say nothing about them except that they are whatever it is that accounts for a specific set of observable regularities. Hume's views about necessary connection, or causal power, are roughly parallel. He does not doubt that we may speak meaningfully of objective necessary connections — rE we mean just some unknown quality in objects that underlies the constant conjunction of their sensible qualities. Inevitably we try to mean something more than this, but any such attempt is doomed to failure. Showing that we cannot mean something more is the point of investigating the origin of the "idea." I will be arguing that with this interpretation we can handle the sets of texts and problems that undercut the prevailing two interpretations, and reconcile those sets of texts with one another, despite their apparent inconsistency. This interpretation also has the advantage of attributing to Hume a view closely connected with a 219 distinctively eighteenth-century way of setting up these problems. Finally, I think the interpretation brings out nicely an instructive and central failing of Hume's views about necessary connection. 2. The Epistemological View Although there are hints of this kind of interpretation in other books, it is really articulated and defended only in Barry Stroud's book, 2 Hume. In what follows here, I mean to be sketching out and commenting on that interpretation. Hume wants to find out what our idea of necessary connection is. He conducts his investigation according to the dictum, "as we have no idea, that is not deriv'd from an impression, we must find some impression, that gives rise to this idea of necessity, if we assert we have really such an idea." (T 155) He argues, of course, that among our experiences of causes and effects, there are no impressions of necessary connection. Our experiences of... (shrink)

I argue that descartes thinks he can be metaphysically certain about each premise in the argument for god's existence, Even before he draws the argument's final conclusion that all his distinct ideas are metaphysically certain. The certainty of the personal premises is secured in the second meditation. The certainty of the causal premises, I argue, Arises from their central role in generating reasons for doubt of the kind that interest descartes.

I argue that although in his earlier work descartes thought of the laws of motion as "eternal truths," he later came to think of them as truths whose necessity is of a different type.

In the Introduction to A Treatise of Human Nature, Hume says he will make a careful empirical study of the human mind and produce a “science of man.” This will provide us with knowledge of the principles of human nature, and these principles will explain “our reasoning faculty, and the nature of our ideas,” “our tastes and sentiments,” and the union of “men … in society”. This seems to be a wholly constructive philosophical ambition, and yet Hume also claims to (...) discover “manifold contradictions and imperfections in human reason,” and he confesses that an “intense view” of these discoveries “has so wrought upon me, and heated my brain, that I am ready to reject all belief and reasoning, and can look upon no opinion even as more probable or likely than another”. It is hard to imagine a more deeply negative outlook than this, or one more at odds with the outlook of the scientist of man. (shrink)

This chapter contains section titled: Impressions and Ideas Original and Secondary Impressions Ideas of Memory and Imagination The Copy Principle Simple and Complex Perceptions General Terms References Further reading.

