🟡| K&D - Hume Section 4

Question 1

Aim

2

Answer 1

• To do for philosophy what Newton had done for physics
• Identify a set of laws that would govern everything

Question 2

Distinctions of Knowledge

2

Part 1

Answer 2

• Relations of Ideas
• Matters of Fact

Question 3

Distinctions of Knowledge:

Relations of Ideas

4

Part 1

Answer 3

• Known a priori - through reason and logic
• Assert a relationship between two ideas (e.g. ‘all triangles are three sides figures’ asserts a relation between triangles and three-sided figures)
• Don’t depend on how the world happens to be as they are purely related to the mind
• Necessarily true & contrary is impossible (e.g. ‘no triangular object is circular’)

Question 4

Relations of Ideas:

How are relations of ideas known?

2

Part 1

Answer 4

• Intuition
• Demonstration

Question 5

Relations of Ideas:

Intuition

2

Part 1

Answer 5

• A piece of knowledge that is self-evidently true
• Example: ‘either today is Tuesday or it isn’t’

Question 6

Relations of Ideas:

Demonstration

2

Part 1

Answer 6

• A piece of knowledge that we can use our logic to work out the truth of
• Example: pythagoras theorem

Question 7

Distinctions of Knowledge

Matters of Fact

4

Part 1

Answer 7

• Known a posteriori - through senses and experience
• Gained by observation - our experience of the world
• The foundation of this knowledge is what we experience here and now or can remember experiencing
• Contingently true - contrary is possible because our mind can imagine it (e.g. we can imagine a world where the grass is a different colour as there is no logical contradiction)

Question 8

Hume’s Reasoning for his Distinction

Part 1

Answer 8

Wants to know why do we have faith in facts about the world that go beyond our own experiences of the world?

Question 9

Cause & Effect

2

Part 1

Answer 9

• Beliefs we don’t directly observe are based on the notion of cause and effect
• Example: we believe the sun will rise every morning because it has done so for every morning we’ve experienced

Question 10

Cause & Effect:

Hume’s Examples

3

Part 1

Answer 10

• Letter to a Friend
• Desert Island Watch
• Voice in a Dark Room

Question 11

Cause & Effect Examples:

Letter to a Friend

Part 1

Answer 11

If your friend told you that they were going to France and later sent a letter that had been posted from France, you would believe that they were in France despite not witnessing this for yourself

Question 12

Cause & Effect Examples:

Desert Island Watch

Part 1

Answer 12

If you discovered a watch on a deserted island, you would assume that there had been other people there before you to drop it since watches are worn by people, despite not seeing said people

Question 13

Cause & Effect Examples:

Voice in a Dark Room

Part 1

Answer 13

If you were in a dark room and heard a voice, you would deduce that another person was in the room with you by their ability to hold a rational conversation despite not seeing the person

Question 14

Cause & Effect:

Basis of Belief

4

Part 1

Answer 14

• Established cause & effect as a matter of fact not experienced, but wants to understand basis of belief
• Not a priori because when a person encounters a completely new object or event that they have never experienced they will not know its causes or effects just by reasoning
• Example: Adam, the first man in the biblical stories would not be able to reason that water could drown him just by observing its clear, colourless nature
• We cannot work out the effects of an object or where it came from just from its qualities

Question 15

Cause & Effect:

Acceptable as Not A Priori Examples

3

Part 1

Answer 15

• Blocks of Marble
• Magnets & Gunpowder
• Bread & Milk

Question 16

Cause & Effect A Priori Acceptance Examples:

Blocks of Marble

2

Part 1

Answer 16

• Most people can remember a time where they didn’t understand how an object worked and could not use reason to figure it out
• Example: two smooth pieces of marble – these will be difficult to separate by pulling the pieces apart, so they must be slid away from each other to separate

Question 17

Cause & Effect A Priori Acceptance Examples:

Magnets & Gunpowder

2

Part 1

Answer 17

• Unusual events which are unlike the normal course of nature that we cannot use reason to work out their effects
• Examples: magnets and gunpowder, which we cannot reason the effects of as they have the chance to surprise

Question 18

Cause & Effect A Priori Acceptance Examples:

Bread & Milk

2

Part 1

Answer 18

• There are complex objects that may have parts we are unaware of
• Example: bread and milk – we understand that these nourish humans, but we wouldn’t be able to reason that these would not nourish tigers unless we had experienced attempting to feed the tiger and seeing the negative impact

Question 19

Cause & Effect:

Unacceptable as Not A Priori Examples

3

Part 1

Answer 19

• When we have become completely accustomed to a certain type of event throughout our lives
• When the event is like most other events in nature
• When the event is something simple with no hidden complexities

Question 20

Cause & Effect:

Proving as Not A Priori

5

Part 1

Answer 20

• Hume wants to convince us we cannot predict cause & effect behaviours using reason alone
• When we become accustomed to events, we assume that we could use reason alone to work out their causes and effects without ever having experienced it
• Example: With billiard balls, we might imagine that that we could reason that when one ball strikes another this would necessarily make the other ball move. The movement of the first ball is entirely separate from the second ball, so we cannot reason from the movement of the first to assume the second would necessarily act in the same way
• if you were to use reason to predict the causes and effects of an unfamiliar event, you would be relying on your imagination which allows for any number of possible effects
• We also cannot know using reason that any cause must necessarily have a particular effect either (e.g. dropping a stone mid-air)

Question 21

Cause & Effect:

Proving as A Posteriori

5

Part 1

Answer 21

• If not a priori, must be a posteriori as cause and effect events rely on impressions
• Example: for the first ball to strike the second ball and cause it to move, they must be near each other on the same table - a relation in space. The first ball must also move before the second ball can be moved by it - a relation in time
• Both requirements derive from an impression
• Third criteria, a necessary connection or relation between the cause and effect, cannot be observed empirically
• if there is no impression then there is no reality to the idea, so Hume has undermined the whole idea of causality.

Question 22

Hume’s New Position

2

Part 2

Answer 22

• Now that Hume has undermined causality, he wants to find out why and how we on from ‘this is happening here and now’ to ‘this is what happens generally’.
• Before he finds this out, Hume looks to inductive reasoning.

Question 23

Inductive Reasoning

3

Part 2

Answer 23

• Often involves looking at past events and using them to form a conclusion about the future
• Becomes an issue because we end up making assumptions on events like what we have experienced, and these assumptions are only probable at best
• Example: during Hume’s time it was unknown why bread was nourishing, but people continued to eat it and bread-like substances because it had nourished them in the past, leading to the conclusion that bread must be nourishing

Question 24

Inductive Reasoning’s Link to Cause & Effect

3

Part 2

Answer 24

• Hume claims that the conclusions we draw from cause and effect are inductive reasoning, as these conclusions do not intuitively follow from their premises – it is not self-evident
• Similar objects having a similar effect does not necessarily follow from a past object having a certain effect
• A hidden premise or intermediate conclusion would be required to prove the conclusions of cause and effect, but this has not been found by Hume

Question 25

# Cause & Effect: Circular Reasoning | 3 ## Footnote Part 2

Answer 25

* Humes argues the reasoning drawn from our experience to conclude cause and effect must be circular * If we point out the possibility that the future may not resemble the past, then the fact that the past has previously resembled the future does not help us to be sure that it will continue to hold for future futures * Demonstrates problem of induction - we have no independent reason to take inductive reasoning to be reliable, other than the fact that it has previously been reliable, making it circular reasoning

Question 26

# Cause & Effect: Hume's Findings | 4 ## Footnote Part 2

Answer 26

* Could be argued as being extreme, but Hume isn't going to stop believing in cause and effect - he will continue to act on his faith in the notion * Wants to understand why we are inclined to believe in the notion when there is no logical argument to justify this belief * Possible that Hume hasn't worked out the correct logical argument and it could be uncovered in the future, but he doubts this * Young children and animals draw conclusions from experience, so we may believe this missing reasoning, if any, would be very simple

Question 27

Conclusion | 4 ## Footnote Part 2

Answer 27

* Belief in cause and effect is gained through constant conjunctions of events being associated with one another * We draw the interference from cause to effect without reasoning or argument, but based on a principle of the imagination – custom - that has bound the ideas of cause and effect in our mind * Custom is an instinct of the mind, a disposition we simply have because of experience of constant conjunction * Without custom, we would be unable to draw causal interference which would give us no knowledge beyond what is immediately present to our senses