what was david hume?

David Hume is usually referred to as an empiricist, although the label is unimportant.

Homework assignment or just curious?

He was an ugly,fat Scottish git who analysed economics and history before electricity distribution was perfected and is thus passe to all intents and purposes. He is often used as a status symbol by pseudo-intellectuals or by politicians to justify some dynamic new policy initiative they think will promote their career.

Chances are that his philosophical outlook was based on exploiting the working classes until the pips squeak except on Christmas Day when he might have given his servants an apple each from the storerooms they took care of.

There's that annoying buzzing sound again.

What a little girl response that is.

No attempt to meet the challenge.

What's Hume's relevance today then Joe except to those who have studied his works and want to ram them down everybody's throat.

Quote-"Methinks that I am like a man, who having struck on many shoals, and having narrowly escap'd ship-wreck in passing a small firth, has yet the temerity to put to sea in the same leaky weather-beaten vessel, and even carries his ambition so far as to thi nk of compassing the globe under this disadvantageous circumstances...Fain wou'd I run into the crowd for shelter and warmth; but cannot prevail with myself to mix with such deformity. I call upon others to join me, in order to make a company apart, but no one will harken to me. Everyone keeps a distance, and dreads that storm that beats upon me from every side. I have expos'd myself to the enmity of all metaphysicians, logicians, mathematicians, and even theologians; and can I wonder at the insults I must suffer?... Can I be sure that in leaving all establish'd opinions I am following the truth?"

Looks like he hated his fellow man from that. Bit of a snob. Not much use in the pub.

There it is again. That buzzing noise.

Just wanted to see you pirouette again Joe.

he might have been a deist, TPQ, although he denied it publicly.

here's a bit more context to Spendius' quote:



from this it seems possible to me that deformity refers to himself rather than to the figurative crowd.

PQ this thing wont let me send PMs but yeah i am doing a level. And i think he is an empiricist.

It's only a label.

According to Braudel, who is well worth reading. Hume opposed paper money and bills of lading and such like and wished to continue the reliance on coin,which had presumably served his Presbyterian family well.

He was therefore in favour of mud huts and bread and water diets for the peasants and probably public floggings for scowling.

What he would have made of the modern financial system cannot be imagined but if it all collapses in a smoking ruin one day he would have taken great pleasure in saying "I told you".

From an economic point of view he's a fossil.

why i wanted to know is because:
he says he is an empiricist, yet he says that there can always be exeptions.
he uses reason to argue, yet says reason is 'a habbit rather than an external tool for measuring good'

maybe he was just a hippocrite.

what board are you doing nick?

i suppose he's a hypocirte if you disagree with him. you could also claim that he was being practical, by not making assertions that would violate common sense.

It's possible to be inconsistent without also being a hypocrite. Hume's empiricism led him into a number of inconsistencies (in particular, with regard to cause and effect) that he never adequately resolved. That doesn't mean, however, that he was a hypocrite.

I'm doing aqa if thats what you mean, i think it is.

yes i am too!!!!!!!!
one more month and then we shall be free forever! hurrah!

yes. i also think it makes sense not to lay down 'absolute rules' and acept they could can be broken.

It is possible to lay down consistent rules by putting down context or exceptions, etc.

"I shall only eat this cake after 2:00 o'clock except if I have to eat it before then to save lives"