In the Introduction to A Treatise of Human Nature, Hume says he will make a careful empirical study of the human mind and produce a “science of man.” This will provide us with knowledge of the principles of human nature, and these principles will explain “our reasoning faculty, and the nature of our ideas,” “our tastes and sentiments,” and the union of “men … in society”. This seems to be a wholly constructive philosophical ambition, and yet Hume also claims to (...) discover “manifold contradictions and imperfections in human reason,” and he confesses that an “intense view” of these discoveries “has so wrought upon me, and heated my brain, that I am ready to reject all belief and reasoning, and can look upon no opinion even as more probable or likely than another”. It is hard to imagine a more deeply negative outlook than this, or one more at odds with the outlook of the scientist of man. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:What Does the Scientist of Man Observe? Janet Broughton In the introduction to the Treatise, Hume cautions the reader that the scientist of man cannot "go beyond experience" and "discover the ultimate original qualities of human nature."1 "[T]he only solid foundation we can give to this science," tie says, "must be laid on experience and observation" (Txvi). This methodological principle is a familiar Newtonian one; indeed Hume makes a (...) point of saying it applies to "all the sciences" (T xviii), not just to the science of man. Although the principle is familiar, just what it enjoins is not clear. We are to renounce investigations that go "beyond experience," and we are not to seek "ultimate" qualities. But exactly which investigations and qualities are these? The question is a difficult one for Newton as well as for Hume. But Hume's invocation of the familiar methodological principle raises two additional questions, ones that need not especially trouble Newton. When the scientist of man goes about his task ofgathering "experience and observation," what sort ofthing is he to observe? And how is he to make his observations? My mainaimin this paperisto answerthose two questionsas they arise for the early stages ofHume's investigation ofhuman nature in the Treatise. I hope also to persuade the reader that these questions are more difficult, and more important, than they may at first seem, andthattheyare connected with evenbroader questions aboutthe sort ofproject Hume undertook in the Treatise. "Perceptions" Without explanation, Hume begins the Treatise proper by distinguishing between two kinds of"perceptions ofthe human mind" and drawsthe distinction accordingtohow the perceptions"maketheir way into our thought or consciousness"(T 1). Afew pageslater, he asks which of these "impressions and ideas are causes and which effects" and then announces that the "full examination ofthis question is the subject of the present treatise" (T 4). The scientist ofman, then, is to observe perceptions in our consciousness. Most commentators assume therefore that Hume takes himselfto be studying what Locke called ideas: states of awareness whose 'immediate objects' are dependent for their existence on the existence Volume XVIII Number 2 155 JANETBROUGHTON ofthe states ofawareness themselves, and can be theimmediate objects of awareness for one mind only. Many commentators make the additional assumptionthatforHume, thepropersphere ofhis scientific investigations is really just his own Lockean ideas. That is, the only form of experience the scientist of man may consult is immediate experience; the only appropriateform ofobservationhe may undertake is introspection. Kemp Smith disagrees. He claims thatin the openingstages ofthe Treatise, Hume takes up a point of view that is "naively realistic."2 Kemp Smith prefers this readingbecause he thinks it explains Hume's general tendency, in the early parts ofbook 1, to slide between talking about objects and talking about ideas; before part 4's "Of scepticism withregard tothe senses," Kemp Smith claims, Hume himselfoccupies the position ofthe "vulgar"(for example, T 192), rather than that ofthe "philosophers." Kemp Smith reminds us that in part 4, after a long account of the position of the vulgar, Hume says that its inherent instability leads philosophers to change their system, and distinguish, (as we shall do for the future) betwixt perceptions and objects. (T 211, emphasis added) Only at this point, Kemp Smith says, does Hume adopt the Lockean theory ofideas. I also oppose the standard view, but unlike Kemp Smith I do not see our central interpretative task here as that of deciding whether Hume began his investigation ofhuman nature as a "naive realist" or as a Lockean theorist. For one thing, when Kemp Smith calls Hume a naive realist, he means that Hume begins by assuming that the Lockean is right about this much: when we see, hear, remember, and so on, we are "immediately" or "directly" aware of something—albeit objects, not ideas. But I do not think that Hume's account of the early phases of his investigation requires us to impute that assumption to him. I also see the choice Kemp Smith offers us as limiting in another way. For it focuses our attention just upon the metaphysical status of the objects ofsense-perception. We might agree with Kemp Smith that on that score Hume does notbegin... (shrink)

