David Hume: Empiricism and Human Understanding

For this session, we'll read and discuss David Hume's An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. This text presents an Empricist view of human knowledge (in contrast to the Rationalist view presented by Descartes), and argues that the only way we can come to know things is through experience. He also critiques the notion of causal inference through reason, and proposes a model of causal inference developed through habit and custom.

Enquiry is a fairly short text (only ~100 pages), but we'll focus our discussion on sections 1-8. You should feel free to read further and bring up topics from other sections if you find them interesting.

Since Hume wrote in English, you should feel free to use any edition of the text that you like (I'm using the Hackett edition). The text is also available for free on Project Gutenberg:

An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding

Note: While the Descartes reading is not required for this session, it might be helpful to provide context for Hume's critique of Rationalism. You can also refer to the Stanford Encyclopedia Page on Rationalism vs. Empiricism

Ground Rules:

1. All levels are welcome! Our discussion will not assume that you are familiar with Hume's other works, or with the writings of other philosophers.
2. Please complete the reading ahead of the discussion section. We will start the discussion assuming everyone has finished the reading and had some time to think about it.
3. We will focus on the reading for the first hour of the discussion. If you want to discuss other works or topics, please feel free to hang out and do so afterwards
4. Please show up on time for the discussion.
5. Be respectful, open, and curious!