Hume Section 4 (Knowledge And Doubt)

Question 1

What is relation of ideas?

Answer 1

• a priori and analytic
• ‘either intuitively or demonstratively certain’

Question 2

Examples of things we know to be intuitively true

Answer 2

Either today is Tuesday or it isn’t
Anything that had shape has size

Question 3

What is demonstratively certain?

Answer 3

We can work out they are true.
For example, geometry, algebra

Question 4

What is matter of fact

Answer 4

Always a posteriori and synthetic. We gain it using observation of the world. They are also contingently true - means they could have been false.

Question 5

What is analytic?

Answer 5

If it is true or false just in virtue of the meanings of the words

Question 6

What is synthetic?

Answer 6

True or false in virtue of the way the world is

Question 7

What is a priori?

Answer 7

It can be known without reference to experience

Question 8

What is a posteriori?

Answer 8

We must refer to experience to know that it is true.

Question 9

What is the purpose of “Humes fork”

Answer 9

• Can be used as a test for spotting suspect metaphysical claims
• knowledge that dosent fall into either category aren’t genuine knowledge claims and should be discarded

Question 10

Why is it necessary to study the relation of cause and effect?

Answer 10

Hume argues that any beliefs we have that aren’t directly viewed by us are based on a belief in the concept of cause and effect.

‘All reasonings about matter of fact seem to be based on the relation of cause and effect which ie the only relation that can take us beyond the evidence if if our memory and senses’

Question 11

Why is it necessary to study the relation of cause and effect?

Answer 11

Hume argues that any belief that hasn’t been directly observed by us is based on the faith in the concept of cause and effect.

Question 12

Examples to support the necessity of studying the relation of cause and effect

Answer 12

1. Take a person who believes ‘my friend is in France right now’ to be true. This claim is a matter of fact as it is not aprior or intuitively/demonstratively certain. However, the person has not seen their friend in France and believes their friend to be in France because they told them they are in France or they received a letter from their friend.
2. A person on a desert island finds a watch and assumes people must have been there and dropped it before them, as people wear watches
3. A person in a pitch black room hears a voice, and having spoken to them assumes there is another person in the room. The assumption is that the conversation can only be caused by another person being there.

Hume argues that if we are to understand our confidence in matters of facts we haven’t experienced, we must find out the basis for our belief in cause and effect.

Question 13

Why is cause and effect not a priori

Answer 13

Because when a person encounters a new object or event they will not know the cause or effects of that object just by reasoning around it.

Question 14

What is the example of Adam?

Answer 14

Adam wouldn’t be able to work out that water would drown him just by seeing its ‘fluidity and transparency’. Nor would he be able to tell that fire would burn him without directly experiencing these effects.

‘The qualities of an object that appear to the senses never reveal the causes that produced the object or the effects that it will have’

Question 15

Examples to support the claim that cause & effects is not known to be apriori

Answer 15

1. 2 smooth pieces of marble will be difficult to separate by pulling each piece directly away from the other. But it is easy enough to slide each away from the other along the side. When we don’t know how an object works we are usually happy to accept we didn’t know it purely by reasoning.
2. Gunpowder and magnets, we don’t know the effects or causes of gunpowder or magnets using reason alone, we have to first bring in knowledge fron experience to know the effects
3. We associate bread and milk as nourishing to humans due to our experience of them being so, we don’t know why milk is not nourishing for a lion/tiger.

Question 16

3 examples where people find it difficult to accept that cause & effect is not known a-priori

Answer 16

Hume identifies cases where people don’t seem to accept these claims:
1. When we have become entirely accustomed to a certain type of event throughout our lives
2. When the event is one that is like most other events in nature
3. When the event is simple of dosent have any hidden parts we aren’t aware of

Question 17

What is the billiard balls example?

Answer 17

Hume argues that the only way we can infer that a billard ball striking another will cause the 2nd ball to move is via past experience as we can’t reason the 2nd would necessarily aft in the same way

Question 18

Why can we not discover the necessity of the effect through apriori knowledge?

Answer 18

We assume that because an event has happened once the way it has occurred -the cause and effect- must be necessary. But this is not something we can know by reason, if we can’t work out using reason what the effect would be of an unknown event, then we also cannot reason that the effect must necessarily occur. This is because we can imagine any number of effects occurring and we can imagine these effects to be different each time an event occurred, so our reason dosent necessarily give one outcome.

Question 19

What is it not enough to say our reasonings about matter of fact are based on experience?

Answer 19

Initially in section 4 part 1 hume rules out the possibility that cause & effect come from a priori reasoning. However this is not enough as we can still ask ‘what are inferences from experience based on?’ - how from ‘this is what is happening here and now’ to ‘this is what happens generally?’

Question 20

The problem of induction

Answer 20

Hume argues we can not draw inferences from cause and effect using reasoning. Just because an object has always had the same effect everytime I have viewed it does not mean it will always have the same effect - the conclusion dosent intuitively follow from the premises. Think of the hillard ball example and the sun.