A collection of more than 30 specially commissioned essays, this volume surveys the work of the 17th-century philosopher-scientist commonly regarded as the founder of modern philosophy, while integrating unique essays detailing the context and impact of his work. Covers the full range of historical and philosophical perspectives on the work of Descartes Discusses his seminal contributions to our understanding of skepticism, mind-body dualism, self-knowledge, innate ideas, substance, causality, God, and the nature of animals Explores the philosophical significance of his contributions (...) to mathematics and science Concludes with a section on the impact of Descartes's work on subsequent philosophers. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Hume Studies Volume XXVI, Number 2, November 2000, pp. 279-289 Explaining General Ideas JANET BROUGHTON Hume declared himself a scientist of man; his aim was to identify the principles according to which our impressions give rise to our thoughts, beliefs, passions and actions. He took it that there are things about these products of experience that need to be explained, and as a scientist of man he aimed to (...) provide the needed explanation by finding principles that govern the operations of the mind. In what follows I want to consider Hume's account of general ideas, and I want especially to raise the question what it is about them that he wants to explain. In order to see what Hume thinks he should explain about our general ideas, we need first to see what sort of explanatory resources he thinks are available. In the introduction to the Treatise, he proposes to undertake a study of human nature, a study of the particular kind that he calls science of man. He is going to study the human mind using "careful and exact experiments"1 gleaned up from a "cautious observation of human life" as it appears in the "common course of the world" (T xix). The outcome will be the discovery of "principles," and Hume aims to render them "as universal as possible," "explaining all effects from the simplest and fewest causes" (T xvii). By itself this sounds awfully bland. How does it differ from the generalizations any of us might make about human mental life? On one common understanding of Hume, the answer is that he is studying objects we don't ordinarily talk about, using a method of observation we don't ordinarily use. He is studying what Locke called "ideas": the items of which a person is immeJanet Broughton is Associate Professor of Philosophy, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720-2390, USA. e-mail: [email protected] 280 Janet Broughton diately aware, and which depend on that awareness for their existence. He is studying them by using his power of introspection, the power by which a person may become immediately aware of his own ideas. I have argued elsewhere2 that Hume's term, 'perception,' isn't meant to refer to Lockean ideas but to people's states of mind as we ordinarily understand them: dateable episodes of consciousness of a great many types, including episodes of seeing, touching, smelling, tasting and hearing objects in the world around us. Nor, I have argued, does Hume's "cautious observation of human life" (T xix) invariably or even usually take the form of introspection. Rather, the scientist of man attends to a range of the features of perceptions that we notice from time to time in ordinary life. What distinguishes the activities of the scientist of man from those of the ordinary observer of human mental life is that the scientist of man attends mainly just to this range of features, and reflects upon them in a sustained and systematic way. The features to which he gives his attention are, I believe, these: force and vivacity; content compounded from simple elements; and the kinds of sequences or patterns in which perceptions with such-and-such content having such-and-such force and vivacity occur. Of these three features, the most puzzling by far, I think, is content; I will be exploring aspects of content as I attempt to identify what it is about general ideas that the scientist of man wants to understand. To put it crudely, we must see what Hume thinks impressions already contain if we want to see what it is about general ideas he wants to explain. In the first part of Book I of the Treatise, Hume sets out the basic distinctions and principles upon which he will draw: the distinctions between impressions and ideas, between simple and complex perceptions, between impressions of sensation and those of reflection, and between ideas of memory and of imagination; and the principles that our simple ideas are derived from resembling simple impressions, and that our ideas are associated via relations of resemblance, contiguity and causation. After clarifying the notion of relations, Hume concludes part i by... (shrink)

This chapter contains section titled: Themes in the Rules Self‐Knowledge and the Method of Doubt Our Knowledge of Our Existence Certainty About Our Thoughts Self‐Awareness and Knowledge of Our Thoughts The Extent of Our Knowledge of Our Thoughts The Priority of Self‐Knowledge References and Further Reading.

This chapter contains section titled: Introduction Hume's Naturalism Hume's Skepticism The Relation between Hume's Naturalism and His Skepticism Skepticism and Naturalism after the Treatise References Further Reading.

A collection of more than 30 specially commissioned essays, this volume surveys the work of the 17th-century philosopher-scientist commonly regarded as the founder of modern philosophy, while integrating unique essays detailing the context and impact of his work. Covers the full range of historical and philosophical perspectives on the work of Descartes Discusses his seminal contributions to our understanding of skepticism, mind-body dualism, self-knowledge, innate ideas, substance, causality, God, and the nature of animals Explores the philosophical significance of his contributions (...) to mathematics and science Concludes with a section on the impact of Descartes's work on subsequent philosophers. (shrink)

This essay contrasts Descartes with three skeptical figures: the Doubting Pyrrhonist, the Agrippan Pyrrhonist, and the Cartesian Skeptic. It argues that the meditator in Descartes’s Meditations is different from all three of these skeptics. Seeing the distinctive character of the meditator helps us understand how Descartes could have hoped to meet the challenge of skepticism.