Knowledge & Doubt - Hume's Theory

Question 1

What are perceptions?

Answer 1

Contents of the mind, a thing and not a process of how we know

Question 2

What are impressions?

Answer 2

What we gain when we experience something in the moment, only experienced once

Question 3

What are ideas?

Answer 3

The faded remains of an impression

Question 4

What is the key difference between impressions and ideas?

Answer 4

Impressions have more force and vivacity than ideas

Question 5

Hume Impressions Quote

Answer 5

“By the term impression I mean all our more lively perceptions when we see, hear, feel or love…”

Question 6

Hume Ideas Quote

Answer 6

“And impressions are distinguished from ideas, which are less lively perceptions, of which we are conscious, when we reflect of any of those sensations or movements above mentioned.”

Question 7

What example does Hume give to explain the distinction between impressions & ideas?

Answer 7

Being burnt

Question 8

What are outward impressions?

Answer 8

Direct sensory experience in the moment (e.g: pain)

Question 9

What are inward impressions?

Answer 9

Direct, immediate experience of emotions within us (e.g: love)

Question 10

What are simple ideas?

Answer 10

An idea deriving from a single impression that cannot be broken down into separate parts

Question 11

What are complex ideas?

Answer 11

Ideas that can be broken down into further distinguishable parts - explains imagination

Question 12

What can the imagination do?

4

Answer 12

• Compound (combine)
• Augment (enlarge)
• Diminish (shrink)
• Transpose (change positioning)

Question 13

Why is the imagination limited?

Answer 13

All four of its abilities need something to base it on - linked to copy principle

Question 14

What is the copy principle?

Answer 14

Hume’s foundation for empiricism - that the content of our mind is necessarily based on our experience of the world

Question 15

Copy Principle Quote

Answer 15

“All our ideas or more feeble perceptions, are copies of impressions or more lively ones”

Question 16

What is a meaningless concept?

Answer 16

An idea which cannot be traced back to an impression, an error

Question 17

What arguments does Hume use to support the copy principle?

Answer 17

• The idea of God
• If I don’t have the impression, I don’t have the idea

Question 18

Copy Principle:

Idea of God

Answer 18

• Created from the augmented qualities of intelligence, wisdom, power and goodness which are extended to infinite - all knowing, all loving, all powerful
• Justifies copy principle - although it initially seems to be far from the reality of our experience, it derives from impressions and therefore ideas

Question 19

Copy Principle:

What examples does Hume use to support his second argument?

3

Answer 19

• Malfunctioning Senses
• Absence of Relevant Experience
• Absence due to Species Limitation

Question 20

Copy Principle:

Malfunctioning Senses

Answer 20

• When the senses have malfunctioned
• e.g. a blind man cannot have an idea of colour unless his senses are restored

Question 21

Copy Principle:

Absence of Relevant Experience

Answer 21

• If someone has not had the experience then they won’t know exactly what it is like
• e.g. a laplander won’t know what wine tastes like due to not experiencing it

Question 22

Copy Principle:

Absence due to Species Limitation

Answer 22

• Sensations we don’t share with other animals we won’t understand
• e.g. using echolocation like bats do

Question 23

What is the missing shade of blue?

5

Answer 23

• Hume’s counter example to his theory of knowledge
• Imagine that an able bodied man who has had his eyesight for thirty years has seen all colours, including all of the shades of blue except for one shade
• He is presented with all of the shades of blue from lightest to darkest with a gap where the missing shade should be
• He will notice that there is a slight jump between the shades before and after the missing one
• He will be able to imagine the missing shade and create and idea of it in his mind, even though he hasn’t experienced it