Key Features:
- No of Pages: 116
- No of Chapters: 05
Introduction:
AbstractOne of the never ending processes in life is the process of knowledge acquisition which to the lay man may not constitute any problem as regards how it is acquired. But to philosophers, from time past this has constituted serious debacles. However, in philosophy, it has become the special concern of epistemology one of it’s branches to analyze how knowledge is acquired.
Epistemology has rationalism and empiricism as its most outstanding schools. These two schools in analyzing how knowledge is acquired have come to be the opposite of each other, because while rationalism hold that knowledge comes through reason,empiricism on the other hand holds that it comes through sense-experience. In this long history of philosophy, however, David Hume has remained the most consistent empiricist and for some reasons, we deemed it necessary to make the aim of this work be the critical analysis of David Hume’s theory of empiricism so that in the end we would have demonstrated whether it exhausts all possible knowledge of reality or not.
Now our problem is what must have led to Hume’s radical position that sense-experience is the only possible guide to the acquisition of knowledge that is certain? We however, discover that it is not unconnected to the fact that the search for knowledge that is certain, which Aristotle shifted to concrete objects through experimentation and which also cut through the time of John Locke and George Berkeley who laid emphasis on perception, influenced Hume to a great extent. Therefore by building on the philosophy of Locke and Berkeley which emphasized sense perception, Hume came to develop his radical position about sense experience as the limit of human knowledge.
In this, Hume categorized the objects of human reason into relations of ideas and matters of facts and he concentrated on the latter which he argued can only be ascertained through sense-experience. He went further to hold that these sense-experiences are acquired as impressions that is at the time of direct contact with an object, and later as ideas when the mind reflects on the impressions.
Analytically one discovers that impressions are however Humes only guarantee for measuring reality, even the ideas in the mind he argued must conform to these impressions so as to be considered as guaranteeing knowledge as real. In short, for something to be considered as real, it must generate impression.
Hume argued, causality can not be real because in reality, only what we experience are the proceeding and succeeding events separately and not any causal relation between the two events. All other metaphysical concepts are not real because they do not generate impressions and therefore cannot be experienced. To demonstrate his utter rejection of metaphysics, Hume campaigned for the burning of every book that contains metaphysics.
In spite of all these, Hume’s rejection of metaphysics was an unsuccessful exercise because Hume used the method of knowledge acquisition through sensation which does not apply to metaphysics.
Then come our wonder, why should sense-experience be the only standard of the measurement of reality for Hume? Are the senses not fallible? Of course, they are. Hardly do two people perceive on thing the same way, what of illusions and hallucinations, all these demonstrates that the senses furnish us most times with appearances and not reality. It therefore amounts to wrong conception of reality as guaranteeing reality.
What the sense furnish us with has to be moderated by human reason before they are considered, qualified as certain knowledge.
Table of ContentCHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of study
1.2 Statement of problem
1.3 Purpose of study
1.4 Significance of study
1.5 Scope and Scopmethodology
1.6 Methodology
1.7 Literature Review
End Notes
CHAPTER TWO: HUME’S LIFE AND THE INTELLECTUAL INFLUENCES ON HIM
2.1 Hume’s life and works
2.2 Intellectual influences on David Hume
2.3 General overview of empiricist philosophy
End Notes
CHAPTER THREE: HUME’S EMPIRICISM
3.1 Hume’s theory of empiricism
3.2 Contents of the mind and Association of ideas
3.3 Hume’s concept of causality
3.4 Hume’s attack on metaphysics
End Notes
CHAPTER FOUR: PROBLEMS AND CRITIQUE OF HUME’S EMPIRICISM
4.2 The limitations of the senses as a source of knowledge
4.2 Wrong conception of reality
4.3 A systematic empiricism leads to idealism
End Notes
CHAPTER FIVE:PERSONAL REFLECTION
5.1 End notes
5.2 Bibliography
IntroductionThe search for knowledge that is both absolute and certain has been continuous. However, since at least the time of Aristotle, there has been a strong epistemological tradition based mainly on human experience, which is not directed towards the possibility of achieving absolute knowledge.
This tradition is a typical example of the doctrine of empiricism. Empiricists argue that it is unreasonable to set a goal of absolute and all-inclusive knowledge, especially when there is close at hand the power to increase practical knowledge by slower but dependable methods.
Empiricist are content in building a system of knowledge that has a high probability of being true even though it’s absolute certainty cannot be guaranteed.
David Hume is one of the greatest empiricists in the history of epistemology and metaphysics who has distinguished himself as a consistent and coherent radical empiricist.
According to him, the only true knowledge is experimental, and any concept that is not available to sense perception is mere fanciful thinking.
The only abstract objects of the abstract science or of demonstration are quantity and number, and all attempts to extend this more perfect species of knowledge beyond these bounds are mere sophistry and illusion.1
With an ideological ferocity, he calls for a book-burning campaign of any metaphysical work.
He proclaims:
When we run over libraries persuaded of these (empirical) principles, what havoc must we make? If we take in our hand any volume: of or school metaphysics, for instance lets ask does it contain any abstract reasoning containing quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter-of-fact and existence? No. Commit to it to the flames: for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion.2
Hume’s proposal of vigorous sensism as an alternative to our natural and acquired scientific, metaphysical and socio-cultural deposits, creates more problems than it resolves. It withers all foundation of science and philosophy. It leaves us in make-shift, sandy subjectivism of dry empiricism.
David Hume’s empiricism within the context of knowledge is great, but a consistent empirist will end up destroying the very foundation of knowledge. The epistemological, scientific and ontological heritage of humanity is we think more than a series of impressions.3 To reduce them as bundles of impressions. To reduce them as bundles of impressions as Hume would want to believe is myopic.
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