Knowledge and Doubt - Hume IV Flashcards
What 2 things make up something that is matter of fact?
-A posteriori
-Synthetic
What 2 things make up something that is relations of ideas?
-A priori
-Analytic
What does it mean for something to be analytic?
A proposition is analytic if it is true because the words which make it up are true. For example: A square has 4 sides.
What does it mean for something to be synthetic?
A proposition is synthetic if it is true because of the way the world is. For example: The sky is blue.
What are relations of ideas?
Relations of ideas are statements. Every statement asserts a relationship between 2 or more ideas. For example: Mr Ferrier is a teacher.
What does Hume tell us about relations of ideas?
They are either intuitively or demonstrably certain.
What does it mean to know something by intuition?
It is self evidently true. For example: Nothing can be bigger than itself or Either today is Friday or it isn’t.
What does it mean to know something demonstrably?
This means we can work out something is true. For example: Pythagoras Theorem
How do we gain knowledge in the world?
From matters of fact through experience of the world.
What does contingently true mean?
That it could have been false, for example it isn’t illogical to imagine grass not being green.
What is Hume basically saying?
(We understand blank , our experience causes blank
We understand matters of fact according to causation and that our experience of one event causes us to assume that it was caused by something we haven’t observed.
What is the desert island example?
A person alone on an island finds a watch and concludes that someone else was on the island before them. They think that watches are worn by people ad the cause of the watch being there was someone else dropping the watch.
What happens if we reason this way? (Following from the desert island example)
We assume the present fact is caused by something unobserved. Otherwise the reasoning is flawed.
What does Hume argue about causal chains?
(Fire Example, always a basis of, true when we have never experienced)
They are always the basis of matters of fact and this is true when we have never experienced the matter of fact. For example: When we observe light we often assume that there will be heat because we assume the source of the light is fire.
Why do we assume that one thing is caused by another?
We assume because it is based on our experience of similar events. We don’t get this through reason.
What is the basis of our understanding of matters of fact?
Causation
Why are none of the arguments necessarily true?
We can imagine the opposite of every matter of fact. For example, the sun will not rise tomorrow.
What is the Adam example Hume gives?
Adam would not have been able to work out that water would drown him just by seeing it was clear + colourless nature. Nor would he be able to work out that fire would burn him without experiencing the effects. For Hume, then, we acquire knowledge of cause and effect from repeated experience.
What is the first supporting example Hume gives?
(Time when humans didn’t understand how things worked example)
Imagine a time when humans didn’t understand the way that an object works:
If you present 2 pieces of smooth marble to someone who has no knowledge of physics, they will not be able to work out that they are stuck together in such a way that pulling them apart is less effective than sliding them apart through reason alone.
When an effect is meant to depend on machinery or secret structural parts what do we do?
We attribute all of our knowledge of it to experience.
How do we attribute our understanding of bread and milk being nourishing to humans and not tigers/lions to?
Through experience and not reason
What is the billiard ball example?
We might argue that we know through reason alone that when one billiard ball strikes another, this would make the ball move.
What is the billiard ball example (part 2)
(Hint: To do with effects)
Hume argues that if we have never seen something before and we were asked what the effect is, we would have come up with a random explanation from our imagination. There could be many possible effects.
What is the billiard ball example (part 3)?
The movement of the first ball is an entirely different event from the movement of the second ball. So we cannot reason that the movement of the first ball necessarily causes the second ball to move.
What is one conclusion of the billiard ball example?
(We often take it to be true…)
We often take it to be true that because of our experience of seeing one event follow another that the relationship is necessary.
What is a second conclusion of the billiard ball example?
When the billiard ball strikes another we think it must cause the other ball to move. We believe that the relationship between cause and effect is necessary, but this isn’t something known through reason.
What is a third example of the billiard ball example?
We can imagine any number of effects happening. We can imagine that these events could be different each time an event occurred. So our reasoning doesn’t tell us that there is necessarily one outcome.
Hume has shown that knowledge from cause and effect cannot come from what?
An A Priori reasoning. Experience must have a role to play.
What question challenges Hume’s knowledge that things from cause and effect can’t come from A Priori?
“What are inferences (conclusions) from experiences based on?”
What problem does Hume need to address?
How we move from “This happened here” to “this happens generally”.
We assume the movement of the first ball caused what?
The second ball to move because we have observed similar patterns in the past
What does an assumption generally mean?
Since similar causes have similar effects, the future will be like the past. We assume events we haven’t experienced will be like experiences we have experiences.
What is the Bread example?
We don’t know why bread is nourishing, but we know from experience that is has been in the past. Even though we do not know if bread will nourish us again in the future, we assume it will.there is nothing observable in the event itself that tells us that another future bread like substance in will be nourishing.
What does Hume mean by arguing reason isn’t involved?
(Hint: Cannot draw inferences about something)
We cannot draw these inferences about cause and effect using reasoning.
What is the Reasoning isn’t involved example?
P1 - In the past, ‘X’ object has had ‘X’ effect.
C - In the future, similar objects to this one will have similar effects.
What reason do we have for accepting the Reason isn’t involved?
Hume claims that the conclusion doesn’t intuitively follow from the premise. So, cause and effect cannot be known through reason.
What does Hume point out about the relationship between cause and effect?
It isn’t necessary
What can relations of ideas be known as?
A priori
What does Hume argue about nature?
That nature could be different to how it is now. Hume gives the example of snow that tastes salty or feels hot.
Nothing about certain causes and effects is impossible to imagine, so what?
It cannot be shown through logical reasoning.
Causes and effect based on matters of fact is what?
Circular
So cause and effect cannot be known through what?
It cannot be known through experience either.
What is Hume’s fork?
Hume claims knowledge is either relations of ideas or matters of fact. Anything else (like God) can be thrown out the window. However it is not clear if Hume’s fork itself is a relation of ideas or matters of fact. Might be neither! Should we just throw his theory away form the start?
What is the Causation Argument?
Hume gives 3 cases which demonstrate his point in knowledge that causation is not based on reason. We might be inclined to agree with Hume that knowledge of causation is not based on priori reasoning.
What is the problem of Introduction/Karl Popper?
Karl Popper - a philosopher in science. Argued science isn’t just about observing an event and assuming it will happen again in the future. Argues science is more about trial and error instead of inductive reasoning. Hume might respond by asking why we should start with any assumptions based on previous experience, given that there is no logical reasoning to believe they will happen.
What is the Habit and Custom argument?
Hume concluded the human mind was like any other animal mind. Would have been controversial in his day, later accepted by Darwin’s theory of evolution. However not always the case that a constant conjection (seeing one thing as another) creates a belief in a necessary connection (A must be the cause of B). We also seem to be able to make claims based on single observations (i.e food poisoning)
What has Hume challenged in terms of Hume’s Fork?
The claim that there are only ever analytic priori truths. He thought there might be some synthetic priori truths. He gives the example that we might predict the date and time of a solar eclipse before it happens. If we do this, we might say we know this will happen, but we haven’t experienced it yet so it isn’t analytic. This is a synthetic truth, but it is known before the event, making it priori.
