Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sat Feb 29, 2020 5:21 am
I suggest, instead of going all over with Hume, why not critique Hume's main proposals, i.e.
1. Causation
2. Bundle theory
3. On Miracles
4. On induction
If you can convince me Hume was wrong on the above, then I will accept Hume was a very bad philosopher.
I have no interest in convincing you of anything, VA. I'm always interested in good conversation, but have no desire or interest in changing what anyone else chooses to think or believe. I will address the four issues you suggested only because you seem interested. I will only be able to provide a brief critique here, of course, but I have addressed most of these issues at length elsewhere if you are interested.
I will begin with one point you did not list, Hume's terrible epistemology which led to all his other mistakes.
Epistemology
Hume's notion of what ideas (or concepts) actually consist of is that of a child or uncivilized savage.
For Hume, "ideas" are like fuzzy pictures or representations of what we directly experience. The idea "dog" or "table" is just an incomplete "picture" of a dog or table recalled from memory. This is the epistemology of a child or a brute, not that of philosopher.
In Hume's footnote to his final section, "Section XII—Of the Academical Or Sceptical Philosophy," he makes his view explicit: "Thus when the term Horse is pronounced, we immediately figure [picture] to ourselves the idea of a black or a white animal, of a particular size or figure: But as that term is also usually applied to animals of other colours, figures and sizes, these ideas, though not actually present to the imagination, are easily recalled; and our reasoning and conclusion proceed in the same way, as if they were actually present."
If you've ever heard someone say, "our ideas can never be as perfect as real things," or "our ideas of things are always incomplete," they are expressing Hume's notion of ideas, which is, at best, pre-Aristotelian. This particular Humean infection is so intrenched in academia and every intellectual field today, that the Aristotelian understanding of what concepts (ideas) actually are has almost been lost.
An idea or concept is not a "picture" or "representation" of anything. A concept is the identification of an existent (entity or idea) or a class of existents (entities or other ideas).
The meaning of a concept is the entity or entities it identifies, with all their qualities, attributes, and relationships, whether those qualities, attributes, and relationships (beyond those necessary for their identification) are known or not. The concept designated by the word "dog," for example, means every dog there is, ever was, ever will be, or can be imagined.
[Please see my article on this site,
"Epistemology, Concepts", for a brief overview of a correct epistemology.]
Causation
If you want to destroy a legitimate concept, especially if it is not well understood, just describe and explain that concept in a plausible but incorrect way and proceed to demonstrate the concept, as described, is logically impossible. The concept in this case is causality, which Hume totally corrupted.
The right meaning of the concept cause is that the events of this world are not random and disconnected but that things happen for a reason which lies squarely in the nature of things and their relationships. Causality is a very broad concept and subsumes more than mere "physical" causality, which is the only aspect of it Hume addressed. The implied (and correct) assumption behind causality is that the world is objectively real, and that the principles that describe its nature can be discovered, and that description, to the extent it is complete and correct, explains why things behave as they do and have the relationships they have. All knowledge, from science to philosophy is dependent on this premise. If doubt is cast on that premise, doubt is cast on all knowledge.
By completely misidentifying the nature of cause, Hume not only destroys the basis of all science, but all abstract knowledge. He wrote: "All reasonings concerning matter of fact seem to be founded on the relation of Cause and Effect," which in his view is the same cause always produces the same effect. "From causes which appear similar we expect similar effects. This is the sum of all our experimental conclusions."
It is not "Cause and Effect" as Hume describes it, that enables us to reason about facts or anything else, but the premise that reality is rationally understandable. In the entire history of the world there has probably never been two identical causes or two identical effects. It was simple for Hume to show that his description of cause was impossible to know, but it was his own ignorant description of cause that was wrong, not the nature of cause itself.
Events do not cause events. All events are only the behavior of entities and the behavior of all entities is determined by the nature of those entities and their relationship to all other entities. Every event has a cause, but cause means an explanation for that event, and that explanation is always how an entity with a particular nature behaves in a particular context.
Bundle theory
The odd thing about bundle theory is that it seems very similar to my own ontology which I had fully developed before discovering Hume's theory. I was actually expecting his view to be the same as my own. It is very close.
He is absolutely right that there is no underlying, "substance," to which an entities properties (I call qualities) adhere. A thing is whatever it properties or qualities are. But qualities are not themselves independent existents that are somehow "bundled" together to make an entity what it is. An entity is whatever is qualities are, but those qualities do not exist independently of the entity they are qualities of. You may be interested in a brief overview of my ontology on this site:
"Ontology Introduction"
On Miracles
I do not disagree with Hume's conclusion that there are no miracles, but I certainly disagree with his argument. Nothing can be established on the basis of other people's testimony, no matter how many or few support it. If a miracle is defined as that which happens in defiance of the nature of reality itself, it is impossible by definition, and no argument is required.
On induction
Hume's arguments regarding induction rest on his false view of causation, but in one sense, his conclusion was correct. There is no such logical process as induction.
His argument against his own wrong view of cause, "It appears, then, that this idea of a necessary connexion among events arises from a number of similar instances which occur of the constant conjunction of these events; nor can that idea ever be suggested by any one of these instances, surveyed in all possible lights and positions. But there is nothing in a number of instances, different from every single instance, which is supposed to be exactly similar; except only, that after a repetition of similar instances, the mind is carried by habit, upon the appearance of one event, to expect its usual attendant, and to believe that it will exist," also assumes that induction is how science is done or that principles are established.
There really isn't such a thing as inductive reasoning, as though it were a different kind of reasoning, there is only deductive reasoning or logic. There is an inductive method, which is really nothing more than observation, a kind of research which looks for things that repeat or are similar, but nothing can be established by that method except the observation and data gathered, and possibly the development of a hypothesis about why there is a similarity or why there is repeated phenomena. If observation gets that far, a hypothesis can be tested, at which point it is deductive reason which is being used.
Our reason for believing the sun will rise tomorrow is not because it always has, but because we understand what the sun is, and that it's rising is due to the earth's rotation, both of which will continue barring some celestial cataclysm. Pre-scientific man may have believed many things based on nothing more than the observation a thing always happened, but that "knowledge" was very uncertain and the reason for famines (the rain that always came, didn't) and natural catastrophes (the volcano has only ever smoked in the past).
There is more to this issue than I can address here. What is mistakenly called induction is really a process of identification and concept formation.
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I've taken the time to address your questions because I believe you are interested. Of course this had to be very brief, because they are not simple questions that can be answered in a few sentences.
I'm also not very interested in refuting all the mistaken philosophy there is, especially since I think most of what goes by the name philosophy is mistaken. I am really only interested in what is true. What is false is infinite in scope and can never by fully addressed.
